IT COULD HAVE BEEN WORSE!

WHITEHORSE, YUKON, CANADA, AUGUST 4, 2006
This picture shows us sitting at milepost 1238 of the Alaska Highway in a crippled RV. Seems the rocks and frost heaves (or should I say frost canyons) have taken their toll and we have a broken spring on the RV, 85 miles from a service center! (sorry, the picture won't load....signal is too weak.)

After we saw the smoke from the tires rubbing on the underside of the trailer, we found a flat spot to pull off on and we unhitched and drove ahead 9 miles to the Tetlin Wildlife Refuge Visitor Center where a kind employee gave us her phone card to call back for a wrecker from Tok. (Cell phones are useless up here.) The man at the service center said someone would be out in 2-3 hours and they would bring several springs along and would attempt to fix it on the spot. Otherwise we'd have to be towed back to Tok, 85 miles in the direction we just came from. That would have meant we would have to spend another night there, and the next day we would have had to travel back over those same frost heaves. That would have been a bummer.

But it could have been worse. We could have not activated the Good Sam membership card with roadservice ---the day before! Can you believe that? We activated our membership the day before.....hope they don't think something is fishy here!

Or we could still be in Anchorage waiting for an appointment for The Dude to have toe surgery. As it was, he got right in on Monday, had his toe nail removed in the afternoon, and the doctor said we could travel again on Tuesday, which we did. (By the way, his toe is doing just fine.)

And we thank God that the RV damage wasn't caused by an accident. No one is hurt and it was just a few hours delay out of our planned milage for the day. We just adjusted our schedule and all is fine.

And, I am most thankful that the boys were so well behaved during the 4 1/2 hours we spent on the side of the road. They could have been cranky or whiny, but they did what boys are supposed to do-----played in the dirt! It would have been very stressful if we would have had to deal with undesireable behavior. Thanks guys!

As mentioned before, cell phones are worthless here in the wilderness, and computer access has been difficult to find, so we beg forgiveness for the lack of phone calls, emails, and blog enteries. Hopefully things will improve as we get closer to the good old USA.

PS: It was $686 and the guy fixed it right on the side of the road. And he took a check!

PS#2: It could be worse, right? Last night we took the boys out for dinner ($60) and to the Frantic Follies ($70), and when we came out we were treated to the sight of a flat tire ($75.) It's peanut butter sandwiches for the next few days, guys!