Day 579

Today started out well.  We were up at 7 and on the road by 7:50.  Then things went to SHIT.

About half a mile up the freeway someone passing us honked and pointed at one of the trailer wheels.  It was smoking.  I stopped, looked at it, and decided we could make it half a mile to the next exit where there was a Lowe's.  We pulled in there.  I called John and asked him to come over.

There was good news.  The failure happened in civilization between the only exits separated by only a mile.  Also it was just before a one lane 15 mile long construction zone.  Finally, there was an RV parking area at the Lowe's.

As I parked the wheel was hanging at an angle like the axle was broken.  When John got there he said he thought the wheel nut had come off.  We called Good Sam and after a circus involving their voicemail and correcting the wrong exit number they called someone.  After a 20 minute wait they called back saying the repair service needed to get our address directly from us.  Ten minutes later the service called and they sent a truck.

John went to get his trailer and the truck got there half an hour later.  When he jacked up the trailer the wheel fell off.  He took things apart and determined that one of the bearings had disintegrated.  Fortunately it had only slightly damaged the axle (more good news).  It had also killed the brake.  The repair guy left with the wheel and hub which needed to be repaired in the shop.

We sat for an hour and a half with no word on whether or not it was fixable.  The repair guy finally called a little after noon to say that it was, but we needed a new brake and hub (more good news).  He said he'd get back to us after lunch.

The repair guy got back to us after 2 and had everything repaired by a little before 3.  We'd been sitting at Lowe's for 7 hours (bad news).  Before I left Brigham City I drove in, found a NAPA, and bought a grease gun and grease.  I squirted grease into the other three wheels.  We finally got back going north on I15 about 3:30.  That was the end of the good news.

As soon as we got on the freeway there was a short traffic jam at the start of a one lane constructions zone.  We drove 15 miles on a very rough shoulder.

After that it was smooth driving, but we couldn't find a place to stay.  We finally ended up at a park about 10 miles south of Twin Falls.  The whole detour to get to it and back to I84 is about 40 miles.  To top things off there was an accident on the exit road that we had to wait for.

The shit continued.  We got to the park a little after 6.  They assigned us a spot and we drove to it.  Some asshole had parked his truck in the spot.  I had to exit the park, drive around, and reenter the park.  We got another space.

The evening was a late dinner and some surfing and reading.