We heard the weather forecast for days leading up to our departure from Basalt, CO. It wasn't good. A blizzard was coming down from Canada called
an Alberta Clipper.
It was mild in Aspen Valley when we turned onto the freeway at Glenwood Springs, CO heading east over The Continental Divide but both of us understood we were running out of precious time.
Glenwood Canyon is truly a spectacular sight.
The roaring river and the soaring bluffs are absolutely amazing and quite the distraction as you drive. You really have to fight it. No wonder people refer to it as Crash Canyon. It's best to pull over so you may
gaze and gaze.... but we did not have the time.
I rode part of the way up The Rockies twisted backwards admiring our newly renovated little camper. I couldn't decide which was prettier, the scenery in front of us or the scenery behind.
In one of the high valleys, we ran parallel to the Amtrak Train whizzing down the rails and I wondered for a while if the passengers were admiring our small trailer accompanying them, with it's turquoise and black new
paint, shiny chrome trim, and bright silver wings!
It was getting colder. Dangerously colder. Then it began to snow. And the snow steadily increased in volume. We climbed and it accumulated. Then, it began to blow, hard. We left Glenwood Springs at 52 degrees and as we
neared Frisco, CO in a full on blizzard, it was 21. We were creeping at this point pulling off the freeway, with the purpose of giving up, and deal with being snowed in. We had taken extra time in the restoration shop, rescheduling appointments at our business, and we
needed to get back to the office. We could not find a vacancy. The promise of early snow had brought skiers up the mountain to hit the slopes and all the rooms were taken.
Frantically, we tried to find a campground but could not. Feeling like we were wasting time we didn't have, we left Frisco.
We reluctantly pulled back on the freeway which was moving at a snails 🐌 pace. The road had been salted, sanded, and sprayed with a gel antifreeze Extraterrestrial goo. Don't get me wrong, we were thankful for it! The thing was, we didn't have much towing experience and we were facing THE STORM 🌬❄️❄️❄️❄️❄️❄️❄️ while towing our new baby!
After what seemed like an eternity in White Knuckle Hell, we reached The Continental Divide at 19 degrees. The tunnel brought a welcome relief from the outside weather but on the other side, we were going DOWN,
DOWN, DOWN !
I was an absolute wreck but poor Dave had it much, much worse. He had locked in behind an 18 Wheeler which gave a backdrop to the swirling frozen precipitation.
We did not speak.
We crept past wreck after wreck. Cars were stopped on the shoulder, in the median, or in piles. There was a giant tow vehicle removing trunks of trees from the west bound side of the freeway after a log truck had
overturned.
*GASP*
We inched along. For hours.
Finally, as we descended toward Denver, the temperature ever so slowly, began to rise. After what seemed like an eternity, the temp finally reached 33
degrees.
By this time it was late, really late. We had planned on spending the night in Denver but we did not want the
storm to catch us, it was quite literally on our back bumper. Thankful as we were to make it out unscathed, we concentrated on beating it down the highway......
We stopped somewhere in eastern Colorado to get gas and find a car wash. I knew the road salt and
mystery goop could not be beneficial to our vehicles but neither would being down a canyon! We found an all night freeway gas station / convenience store and pulled off. It was resplendent in it's fluorescent lighting with the one obligatory flickering tube buzzing on and off,
*buzz* *buzz* *buzz* and a blue, fuchsia, and purple spiked haired attendant dozing behind bullet proof glass. But beggars can't be choosers.
I inquired of our professional service provider, "Pardon me sir * I think * where is the nearest car wash?" The
person looked up and mumbled out the hole in the clear fortress, "Uhhh.Theeeerrs ooooone about twoooo blocks ooooverrr. But yooouu'll neeeed quaaaarterrrs...", trailing off. Crisp fried and suppressing a MAJOR eye
roll 🙄 I got my change through the tiny opening at the bottom of the translucent bulletproof cage. "That poor soul", I thought as I exited the foyer of this remarkable oasis in the night.
It's a funny thing how when you've been married for so long you can read each other's minds. Dave walked next to me on the way back to the truck and side mouthed, "At least that person has a job." Precisely at the
moment I thought it.
We found the car wash on the blackest street in the night but the high beams did not reveal the massive trench in the road before we hit it with a bone jarring WHAM!
The truck met the crevasse with such force that it launched us skyward pulling on our seat belts like hitting turbulence on a really bad flight! We no sooner screamed when our petite towable bundle of joy hit
the fiord!
GOOD LORD!!! As we swallowed our hearts and stomachs, we spotted the flickering light of the car wash up ahead. We were in the middle of absolute utter nowhere. Pulling into the car wash, I blurted, "This looks like something out of a horror movie!"
With quarters in hand, I got out of the truck and directed Dave into the right position and started the machine. Thank the Good Lord Jesus, it worked!
Beginning with the truck, while suppressing a slight stagger, I began spraying off the dirty wax build up. By the time I got to the trailer, I had reloaded the sputtering, hissing, and clanking machine twice.
For fear of running out of quarters, and disturbing the convenience store clerk's slumber, I quickened my pace. I got to the back of the camper and stopped dead in my tracks. Dave stuck his head out of the truck window and hollered into the night just loud enough to hear over the
rattle of the water pump, "What's the matter?!" I belted back, "You've got to come see this!"
"I'm not coming out there!" Dave barked.
My wonderful Dave was raised on horror films, loves them, can't get enough. He actually watched The Poseidon Adventure before we left on a cruise. Really. Truly. I'm not kidding.
In one hot second, I screamed, "YOU GET BACK HERE RIGHT NOW!" He came. Reluctantly, but he came.
The two of us stood there in the dark moonless Colorado night, exhausted, spooked, and wide eyed at the sight.
The back of our trailer WAS GONE!
Think about that...... especially in our weakened condition.......
No, it wasn't reeeeeeeeeaaaaally gone. But, it was covered in so much road salt, sand, and antifreeze goo that it barely shown in the limited light as the darkest brown, giving the very distinct impression that the back
of the camper WAS MISSING! The window was completely covered. The tail lights were coated so thickly, the red glow I knew was there, could not be seen even in the slightest. The bright turquoise paint was obliterated. For all intensive purposes, from behind, it looked like we were towing a giant fudge sickle. I'm talking a chocolate dipped Dairy Queen cone...
( without the curly Q ) *must have blown off*
It's an absolute miracle we weren't rear ended. I'm certain we were invisible from behind.
We discovered the charming Canned Ham shape of our trailer possessed aerodynamic properties that picked up all the circulating road pith only to deposit it stucco style on the posterior of our camper.
It took all the remaining quarters plus some we scrounged from my purse and the console between
the seats to remove the mess. Finally, underneath the highway Baklava was our little trailer as lovely as before.
We drove on and on, stopping for the night ( ha ha ) somewhere in Kansas. We pulled into the RV Park around 4 am rode tired and about to be put up wet. The funny thing is, by that time, we were so punchy and wired we
couldn't sleep! After setting up for the first time in the balmy 54 degree night, fumbling as we were trying not to make noise and wake anyone up, we connected the sewer and water hoses then went inside to sleep the first night in our new paradise on wheels.
We giggled like children, each taking turns using "The Potty". The two of us explored everything. The cabinets. The drawers. Marveling at the wonderful job John and Dennis had done. I turned on the fridge even though nothing was in it. Dave started the microwave and flipped on the television. EVERYTHING WORKED.... IT WAS NIRVANA! *Traileritus* We had it bad and the fever was climbing..... Sometime, and I can't tell you
when, except the sun was coming up, we lowered the shades, and like a thrown switch, both of us passed out.
We couldn't sleep very long. The storm was coming. I had set the alarm for 12:30pm and we awoke with the same excitement we went to sleep with. Positively
giddy were we driving out of the park headed south to Oklahoma and on to Arkansas.
The Alberta Clipper had morphed in one of those scary humid early winter mid south storms that produce killer
tornadoes. The wind was coming steadily out of the west, now at our right side, providing a lesson you just don't get in driver's ed.
We pressed on. Somewhere in northern Oklahoma we slowly passed a car driven by an elderly woman with her very elderly mother at her side. We were creeping past so, I had ample time to compare their features, as
their faces were turned in our direction admiring our trailer with expressions of absolute delight! So complete was their joy, I became thankful for the delays in our progress.
We stopped for gas later on and a trucker made a bee line for us. "Well now! I used to have one of those back in the day.... never looked THAT GOOD! Say, little lady ( I did not take offense this time ) I'll bet that's older than you are!" It wasn't so, I enjoyed the compliment.
This sort of encounter, in various forms and locales, would repeat itself for the next two years...... sometimes welcomed and sometimes not. More
on that later.
Home never looked SO GOOD! Pulling onto our street was an event. Our neighbors Judy and Brian, came out
immediately to see our newly refurbished bundle of joy and like proud parents, we showed her off. "You two do the COOLEST stuff ", said Brian. Our other neighbors were no where to be found.
The storm that had been chasing us arrived in the overnight hours with thunderstorms and spectacular lightening. I got into bed praying it would not hail. I rolled over and told Dave, " Well, I guess we'll find
out if it leaks!"
No hail and it didn't leak! I had gone outside the next morning thinking the rain would do the trailer
some good, like another car wash.
But.
To my ABSOLUTE AND UTTER HORROR, the paint was bubbling up in places!!! My feet didn't touch the ground as I flew into the house to get Dave. "What now?!", he sighed, "Calm down, calm down!" I ran out the door,
"Would you look at this! JUST LOOK AT THIS!", I wailed.
The camper had been properly primed and painted with a special acrylic formula used to coat aluminum siding. BUT OMG IT WAS BLISTERING!
Without missing so much as a beat, Dave's a drummer, see what I did there.... missing a beat 🤣 saying, "Don't worry, honey, we will just have it repainted. We've come this far, don't let it upset you." There he was again, my Dave, reassuring as always, ready with a solution.
The next day, the blisters were gone. GONE! Like a bad nightmare. Gone. Poof! Like it never happened.
It was now time to put our Happy Camper in the garage......
I apologize for no pictures in this section of our journey but, at the time, I didn't even think to take any!
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