This particular adventure was too much to include in the previous post, but it occured in the middle of it.
The motorhome's black tank was full, but Dawndee wanted to wait until we were there to empty it so she could show us newbies how it's done. Abe drove to the RV park's dump station, and Dawndee hooked the hoses up, pulled the valve out for the black tank, then switched on the macerator that was installed to grind everything up in order to prevent clogs. We were able to see in the clear pipe as everything started moving. I had to look away a bit...Abe made comments on what she'd been eating. When we could see that nothing was going through, Dawndee pulled the gray water lever, but still, nothing flowed. There was a clog. After some time of trying, we gave up. The black tank was down to 2/3 full, and we could figure it out later. After reading about clogged black tanks and tips to keep them flowing, I ran some water in the toilet so it could slosh around in the black tank while we drove and hopefull get things moving again.
The next morning we left. We drove about a hundred miles before stopping at a Love's truck stop to use their dump tank. Abe went in and paid the $10 fee, then got to work. Once the hose was hooked to the tank and secured in the hole, he pulled open the black tank valve and we watched things flow. Now, watching your own excrement move is gross, but watching someone else's is an entirely different level of disgusting. That said, I've never been so happy to see poop flow through a hose in my life. I was proud of myself for putting water in the tank because it had worked. Until it stopped. Abe jiggled the hose. Nothing. He sprayed water in the black tank through the black tank flush out. Nothing. He emptied some water from the gray tank. Nothing. He couldn't do anything to get things moving, but we HAD to get the poop of a stranger out of our soon to be home.
I had the job of standing back and watching. And I will always live with the regret of not having my camera in my hands recording. I'm fortunate to be married to a very handy man. I don't believe there's anything he can't fix. And sure enough, he figured out what needed done. He was going to have to unhook the hose from the black tank so whatever was jammed in the macerator could run back out. He knew it would be a mess, but you gotta do what you gotta do. He closed the gray water tank valve and disconnected the hose.
I saw what was happening, but I had faith that Abe knew what he was doing and assumed that I was just missing something. I wasn't sure why he didn't close the black water valve, but I stood there silently, processing what I was seeing, when Abe untwisted the hose and let it fall. I stood there watching as a 4 inch cylinder of human excrement gushed straight down and splashed onto the blacktop! It took less than a second for Abe to realize what was happening, while I was still standing there thinking, "Why did Abe just dump poop all over the blacktop?" He stepped forward and slammed the valve shut, stopping the dark brown, lumpy waterfall almost as soon as it started.
That was the one and only part of our trip that we were both thanking God for the rain! We'd been unfortunate enough to be downwind from an RV getting it's tanks dumped the day before, and I've never smelled anything quite like it. If you've never had the pleasure, just know that the smell is pungent, foul, and STRONG. With the pile under our motorhome now, the stench would have been unbearable if it had been dry, but the rain that had us both drenched, also washed the smell away completely. The even better news was that once Abe got things reattached everything flowed smoothley. He sprayed at the soupy mixture of liquified and solid waste, washing it away the best he could. I felt awful leaving it there, but I'm sure it didn't take long for the rain to wash it away... We're going to try to find free places to dump whenever possible next year, but Love's deserved every penny of their $10 dump fee that day.
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