West Virginia, ATVs and Poopcicles

This adventure started on a Thursday and we were looking forward to a long camping weekend. Our destination this time, Buffalo Trail in Bluefield, WV.  Our group is 12 strong, we are the only RV campers in the group, the rest of the gang is holing up in various cabins across the property. One really cool feature, a restaurant on-site that has food and drink, I will get to that later.The highlight of our trip was to be our Friday rental of a 4 seat Polaris ATV from West Virginia ATV Rentals and taking it out on the Hatfield and McCoy trails around the area.

Some of you may remember on our last big trip on 2017 we had a tire blowout. I was determined to not experience this again so I purchased a Tire Pressure Monitor System (TPMS) . If I'm being honest with myself I probably didn't check them often enough. Armed with new Goodyear tires and my new TPMS I planned to stave off the tire blowout gods. Setup of the TPMS was fairly easy, take off the old caps, twist on hex nuts then the new caps (with wireless sensors) and back the hex nuts up with the wrench to keep them secure and then plug in the display inside the car. Some easy setup for max and min for both pressure and temps and off you go. Don't forget to match up the tops with the proper tires. I was really impressed with this and probably should have gotten it when I bought the trailer but hey, I have it now so I'm good to go.

Loading up in front of our house

We left pretty early on Thursday. The resort staff recommended we get there early (well before 4 pm) so we would not have to deal with the restaurant crowd while trying to park and setup the RV.  We have packing down to a science with almost everything we need already on the coach so all we are really putting in is our clothes, food and drinks. We picked up the RV from the storage place around 6:30 AM and parked it in front of our house for loading. We were on our way by about 8:30 AM. The trip up was about 3 hours and even though I could have made it on one tank of gas I filled up on the interstate before arriving in case gas was tough to find in our destination area.

See how close the pads are to each other?

Turns out Bluefield is a decently sized town and has most of the regular suburbia stuff. Leaving the interstate and driving the 10 miles to the resort was easy. The signage was very good and we turned right in to Buffalo Trails. Pulling up the hill you pass the restaurant on the right and straight ahead are 5 RV pads. Each is about 10 feet wide by about 50 feet deep. They each have another 10 feet of "grass", a picnic table, fire ring and services box (50 AMP, water and sewer). After seeing where the RVs were parked, I am SO Glad that we left when we did. As it turns out we were all setup well before the crowds came in.

We had some issues with setup. I parked the rig too far forward and had to use both my sewer hoses hooked together and an extension cord for my 30 amp connection, also my 50 foot drinking water hose. If I had pulled all the way back I would not have needed the extra (this is an important note for later). The power breaker kept flipping on our hookup so the on-site guy worked with it for awhile and was able to fix it and he was very friendly through it all. The area in front of our camper was very muddy so he also got us a couple bales of hay and spread it for us. This helped a lot but we left our front mat there when we left as it was soaked through and we just didn't want to deal with it. No big deal, cheap to replace. We checked out the bath houses which were good, nice tile and fairly clean. 8 individual unisex rooms with a toilet, sink, shower and locking door. There was also a free ice machine here but it was broken (the bar gave us ice when we asked) and there was a woodshed with free wood which we took but never used, honestly our fire pit was very small and in the back near the sewer line, not much fun there.

One of the group's ride, I was chauffeured in this...

where the buffalo roam

Once we were all setup it was time to meet the rest of the gang at their place, not far from our campsite. I had injured my foot earlier in the week so I was picked up in a side-by-side and this was my first experience in one of the vehicles. Very cool ride and lots of torque. I asked a lot of questions of Cason, my driver (the son of one of our friends) and he answered them all and was very excited for me to get one of my own the next day, as was I. The setup where the rest of the group was located was awesome, nice large cabin with 1.5 baths, a very large fire pit next to the cabin and a beautiful view of the fields and the buffalo.


I hobbled over to where the buffalo were hanging out and was in awe of their size. A very large fence separated us and for that I was glad! There was a large bull hanging out with them and also some ducks. Ultimately this is what made me order the 1 lb buffalo burger later at the restaurant, but I digress. We hung out by the first until our 6:30 pm dinner reservation at the restaurant located on the property. This place is rustic, warm and inviting. They had a setup for on the outside area which was well insulated and warmed by several wood stoves that were stoked and cranking. The menu was very diverse with lots of options for everyone. We had appetizers of cheesy chipotle bursts (they were ok), hatfield cheese fries (these were a big hit) and fried pickles (my 2nd favorite after the fries). My dinner, as I mentioned above, was a delicious 1 lb bison patty which was delicious, lean and gigantic, I barely finished it! A few photos from our dinner at the restaurant.

My lovely wife Suzi

My youngest son Jake

The 1 lb Bison Patty

The gang of girls! I was the only adult male :-)

After dinner we said our goodbyes till tomorrow and the trails. I was pretty exhausted from driving and setting up and still nursing a bad foot. We settled in to the camper and watched Twilight Zone, the Movie, from the 80's. The boys enjoyed it and I did as well as I really didn't remember a couple of the stories, Akroyd was awesome in it as was Burgess Meredith as the narrator, remember his original episode with the books?

A couple of hours into our day, we came back for goggles.

Friday couldn't come soon enough. We left our camper around 8:30 am for the drive up the mountain to the ATV rental shop. As we drove up the mountain the temperatures dropped and the views became more and more breathtaking. Rick, the owner of WV ATV Rentals was so amazingly helpful and friendly I cannot recommend his place enough. He explained everything perfectly, was available for us the entire time we were out and even gave us a guided tour down his private path to another trail head! A couple of hours into our riding we realized that goggles were completely necessary and needed so we went back up to Rick's place to buy a couple pair. I was fortunate that I brought my motorcycle helmet which had a full face shield, it worked really well except for when we went through one large puddle that splashed us like we were on a flume ride at disneyworld! I had to slam the breaks to raise my shield in order to see, crazy stuff.

We spent a lot of time on the trails. The polaris handled amazingly well and I quickly acclimated to the driving conditions. I really feel as if my time on my sport bike all those years paid off. There were a couple of times where I might have scared my passengers so for that, I do apologize but I felt in full control the entire time as I knew the cargo I was carrying (my family) was precious and I did not need to be stupid. They rate the trails like ski slopes, we stayed on greens and blues the entire day although we passed lots of trails rated black or red/black which I assume were terrifying.

One of the really fun stops we made was in a mud pit area that was big enough to get plenty of speed and tear through and even grab a bit of air. Jake hopped in with Pam in her 2 seat vehicle and had a blast for about 10 minutes getting really muddy and jumping a few times. Here's a short clip of Jake and Pam at the mud pit. The smile on that kid's face when he got out of the car is something I will remember for a long, long time. Thanks Pam for taking him on a ride he will never forget! After some time in the mud pit we hit a few more trails and it was time to say goodbye. But not after we had to give our vehicles a good power wash!

A good shot of almost all the vehicles

Jake after his killer ride!

After the powerwash session we headed back to the resort for winding down. And we all needed showers. This was a bit of a disappointment but I understand. Remember earlier how I had mentioned that bathhouses were nice? Well after probably 50-100 people come back from all day on the trail, it can be difficult for the staff to keep up with their cleanliness so as such, Suzi and Jake had a less than stellar experience there, they said it was nasty actually. When they came back, their recommendation was for me to shower in the camper, I was glad that I did. After clean up it was time for dinner which was a great soup (white chili) that Suzi had made before we left, I also grilled some hot dogs for the boys and then we all crashed hard as we were exhausted from the day's activities. 

Saturday we had planned as a do nothing day, a present to ourselves really and we played it like a fiddle. It started with a great camping breakfast of bacon and eggs and ended with a movie marathon. In between was a visit to the restaurant again for drinks, chicken tenders and chocolate cake (all outstanding I might add). The friendly staff here I cannot say enough about, these folks really do care about their customers and it shows! As the day wound down I started to consider the incoming weather, snow had started to fall and the temperatures were dropping quickly.

Bacon Bacon Bacon

Chicken Fingers for the boys

Yep, snow in April!

Alright, so let's get to the meat of the situation. It's dropping fast (the temps) snow is coming down and we're in a camper. Things to think about... (probably not an exhaustive list)

1. Ice accumulation on the awning
2. Freezing water line
3. Freezing sewer line
4. Propane reserves to run the heat
5. Getting things out of the elements so they are not soaked in the morning
6. Potential power outage
7. Road accumulation and when we be able to leave

Ok, so probably not everything but enough to slightly start stressing about. I decided that emptying the tanks ahead of time was a good idea so I did that. I also decided to leave the water faucet in the camper dripping so the water line would not freeze. We had an electric space heater to backup the propane heat if needed. I cleared off the awning after it snowed and we were good there. I also got most of the stuff either in the truck or under the awning. So, all good, right?

Cue up 3 am, I have to pee, I get up, walk into the camper bathroom and relieve myself, hit the peddle to flush and no water comes out. Turn the faucet on in the bathroom, nothing. Oh no, frozen water line. I put my clothes on, go outside and unhook the water line from the camper and then hook up a backup water line I happened to have (Thanks Dad!) and get water running in to flush the toilet and fill up a jug. I unhook the water line that I just used, put it in a bucket and Suzi puts it inside to keep it warm so we can use it in the morning. All good, back to bed. Side note, damn it was cold out there, real feel said 10.

Fast forward to morning hours, we're all sleeping hard, we wake up and decide biscuits are in order. Someone had mentioned Tudor's Biscuit World and it did not disappoint. Really close to the campground and all it took was a little warmup of the truck and some ice removal to get me going. I was back gassed up and with food and we all had a nice breakfast. Time to start thinking about breaking camp.

First order of business, dump the tanks. Pull the black tank valve and it starts going but then stops. Uh Oh! I notice that my nice angle of hose now has a dip in it about 2 feet from the sewer intake. I have a sewer connector that is an elbow because literally all of the sewer hookups I've seen up till now have been flush with the ground or slightly raised. This one is sideways going into the box for the utilities so it created this dip. Remember i've extended 2 hoses because of my earlier mistake of not backing in far enough. As I work my way down the sewer hose I realize that it is frozen solid and/or very slushy about halfway down. Crap! Or should I say Poopcicle anyone?

Now what? I'm nervous as hell about the hose breaking due to the stress of the weight and ice inside of it so I'm gently manipulating it, really coaxing it down the sewer pipe by talking nicely and caressing it. It's moving some but not nearly enough. I try a couple of different movements and even open the valve again to try to get some movement going but nothing. It's jammed up at the elbow. As far as I can tell it's solid ice there. My first idea is wait it out but that could take hours. I finally settle on getting the space heater out and trying to melt the poopcicle into submission. I set this up for 15-20 minutes but still no real luck. Remember the dip I mentioned earlier? Well, this is what I try next. I very carefully (with my rubber gloves on) remove the hose from the elbow connection being very careful to hold it up high enough so i'm not dumping poop ice everywhere, I'm lucky at this point it is working. Suzi gets the last bit of hot water she can coax out of the system with little or no pressure and we pour it down the elbow to try to melt the blockage, it moves! I get movement going and am able to empty and back wash the tanks and put everything away. The hoses are still frozen so we end up putting them in the bathroom to melt while we drive home. After it was all said and done my pack up and leave time was around 3 hours, certainly my worst ever but no real disaster just lessons learned.

So, what are these lessons learned?

1. Always have a plan, I really didn't
2. Disconnect sewer hose when temps are dropping to below freezing, let the tanks fill up (put a bit of antifreeze in there if you like) and dump the next day 
3. Disconnect water lines and put hoses in a warm place, fill up your fresh water tanks and use your RV's water pump for water supply when it is freezing. My theory is that it will take a lot longer for a 40 gallon tank of water to freeze than a little thin hose
4. Alternative plan, buy a heated hose

This was an amazing weekend and this is what we bought an RV for. To spend time with friends and family in different places doing things that we never thought of doing. I think we checked all of the boxes. I also think I'm a more educated camper now and will be ready the next time we hit cold weather. Thanks for reading and see you next time. Leave your comments below and tell your friends to stop by and check the place out.