Transmissions, heading south and an Elvis sighting

Well, the end of 2016 ended with a bang. On the way to Sioux Falls, we had a warning light come on in our car. We scheduled a time to get it in as soon as was possible. Result? A blown transmission, in a car that was barely a year old. Since repairing it cost more than a new transmission, we opted for the new one. However, Chevrolet/GM said they would not cover it because we did not use proper techniques in towing the car. We are in dispute with Chevrolet over this. The rules in the manual are very loose, with phrases saying you "should" do this, not you must. Since we're out about $4K, we hope that they will cover at least part of the bill. We will see.

We headed for Memphis for New Year's Eve. While driving the car we smelled a burning smell that we had smelled at other times. (This was with the new transmission.) So we left the car in Memphis to get it checked out and make sure nothing was wrong. That necessitated a rental car so we would have one in Red Bay. Yes, it was back to the Tiffin service center again. This time we were only there a week.We still have times when we smell the burning smell. It's not the brakes, but we haven't figured out the cause yet.

During our scheduled service on our Freightliner chassis, the tech noticed that we had an oil leak in the engine that wasn't normal, and should be checked out. Great. Now we have to schedule service at a Cummins dealer. We tried one in Albany, GA but they didn't have the right equipment. So onto Florida we went.

This is our home for the next couple of months. This park is a mixture of homes and RV's. There are lots of activities here. I started taking a water aerobics class which I really like. 

We had not expected to see sand hill cranes walking around the park. You can get quite close to them.

Their heads are quite distinctive with the red coloring. 

We knew that we wanted to take in the Tampa RV Show, one of the largest there is. So we scheduled service at the Cummins dealer in Tampa and set off to take in the show. There were lots of vendors there. As usual, we found a few things that had been on our shopping list, like a clothesline to hang on the back of the RV, and a desk for me.:) Here's a picture:

One night we were trying to find a restaurant in Tampa. We missed the corner it was on and traffic was heavy so we looked for another restaurant to go to that was nearby. We ended up at Nicko's, which is a neighborhood diner. And look who showed up!

This is a fun place! Nicko (the owner) is a character and was going around entertaining people with tricks. He even went around with a burning wallet saying his wife "burns through all his money." We hadn't expected to be entertained so it was a pleasant surprise. 

The repair took a bit longer that we had anticipated. We're now back at Red Oaks and settled in again. Florida is expecting bad weather this afternoon, so we are hunkered down for the day. 60 mph + winds are predicted so we may end up pulling the slides in. Turns out even sunny Florida can have severe weather like any other place!