After our trip to the RV dealer for some warranty work, we drove about 100 miles to the north east to the perfect rural spot to enjoy some peace and quiet, hiking, and some history all thrown in – James River State Park. The access road into the park is longish and is basically a single lane. It is fine for our big rig until you meet another vehicle coming the other way and they have to drive off onto the convenient grassy area. The park did have some large heavily wooded campsites with huge separation between campers.
This was quite refreshing after the last park was packed like sardines. We stayed there for 5 days and took in the hikes around the lakes, the hike up to the confluence of the Tye River and James Rivers. The beauty of God’s creation in nature. We also ventured into Appomattox, VA to tour the site where the Civil War ended. Earlier in our travels (May 2017) we toured Ft. Sumter in South Carolina where the first shot was fired to begin the war.
Keeping a very active sightseeing schedule combined with no park wifi, my blog posts are still about 3-4 weeks lagging real time. Oh well, retirement life can be so challenging!
Low Clearance Roads
Skipping ahead to when we left Washington DC to travel north in Pennsylvania. I also plan a day or two ahead of our next relocation. Using the Garmin RV 760LMT GPS, Google Maps, and a hard copy of Rand McNally’s road atlas. We were driving to Kutztown, PA which is in the Amish area, in east central PA, between Reading and Allentown.
My specialty RV GPS (about $600 new) was re-routing us over through Baltimore and Philly instead of the more direct route that Google Maps suggested. This routing would go through more large cities rather than the more rural drives that I prefer, so I opted the interstate route of I-83 to Harrisburg, PA, then I-81/78 east to Kutztown.
My GPS started going crazy on I-83 around York PA. Warning of low clearances and telling me to exit the highway. I thought the GPS was acting up because I was following semi trucks and I know they are at 13’6″ to 14’0″. Our camper is 13’3″ per the manufacturers specification. Well sure enough I started seeing large warning road signs for low bridges. What? On our US interstate system? Yes, I later researched and found many of our roads in the east, particularly in Pennsylvania are older and are not to the latest height expectation.
When I purchased and set up the special RV version of the Garmin GPS, I entered our height at 14’0″ to allow for any road repaving or other errors. The GPS was going nuts because that is what it is supposed to do.
As I kept going more bridge warnings were coming up. The next was stated at 13’3″. Again, this is on an interstate highway with trucks barreling along at speed. So, I exited at the next stop and called for some more information from the state police and state highway department. Some interesting conversation, but they were basically no help. They just said to watch the road signs. Really?
Back onto the road again. Still following semis at 60 mph. The next warning stated 13’0″. So, I veered over to the center of the highway to meet at the apex of the bridge. Talk about stressful! I had not even really thought about low bridges driving 2,500 miles around the southeast. And now each one of these low clearance signs would have me thinking what a bridge would do to our two A/C units on the roof. Would it be a clean shear or remove the entire roof? Ack!
At the next rest area, I stopped and really needed a strong drink. I was barely able to resist, but instead found a truck driver to ask about the roads and under passes. He said that I should be fine because he drives this route each week and thinks the road people add a large fudge factor to the road signs. Good grief!
I went back into the GPS set up and changed the rig height to 13’5″ to allow just 2″ of error. The GPS re-routing still continues, but to a much lessor extent. The truck and camper made it in fine shape to our destination. I was completely frazzled though. Took about a day to stop seeing those road signs appearing in front of me.
I will take the GPS warnings quite seriously now along with some cross-references. I bought a large format, laminated truckers atlas that has all the truck routes highlighted and has a section to note every low clearance in every state. So now in trip planning, I program the RV GPS, note the route it has selected, and then check each and every leg in the trucker’s atlas. Perhaps some overkill, but it make for some less stressful driving.
We are currently at Four Mile Creek State Park, right next to Niagara Falls. A blog update will be along soon for both our week in Washington D.C. and Niagara. Enjoy the photos!
