August 29, 2012

Mammoth Springs Campground, Yellowstone National Park

We attended the Ranger presentation last night.  The topic was about the wild life in Yellowstone.  It was very informative and entertaining.  This morning Monte woke me up at 6:30.  He said look outside the window.  There was a herd of elk munching away right outside our rig. 

 We grabbed our jackets and quietly slipped outside and began taking photos and video.  It was amazing.  We stood on our picnic table for quite some time just watching these beautiful creatures.  Shortly after we went inside I heard a bugle like noise so Monte and I grabbed our cameras and again went outside to see what was making that noise.  We didn’t have to wait long before we spotted a bull elk maybe 20 feet away from our campsite.  We stood very still as we clicked away.

 

We were so excited to the bull elk because just the night before the Ranger had told us that it is very rare to see bull elk. 

We eagerly awaited 8am when generator use was allowed.  We had bought a generator on August 16 in Elkhart but hadn’t had a need to use it until today.  Monte added the oil and gas and fired it up.  I was able to make coffee, charge my phone and laptop and even plug in my waffle maker to make waffles for breakfast.

We had planned on just having a relaxing day but it didn’t end up that way.  After about three hours of running the generator, it died.  Monte is very mechanically inclined but he couldn’t figure out what was wrong with it.  We called the place we bought it in Elkhart and were pretty much told that it was our problem. 

Monte then called Dometic, the maker of the generator.  He was number 12 in line for customer service.  When he finally talked to someone he was given a few telephone numbers of generator repair places.  The closest one was located in Bozeman around 85 miles away.  Monte called all the numbers and was told by each one that they do not service generators.

He tried calling Dometic again and was on hold for 20 minutes before finally talking to another customer service agent named Rhonda.  She said she would have to put us on hold while she looked up other repair places.  We were on hold for another 10 minutes.  Just as she was getting back to us we got cut off.  Monte called back and left a message with his phone number asking her to call right back..  She never did.  I am not impressed with the customer service at Dometic.  They apparently do not care about their customers!

To make my day even brighter I had a comment on my blog from a stranger taking me to task about an entry I made when we were in Elkhart, IN.  On the morning we were scheduled to go into Mor/Ryde for service to our rig we had to first go to a campground a few miles away to dump our tanks as Mor/Ryde does not have the facilities for dumping.  We had called the campground for directions and when we got there the office was still closed.  We rang the bell and an upstairs window opened up and we heard a voice instructing us to put $12 in the slot and then proceed to the dump station.  Monte only had ten dollar bills so he put a ten dollar bill in the slot and we went on to the dump station. 

According to the gentleman who commented on my accounting of this incident he was appalled by our actions.  It seems we are criminals and are going to give campers a bad name because we short-changed the campground $2.00.  I know I shouldn’t let what a stranger thinks about me affect me but it did.  I am a good person and try to always do the right thing.   

Getting back on track—I called Visa to find out what recourse we had since we were not getting any satisfaction from the merchant we purchased the generator from nor the manufacturer.  I was told I could dispute the charge.  The service rep gave me instructions on how to accomplish the dispute.  We decided to take a ride into Bozeman to see what our options might be as far as possibly buying a new generator.  On the road leading to Livingston we saw a large cloud of smoke and as we got closer we realized it was a fire.  There were planes circling the fire.  I think they might have been dropping water on the blaze.

In Bozeman we went to Home Depot and Lowes.  Their generators are too large.  Someone suggested Ace Hardware.  They carry Honda generators for around the same price as Camping World.  We decided to hold off buying anything else until we see how the dispute with Visa pans out.  We took advantage of being in Bozeman by stocking up on groceries at Walmart.  On our return trip we passed the fire again and were amazed by how much it had spread in just a couple of hours.