The day we left Spokane, we encountered an unexpected delay. The chassis battery in the motorhome was dead! Actually, it has two batteries for the engine/chassis. I jump started it with the Suburban, which seemed like a guppy resuscitating a whale. We got down the mountain and started out of town, and got a check engine light. I pulled in a truck stop, and shut down the engine. Partly to see if the battery had charged enough to start the engine, and partly to see if the stop/start would reset the check engine light. Nope to both answers. With the diesel generator I was able to start the motorhome, but it was obvious the batteries were toast. Right next door to the truck stop was a Freightliner service shop! We drove over there, bought two new batteries, and changed them in the parking lot. Now it started like a champ!
But it would still light up the check engine light. Sigh. The manual for the chassis just said the light meant schedule service, and not an immediate stop moving. All the gauges were in normal ranges. The diagnostic readout said no current codes. Sigh again. We drove on to our next stop; Cashmere, Washington. (The geographic center of the state.) As we drove, I felt the power was significantly reduced.
One thing I had noticed is that the gauge that tells me when to replace the engine’s air filter was getting close to the red line. Closer than I’ve let it get before. Could it be that it was clogged, starving the engine of air, and that also triggered the engine’s computer to complain? Well, it was worth a try, and I drove to Yakima (a bit under 2 hours) to get a new one. I had it replaced in about an hour the next morning. We took the rig for a test drive, and it drove like new!… for about 3 minutes. Then the light came on again, and the power instantly was degraded again. Sigh3.
So I called the Service place in Yakima, and could get an appointment for Thursday morning. That gave us all day Wednesday to tour Cashmere, instead of the 3 or 4 days we’d planned.
The campsite was pretty enough, especially if you count the beautiful skies.
Cashmere is the home of “Aplets & Cotlets.” These are candies I remember from when I was a kid – haven’t seen them much lately. They are made at a little factory shown in the picture below.
It’s kind of a nice story – A couple of Armenian men, immigrating from Turkey, settled in Seattle, and started a yogurt factory and Armenian restaurant. They were a bit ahead of their time… neither endeavor prospered, and they decided to relocate, ending up in Cashmere. They bought an apple farm and named it “Liberty Orchards” in honor of their new home.
1918 was a tough time for orchardists… lots of apples, but not much market. Transportation was not easy, and tons of apples went unused. Dehydration seemed a good answer, and the preserved apples helped not only local growers, but our “Boys over there” in wartime. That proved so successful that they opened a cannery.
By 1920 they decided to try and create a fruit candy like they’d had in “the old country.” After much research and development they came up with the “Aplet.” It was a big hit, and after a while they came out with an apricot version, cleverly named “Cotlets.” They still make these and more flavors here in Cashmere, the little town at the center of Washington.
The kitchens have advanced a bit… we toured near the end of the work day, so we only saw them clean up (by pouring boiling water all over the floors.)
The mixture is cooked in these large pots, then poured into plastic lined trays, about an inch deep and 2 feet wide and 3 feet long. The stuff sets somewhat like Jello.
Then this rubbery sheet is placed on a conveyer, covered with corn starch, and run into a large knife machine that cuts them into little rectangles. The corn starch was just used to keep the knives from gumming up, and it is now removed and replaced by powdered sugar.
Then the little rectangles are hand placed in boxes. There is a row of ladies placing candies in boxes as the line moves along… Anyone else think of the famous Lucy clip? Click here to see that classic from long ago! [You may get a few seconds of ads… feel free to skip them!]
Someone puts the lids on the filled boxes, then they go through this wrapping machine.
Finally, the finished boxes are stacked on pallets and out the door they go!
Below is a 44 second video showing the packaging of the Aplets… not near as funny as Lucy.
Cashmere is known for some interesting architecture, mostly Craftsman style homes. Here is a sampling of some cute buildings, and a church or two.
The Aplet & Cotlet factory parking lot has just been resurfaced. I saw this gal painting the handicapped marker, and complimented her work. Always fun to make folks smile!
Our last night in Cashmere was very pretty too!
We drove to Yakima Wednesday afternoon, and parked in the lot of the repair place so we could start early Thursday morning.
While the motorhome was getting evaluated and hopefully fixed, we toured Yakima. A nice bike trail winds along the Yakima River, and we rode a ways through the Arboretum and Botanical Gardens.
They have a boxcar (in a cage) from the Merci Train. In 1947 the Freedom Train started from Los Angeles, and headed for New York. It was hoped that 80 boxcars could be filled with donated food and clothing as a gift to war-torn France and Italy. It ended up with over 700 cars, equalling over $40 million!
In 1949 France and Italy reciprocated by sending the Merci Train to the states… 49 “Forty and Eight” boxcars full of various “Thank You Treasures.” The boxcars had been used in the war, and were called Forty and Eight because they could hold 40 soldiers or 8 horses.
Fairly soon after we ran out of energy exploring Yakima, our motorhome was ready. It turned out to be a crankcase ventilation system that wasn’t performing as well as the computer though it should. Parts were available and got installed.
It was far too late by then to set out for Hoquiam River, where we’d planned on arriving that day, so we found a campground near Yakima for the night. The great news was that the motorhome was running really well, with no warning lights and full power!
Friday morning we set out for Hoquiam River. We made the whole trip with no engine computer alarms!
We stayed in this campground last year. It just worked out to be in the right place as we attempt to see more of the Pacific North West. It was fun to be here again, and walk in the beautiful forest pathways which are part of the camp.
We saw this gal in the campground unloading lots of crates of… what? So being as shy as I am, I asked her. They are Chanterelle Mushrooms. Very interesting. And hard to find elsewhere, making these valuable. She gave us a bunch of them. We added them to a potato/egg scramble, and they were good! I’m not sure I’d rush out to buy a bunch more…
The campsite near the river is really very nice. I couldn’t help photographing the walkways, even though I took essentially the same shots last year.
A railroad track leads to what used to be wharf on the river. I’m supposing trains unloaded logs here. Now the tracks have been taken over by the forest.
It’s views like this that make the PNW fun to visit!
