Summer 2011

I'm extremely happy to report an uneventful trip. As you can imagine, we were constantly watching the trailer tire pressure and temperature monitor for any alarms. One of our sensors is defective in that it gives us an alarm indicating a sudden pressure loss/blow out and then it tells us the pressure is OK. The first time it happened on the road from Diamond Lake to South Lake Tahoe, it frightened both of us because we were on a road with with little or no shoulder space to pull over. We did find a spot and I checked the tire and it was OK. We learned to ignore that alarm. A second sensor is not functioning at all because the battery holder broke. You can bet the manufacturer of the sensors and monitor is going to hear from us when we get home.

Our route was simple... the same that it will be for the next four legs of our trip home... get on I-80 east and get off at the next stop. I don't think we will get lost. One of the biggest challenges on this trip was right at the beginning, the Wasatch Mountains, just east of Salt Lake City. A few miles from where we got on, I-80 joins I-15 in a southerly course for about 1 1/2 miles. The highways separate and I-80 turns east. A few miles from the eastward turn you start climbing the Wasatch. The last time we did this stretch of I-80 we had our old truck and a trailer that weighed 2 1/2 tons less then this trailer and the truck had difficulty doing the job. It was the main reason that I bought a diesel truck and it did the job just fine... if you don't consider that it is sucking fuel at a rapid rate. The rest of the trip was over a number of passes that ranged from 6,000 to 8,000 feet followed by relatively level plateau. Now that we have reached Cheyenne, most of the mountains are behind us and the prairie is just ahead... hopefully with a tail wind to make up for the westbound portion of this trip.

You know you are in a Wyoming rest area when you see this...