Another beautiful day. The sun is shining and we are looking forward to the rest of our trip with pleasure. We spent the day with Don and Diane in their rig, playing games and waiting for the call to get the rig from the shop. Finally, around 3:00 PM, we got the call. So Don and I took the car and drove over to Freightliner in North LV. Half an hour later we were on the road back to Arizona Charlies.The repair job on the RV was relatively simple, the radiator was clogged with debris and dirt due to a poorly designed oil vent tube. I was put in front of the radiator and as the oil vapor exited the end of the tube it would coat the front of the radiator attracting dirt, etc. With everything cleaned up and a rerouted vent tub, the mechanic checked out a few other engine code issues, replaced one of the exhaust brackets and did a test drive up to apex with no signs of overheating.
With the coaches set up for one more night Tina checked out the freezer and decided we needed to eat the beef ribs, so she made some great BBQ ribs and mashed potatoes for all of us with M&Ms for desert! After dinner we played Uno and Aggravation until 10:30 PM then called it a night.
Thursday the 19th
With the sun shining down and the dogs anxious to get up we piled out of bed around 6:30 AM, planning to get on the road around 9:30 for the drive to Glendale. After breakfast and clean up Don came over with some concerns about weather and our schedule. So we spent some time looking at our revised itinerary and the weather forecasts. Everything looks ok except there is a lot of cold weather and a couple of Cold Rainy days ahead. Then we checked our route and Don spotted a flaw in my logic. Ooooopps! We can't get to Glendale via UT-9 as it passes through restricted tunnels. So we re-routed our trip route to go down and around through Kanab.Once we pulled out of our spot and hooked up the trailer we were on the road and looking for fuel. We bypassed our first choice and decided to get on the freeway and look for a truck stop. Sure enough, 20 miles NE of LV we found a Loves and fueled up. Then it was back on the road.
A little after noon, I decided to pull into a Flying J truck stop to top off as we would be going into the boonies and I didn't want to be short of fuel.While I was in the office getting the pump started, Tina took the kids for a walk. When she got back she pointed out that the left wheel on the trailer had smoke coming out of it. Not Good!! Once we were fueled, I pulled the rig forward and parked out of the way to look at it.
Don came over and between the two of us we couldn't really determine the problem. So I went back in the station and asked the attendant if there was a tire place nearby. He suggested asking the manager, so I did. The manager came out and looked at it and suggested taking it to his mechanic in St. George about 5 miles away. So we took the car off the tow dolly and headed for St George.
We pulled into the Shell station and saw the mechanic Ron, told him our story and he said to bring the dolly over to the service bay so he could look at it. Well, wheeling it over you could hear the bearings rumbling in the bad wheel. He started right in and took the wheel off, then the hub. As the hub came off out came all these little bits and pieces of bearings, bearing races, etc. Fortunately, the spindle wasn't scored too badly.
Ron was able to order a replacement hub and bearings. While he waited for it to come he filed and sanded the spindle as best as he could, then pulled of the tire on the other side, checked the brakes and lubed everything up. When the new hub arrived, he reassembled everything, packed it full of grease, put the tire back on and lubed all the zirk fittings. All within a couple of hours.
We were back on the road by 3:00 PM headed for Glendale. The rest of the drive was through absolutely gorgeous, rugged mountains and across high plains next to the Vermilion Cliffs before reaching our turn north through Kanab and into the mountains between Zion and Bryce. We gained an hour moving back into Mountain Time so it was just past 7:00 PM when we arrived at the KOA and got set up.We had a late dinner, walked the kids then played Uno for a couple of hours before calling it quits.
Distance for today was about 260 miles. Total for the trip so far, 7,000 miles.
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