875 Miles so Far and Still have the Same Tires we Started With!!

Another uneventful day mechanically...the trailer's really pulling nice..even the couple times I got it up to 75mph (I normally keep it between 60-65 mph while pulling the trailer). Speaking of speed, would you believe that Utah is testing areas of the state where drivers can legally run 80mph? Well, believe it! Here's a picture I took today on I-15 south of Nephi UT. Once I saw the speed limit sign, I thought everybody would be flying down the road past us, but, amazingly, most of them were traveling around 70-75mph.

Our morning didn't start out on the freeway. Before we hit the road today, we ran into town in Beaver UT and visited the "Dairy Farmers of America" Cheese Outlet. It was kinda like walking through Costco, only all of their samples were in the same place. It didn't take us long to decide on our favorites..mine, Jalapeno Cheddar and Linda's was Gouda. We each bought a package of cheese and it was back on the road.

An interesting bit of trivia about Beaver UT...it's the hometown of Butch Cassidy....of Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid. We thought this was interesting because our friends Jerry WY6JB and his wife Pat are from Sundance WY...named after the "Sundance Kid"..and we'll be in Sundance WY visiting Jerry and Pat next week. Also of fame from Beaver UT was Philo T. Farnsworth who was the inventor of several electronic devices including the CRT or Cathode Ray Tube which came with his invention of the television in the '50's.

We ran I-15 to Salt Lake City, then hung a right and took I-80 into Wyoming and stopped at Little America WY for the night. Tomorrow's travels will take us off the interstate. We'll cut north from Rawlins WY on the Oregon Trail and enjoy the scenic bearty of Wyomings back country. Our travels tomorrow will end in Casper WY. We should be in Casper fairly early and will have time to fire up the grill and enjoy a relaxing evening.

 

Until next time..73, and happy trails....

We're almost half way there

Linda and I have made it almost half way to South Dakota without a single mechanical incident!! and still have the same tires on the trailer we started out with. The modification we did on our trailer has really worked out well...and did an awful lot to smooth out the ride of the trailer. 

Sunday morning, we pulled out of El Cajon around 5:30am. We had a good trip through the desert..clear skies and temps that didn't go past the upper 80's. After we checked in to the Family Camp at Nellis Air Force Base in North Las Vegas, we spend a couple hours sanitizing and flushing our Fresh water tank. Now we can drink the water from our faucet...the water in the tank is no longer "green" from algae. 

Back on the road this morning, we ran north out of Nevada into the northwest corner of Arizona and into Utah. Linda's favorite show is "The Bachelorette" and it was on ABC this evening. My job was to make sure she was able to watch it. We stopped at an RV Park in Cedar City UT with thoughts of spending the night...they had "cable", but even with our "Good Sam Club" discoung, they wanted $36.00 for the night. We made a hasty retreat and got back on the road. Fifty miles or so...and over a few mountains, we pulled in to a Flying J truck stop in "Beaver, Utah" around 5:00pm. On with the inverter and TV, up with the antenna, and we found 27 digital TV stations. ABC was one of them..I successfully completed my task and made Linda very happy. We were able to sit outside before the Bachelorette came on and enjoy the view of the mountains. We're at about 5,500' in elevation here. Before it got dark, it was pretty warm, but after the sun went down, it cooled off pretty quickly.

In he morning we'll run a few blocks down the road to the "American Dairy Farmers" cheese outlet and take a tour. We're looking forward to free samples. Who knows, we may have to grab a thing or two to munch on.

Don't know how far we'll go tomorrow, but we'll end up somewhere in Wyoming. We decided that even though getting to South Dakota and getting into the VA system is a priority, we're going to take our time and enjoy the trip.

Until next time...73,

Good but busy month and a half in El Cajon

The day to get back on the road has finally come. We'll be rolling out of here, north to Hot Springs South Dakota before the roosters crow in the morning. Kori, Jamie and the boys (daughter, son-in-law and grand kids) dropped by yesterday. Was so good to see them before we leave for the summer. We're gonna miss them, all of our San Diego area friends, and especially Virgil and Ruth who we've spent the last month and a half with.  

 

We've gotten so much accomplished while we've been here...and Virgil and I have both learned a thing or two about wood work. A day or two after we arrived in El Cajon, Linda and I began a remodel job on our trailer. We ripped out the couch, table, benches and carpet, so we could build new work stations for each of us. With Virgil's knowledge of wood work...and his woodshop, I was able with his assistance, to design, manufacture and install Linda's sewing table/work station as well as my radio shack/computer station. The entire job was completed using only two sheets of 1/2" Birch plywood, a bunch of screws, every "L" bracket in town, less than a quart of stain and a quart of polyurethane. In the next few weeks, we'll have it all completed.The following are pic's of our newly remodeled slide.

After Virgil and I completed the remodel on our trailer, we built a table/cabinet for Ruth's quilting machine..and it's 11' long. Becuase of the cabinet's size and the limited amount of time Linda and I had before our scheduled departure, this job was a real challenge! Bunches of sweat and laughter later, we finished it. Below is how it turned out. The finished product.

THere's a lot more I'd like to tell you about our time here, but I've got to get to bed. 4:am is only a few hours away...we'll keep you posted of our travels.

We'll make it to South Dakota yet!!!

Linda and I departed El Cajon on the 7th of April headed for South Dakota. Before we got 100 miles down the road, we blew two tires on the trailer and ended up with accompanying trailer body damage. Over the next 3 days, we had our awning destroyed by the wind, our TV antenna bent by the wind blown awning, and our slide quit working. I had to re-wire the slide before we could move (manually moving the slide in or out sucks!). With all this damage, we decided to come back to El Cajon for needed repairs. We now have a new awning, new tv antenna and 5 new tires.

After carting our bad tires around with us for close to a month, the US Distributor for our Nanco tires had them picked up by UPS. We're awaiting a refund for the tires. The tire story is a long one that we'll post at a later date.