Days 212 & 213: Oak Flat Campground, AZ

Oak Flat Campground was only 29 miles from the casino, so we took our time getting moving in the morning.  That put us through Globe about the time that businesses were opening up.  It was a bigger town than I imagined it would be, and it happened to have a Ford dealer.  So we stopped in and inquired about getting our battery replaced.  They told us to come back at 1 pm, so we headed off for the campground.

We are in mining country - a large open pit mine near Globe.

This was one stretch of road that our Adventure Cycling maps warns us about, as parts of it have no shoulders and lots of mining traffic.  But there is a lot of construction in progress right now, so it seems a good part of the mine traffic has opted to use a different route.  The construction was a good thing for us, as large stretches of the highway have been widened with large shoulders, and the construction on those stretches was close to being wrapped up.  So I made good time getting up and over the pass.

We camped at Oak Flat Campground (Free, no water, pit toilets), where there is a group advocating Save Oak Flat.  We aren't sure what that is about, since we rarely see anyone outside of the tents.  But given the amount of mining activity here, we suspect there are plans to expand mining in the area.  There are also a few other campers using the campground, most of whom appear to be boondockers.  They seem reluctant to make eye contact with us, but they seem to be good neighbors.

Once we had unhitched, I returned to Globe to get the battery replaced at McSpadden Ford.  The battery is barely visible, tucked deep in the engine compartment under the dashboard.  I was expecting to pay for at least an hour and a half in labor, plus an overpriced Ford battery.  Instead, since the battery was only 15 months old, it was replaced for free under warranty.  

They also changed the interval where the parking lights come on when any door is open to the shortest time available: 20 seconds.  That was likely the main culprit in wearing the battery out so soon (since we are in and out of the van a lot), coupled with using our emergency flashers quite a bit when parked along side the highway.  So we've learned a few things.  First, when we are camped, but not unhitched, we will disconnect the camper's 7-pin plug.  That keeps the van from also lighting up the side marker and rear lights on the camper when a van door is open.  Second, we will only use the emergency flashers when we are parked fairly close to the road.  Third, when we are setting up and breaking camp, we will leave one door open.  That way, after 20 seconds the lights will go off and stay off as we open and close other doors.  With these simple changes we hope to get much farther down the road with this new battery.

A jeep track that goes through Oak Flat.

Since we were able to get the battery fixed, we opted to stay a second night at Oak Flat, as originally we were planning to spend an extra night near Apache Junction to get that done, and to get the wheel bearings repacked and brakes checked on the camper.  Now we'll only need to spend one night there to get the camper worked on, so that saves us $30 in camping fees.