(Mid June, 2019) From Trindad, California, we moved on up the coast just a short distance on highway US-101 to Brookings, Oregon. It was a lovely day for a drive, with clear skies at first, then light fog and mist to add interest to the scenery along the way.

Arriving in Brookings, we checked into the Beachfront RV Park for a seven-night stay. The RV park was very basic and utilitarian, with few amenities and little charm, however, it had a great location – right on the beach at the mouth of the Chetco River.

This proved to be a nice park and we enjoyed our stay. It made for a great base to explore around the Brookings area. The park had easy access to the sandy beach where Jasmine and Pepper enjoyed a romp and swim almost every day. At night, we enjoyed the sound of waves crashing on the beach and of bells on distant buoys.

Slide-Out Headaches

While in Brookings, we took the time to investigate an issue with the kitchen/living room slide-out on our fifth-wheel. We had noticed on our last few stops that the slide-out was not closing completely when retracted – and the problem was getting worse. It seemed that one corner of the slide room was starting to jamb up and torqueing the room – leaving one side incompletely retracted.

We found a mobile RV tech in Brookings – Bob, from Red Cap RV Service & Repair – who could come out and take a look. The news was fairly bad. A side of the hydraulic slide room was binding and the torque was causing support brackets to bend, the support beam to twist, and carriage bolts to begin pulling through the slide floor. The brackets and bolts were nearing a failure point which could prevent us from retracting the room at all!

After straightening and reinforcing the support brackets, Bob & his helper managed to retract the slide room almost fully, at which point we turned off the hydraulics for that slide to leave it in place. We would need to live with half our living room space until we could get the unit repaired. Bob gave us a few recommendations of area RV repair shops and we called around until we found a shop in Medford – Triple A RV Center – who could get us in fairly quickly to inspect, diagnose and start the insurance & repair process. (Bob & Red Cap RV Service – great job and thanks for the timely response!)

Once we had our appointment with Triple A, we decided to extend our stay in Brookings until the day before our servicing. Beachfront RV was able to accommodate us for the four extra nights – the staff was very helpful and patient with the process.

We also booked several nights at a pet-friendly hotel in Medford while our trailer was in the shop. The plan was to arrive the day before the appointment, park the trailer overnight, and drop it off at the service center first thing in the morning.

This whole process took nearly a week before we could really settle in and start to enjoy our time in Brookings.

Around Brookings

The rest of our time in Brookings was spent enjoying the beach with our pups, dining out at several places around town, and taking scenic drives around the area.

One day we took a drive up the coast to Gold Beach – enjoying a favorite section of the coast, Pistol River, along the way. As we returned, highway US-101 had been closed due to a bad accident blocking both lanes of the highway. Two logging trucks had collided head-on. The drivers were unharmed and walked away, but a load of logs had spilled and blocked the coast highway. Traffic was diverted inland on a narrow, steep, windy mountain road through the coastal hills. Quite a scenic detour, but not fun for all the semi-trucks and RVs on the ill-suited road!

Onward to Medford

When our time was up at Brookings, we backtracked to Crescent City and took highways CA-197 and US-199 through Grant’s Pass, then interstate I-5 to Medford, Oregon – total distance, about 123 miles. Highways CA-197 and US-199 were very scenic – winding through coast Redwood forests and through a rocky river canyon piercing the coastal mountain range.

The drive went well and we parked the trailer overnight at a travel center across the street from our hotel. I dropped the trailer off at Triple A in the morning and was able to pick it up by late afternoon. Triple A confirmed the slide room diagnosis, gave us an estimate for parts and labor, ordered parts, and we started the insurance claim process. Whew!

After one more night in Medford we headed back to the coast – next stop, Bandon…

Photos

That’s all for now. Safe travels and enjoy the journey.