An Unexpected Detour

On Wednesday, we headed west from Sky City Casino, just on the edge of the Acoma Pueblo on I-40, where we had spent the previous night in their functional but unexceptional RV facility. Our plan was to get past Flagstaff, AZ to the point where the elevation was somewhat back down from the 7's, at least to the 5's, so that it would not be quite so cold at night. Also so that Clara's physical reaction to "extreme" altitude would subside somewhat.

Our goal – Seligman, AZ – elevation 5460 ft., approximately 1500 ft lower and 10 degrees warmer than Flagstaff, AZ. As we approached the town, I could feel in the steering wheel that there was something amiss in the left front wheel, although I was totally unprepared for what ultimately was found there. We stopped at KOA, the first RV park in town, to make inquiry, but as sadly expected, moved on to our second possibility – KOA is, for some reason, seriously overpriced, both in terms of what they have to offer and in light of other facilities. [KOA was $36 for the night, compared to the $20 we ultimately paid at Route 66 Campground.]

However, the KOA campground host was congenial enough to point us to the town tire shop, where the problem shown in the picture above was soon discovered. To me, the frustrating factor is that there were only some 32 or 33 thousand miles on this tire. Ah, well . . .

That is why we now find ourselves in Las Vegas, NV where we have gracious friends with a spare room, and where there are many resources for getting one or more new tires.

There are two complicating factors in getting a replacement tire or tires, and if you're not interested in the technicalities, you may stop reading here. Others may continue.

The engineers at Winnebago, in their awesome wisdom, decided to put larger tires on the rear of our MoHo than on the front. Besides that, the sizes of the tires on either are the same as on many passenger cars, BUT the load carrying requirement is radically different (passenger car, perhaps 1100 lbs per tire, our vehicle, approximately twice that). The conclusion is that there is essentially only one brand of tire that fits the bill, and it's made (surprise, surprise . . . ) in Germany. And those folks, bless their hearts, crank up the production line for these two sizes about once a year . . . and this year, the shipment is scheduled for two weeks from now!!

The process began late Thursday afternoon at Discount Tire, and on-line at TireRack.com, but didn't conclude until slightly more than 24 hours later (at Nevada Tire City), after visits to Nevada Pick-a-Part (imagine six football fields of junk vehicles waiting for you and your tools to help yourself), Nevada Truck Salvage, and a couple of tire repair facilities (verdict – negative). The word from Nevada Tire City is that they'll have a new tire, found in somebody's backroom, here in town next Wednesday!!! I hope it's not the same type of pipe dream that many folks in Las Vegas have when standing in front of one of those machines you can find everywhere here . . .

Ah, the adventures one can find while traveling . . .