Another Day Another Dilemma
Trip Start
Aug 18, 2008
1
18
35
Trip End
Ongoing
Elk City,
Oklahoma,
United States
Sunday, September 7, 2008
Yesterday morning we woke up again having had little sleep the night before as Gonzo kept waking both Steve and I up. He sleeps all day in the truck then wants attention all night when we get landed. Cocoa seems to be adjusting quite well to the traveling. I had checked the time on Steve's cell phone the night before and we set the clocks based on that...little did I know that because we are not paying for roaming for his phone, that the time is not getting updated.
I am sure when I called Jake (Judith Lear's son) he must have thought that I was a bit off the wall when I said to him that I thought we were going to be touching base between 8:00 and 8:30...here I am thinking it was already 9:15
Luke
. When he said we could meet at 9:00 I was a bit confused...I picked up my phone and looked at it and there it was in black and white 8:16 AM - that is how the day started.Jake gave us great directions to meet he, his wife Gina and son Luke at a local IHOP restaurant. Luke just turned 4 years old and is an absolute sweetheart. We really enjoyed our breakfast with them. Jake works for the fire department as well as having a landscaping (grass cutting service). Gina works for a communications company and Luke is just about to go into a preK school (I think they said that he starts tomorrow - Monday).
After breakfast, we headed out on the road again. Steve and I both commented that it was amazing that you can tell when you are hitting a new county by the roads. Some of the roads were so bad through Oklahoma City - bouncing the trailer quite hard. We would be so thankful to get into another county with better roads, then we would hit another spot where again the roads were so bad again. At one point we felt that some of the roads we traveled would easily rival the roads in Michigan for the award of the worst roads in the US.
When we stopped for gas in Oklahoma, Steve noticed that the tires on the trailer were wearing on the inside rim to a dangerous level. We knew at that moment that we had to find new tires for the trailer as it is completely unsafe to continue on our travels with them the way they are. We had already planned to stay in Elk City which was just a few more miles up the road, so we headed there. We had another coupon book where we could get a room at the EconoLodge for $39.99 for the night
Luke with his Snake Mustache
. We headed there - I said to Steve that I wanted to look at the room first before we take it...he agreed that it would be a good idea since the room the night before was less than desirable. When I got into the office, the woman said there were no rooms at that price and it would be $59.00 - the place looked not like someplace that I was willing to pay that much for a room...in fact, I don't think for any price I would have stayed there.Across the street was a Comfort Inn and Suites and it looked quite new. We ended up having to pay $125 for the night, but worth every penny. The room was clean and very large. They generally don't allow pets, but good for us there was a dog show in town so many people had their dogs with them...and they said no problem to the two cats.
We headed to Walmart to look for tires...no luck. We would have to call around in the morning. We are off now to see about getting some replacements...the tires are going to be $89 each so that on top of the new battery that we had to purchase leaving Huntsville have put a bit of a strain on the budget...but at least we will be safe and for that, there is no price too high.
We are going to move on our way to Santa Fe once we have the new tires. We will keep you posted.
