Day 20 - Solutions

Today had to be a work day.  First order of business was sorting out my external hard drive.  Turned out that a trip to Best Buy and a different cable was exactly what the doctor ordered.  Solution #1.

Second order of business - tires.  Yes - again with tires.  Since the second tire went down in Colorado, I've had this vibration that shows up the second I hit 63 mph.  Since we've not been on any interstates, doing 60 mph hasn't been much of an issue.  I also think slowing down yesterday saved us from running out of fuel and being abducted by aliens, but I really noticed the problem yesterday when we were stuck behind this oversize load in eastern NV doing 8.5 mph.  At that slow speed, I could actually see the trailer bouncing in my rear view mirror - almost like the tires on that side were oval instead of round.

So when we arrived here in Dayton yesterday, I noticed a tire shop across the street.  Stopped in to see him and he could take a look at them this afternoon.  That posed 2 issues: the camper had to be packed back up and re-attached to gigantibeast and we needed something for everyone to do while I waited.  After an exhaustive search we came to the conclusion that there's nothing for kids to really do in Carson City or Dayton.  And there's no pool and no playground at this campground, either.  It also hit 115 degrees here today...  I watched the water from the air conditioner drip off the roof where a puddle usually forms when we camp.  Today, within a second or two the drip spot was dry as a bone.  So I dropped everyone except Maribeth off at Bed Bath and Beyond and went to see what was wrong with these tires.

The owner of this tire shop is also a camper guy so he was very helpful with a number of things, but most importantly we learned that both tires on the driver's side had the same issue - the tread was separating from the tire.  Both had large bubbles and we came to the conclusion that these tires were definitely defective.  Since my spare was new from the Pennsylvania blowout, we threw that tire on, bought a new tire and for $15 he sold me a slightly used tire to use as a spare.  I'm breathing easier now...

When we shared with him that our next stop was Crescent City, CA, his eyes lit up.  It happened to be one of his favorite places and since he had just been there for the Fourth of July, he told us about construction on Rt 299 (our planned route) that would have made for a miserable trip.  Apparently, a landslide on one section of the road took out a number of switchbacks and the road is a mix of traffic jam, dirt and pavement.  Good info so Maribeth and I already worked out an alternate route with his help.


So while we missed out on swimming in Lake Tahoe today, I feel pretty relieved that a couple of problems have been solved and I've done what I can to make the remainder of the trip as safe as possible.  And Scarlett got some new curtains for her room!

Sunny and 115 degrees in Dayton, Nevada

So tomorrow we head to Crescent City, CA to see some really big trees!  I decided to check the weather there for the next few days...  We will go from 115 degrees today to a high of 59 degrees tomorrow.  You'd think we were traveling from Death Valley to Alaska.  See everyone tomorrow!