Our Road Trip 2011 in SteSpot

[SteSpot]

Originally Posted by CrawfordGene

I thought we might cross paths, but you are already home.

Gene

You know after that last presentation we were sort of like the horses heading back to the barn...we did three 500 mile or so days and bingo, we were home......it surprised even us....we had never done so many miles in a day before in the entire trip....but the weather was good and we were somehow energized......

The trip across northern Nebraska on the two lane Route 20 was so nice.....little traffic...we saw the grass covered sand dunes....seems like there are sand dunes all over this country...

I put out a plea for the route in WY and it was answered by a fellow Californian who was in front of us in NE at a road work stoppage. In fact he lives in Venice and had been touring that part of the country. He suggested we go to Casper and then turn south to Rawlins, WY to hit I-80. His name was Claus......and we kept running into him at our stops for gas....he kept telling us more things...like Hwy. 40 to bypass Salt Lake City....it was so totally cool to have our own tour guide along the road. Actually people all along the way told us about alternative roads to the interstates....we took them all and were not disappointed.....call me a Backroads Junkie....paula

[SteSpot]

Somehow my camera got set to take black and white photos....not my intent because the countryside was nice and green.....but you can get the idea.

The stagecoach was in Lusk, WY at the Stagecoach Museum.

The last photo is sadly Ed taking some of the remaining shards out of the broken window in SteSpot.....it was the streetside forward window (29 1/2 inch one) on a 1968. The curved one with a metal frame (scarce as hen's teeth to replace). Somewhere between Atkinson, NE and Rawlins, WY something happened to the window. When we got to the campground we noticed tiny specks of glass on the dinette seats....went outside and saw that the whole window minus the frame was GONE. We have no idea what happened to it. It was there in the morning and was gone in the evening....so Ed got busy and taped it up with Duck Tape.....more on that later.......paula

[rebelstand]

sorry to hear about the window!!

[SteSpot]

Originally Posted by rebelstand

sorry to hear about the window!!

They only made those windows for 3 years and only 1968 had a frame.....and it was a lot of fun retaping the window with package sealing tape on a windy I-80 with 25-35 mph winds...the duck tape peeled right off when we hit the road....

So now we are looking for another window (Uwe is on it).

[rebelstand]

you've found something duck tape won't fix... be still my southern heart, it just can't be possible!

[SteSpot]

Originally Posted by rebelstand

you've found something duck tape won't fix... be still my southern heart, it just can't be possible!

Yup. That is correct. The wind just peeled that duck tape off the shiny Airstream like you could not believe....perhaps if we had wrapped it all around the front it would have held sort of like wrapping a package but at that point the duck tape was all used up....both rolls of it.....

We happened to have clear package sealing tape with us and that is what we used with a plastic trash bag....hint. Make a big X across the window so you have something to tape to.....then the trash bag and then the package sealing tape. Have been told that aluminum tape works better.....and perhaps so....I plan to put some in my fibber magee drawer for the future. paula

[Gene]

We had a window blow out and duct tape and a garbage bag solved it. There are different grades of duct tape and some don't stick as well. WD-40 and some vigorous scrubbing will remove the glue.

Gene

[SilverPal]

Paula....happy you made it home in one piece...thanks for sharing your adventures! Any chance you'll be at the Balloon Fiesta this year?

Rebelstand...love your dawg!
Gene....I'll meet you in Albq!

[rebelstand]

Originally Posted by SilverPal

Rebelstand...love your dawg!

thanks you inspired me to update my profile picture with one of the dawg and the a/s

[SteSpot]

Originally Posted by CrawfordGene

We had a window blow out and duct tape and a garbage bag solved it. There are different grades of duct tape and some don't stick as well. WD-40 and some vigorous scrubbing will remove the glue.

Gene

Garbage bag yes......perhaps we should have wrapped the duck tape across the front to hold it or perhaps our trailer is just too shiny ........hoping we didn't damage the skin with the tape.....

Now for having a 1968.....they made the windows curved and framed only that year and replacement glass is a different thickness......argh........I knew it would not be easy or inexpensive.....but on the other hand, that was the biggest problem we had......and over 11,000 miles and 21 states, I would say that was pretty good.

Are you in the mountains now? paula

[SteSpot]

Originally Posted by SilverPal

Paula....happy you made it home in one piece...thanks for sharing your adventures! Any chance you'll be at the Balloon Fiesta this year?

Rebelstand...love your dawg!
Gene....I'll meet you in Albq!

Unfortunately we will not be able to make the Balloon Fiesta this year.....you will have to be a good reporter......and take lots of pictures.....

[SteSpot]

Originally Posted by rebelstand

thanks you inspired me to update my profile picture with one of the dawg and the a/s

Amazing animal and is one of two.....great dogs......keep you moving......paula

[rebelstand]

Originally Posted by SteSpot

Amazing animal and is one of two.....great dogs......keep you moving......paula

you've seen the other one but most people miss her because they are awed by the size of the minature horse

[Gene]

Originally Posted by SteSpot

Garbage bag yes......perhaps we should have wrapped the duck tape across the front to hold it or perhaps our trailer is just too shiny ........hoping we didn't damage the skin with the tape.....

Now for having a 1968.....they made the windows curved and framed only that year and replacement glass is a different thickness......argh........I knew it would not be easy or inexpensive.....but on the other hand, that was the biggest problem we had......and over 11,000 miles and 21 states, I would say that was pretty good.

Are you in the mountains now? paula

The glue should come off the skin with some rubbing and WD-40.

We are poised to go to the mountains.

Gene

[slowmover]

11,000-miles and 21-states! Some trip! Thanks for posting it all. I try to keep up sometimes by riding around on CrawfordGene's shoulder (he's sure to find good threads), but only found your thread today. Thanks for the pics, it was great to see a Uwe-trailer in such fine use.

So this trip is not my idea of an Airstream trip, but after I got over kicking and screaming we are actualy having some fun.

I'm still laughing. I recall my mother's reticence in the mid-60's at traveling with a trailer (even though her parents by this time had a gorgeous Streamline); her emphasis on the words emboldened above would have held a different inflection, ha! Train, airplane, all were okay, as was car travel with nice hotels at each end. I think it might have taken a couple of years before her conception of what it should be, and what it was, was allayed by meeting some high $$$ specialist physicians we knew from home and church (Dallas) and that they were combining business & pleasure in their trailer travels. So though your conception differed in essence, the principle was perhaps not so different as revealed by experience.

Cell phones and Internet certainly make this easier today. Although I can wish for the tiny percentage of commercial traffic seen yesteryear, and the wide-open wonderful Interstates of the late 1960's: no advertising, no chain restaurants or service stations, mainly small business owners on the up and up (for the most part). An all too brief window of See the USA in it's majority.

For the next long journey, keep in mind Larry McMurtry's dictum about US car travel: that a line extending from Washington D.C to Cleveland denotes the boundary between open roads and congested roads. The population of the Bos-Wash Corridor, and the Great Lakes Midwest, work as a barrier to long distances easily covered. (They also don't know how to drive when from cities where cars aren't really needed).

On the other hand the Revolutionary and Civil War battlefields -- as an example -- are practically on top of each other. Which is all to say that the daily grind behind the wheel has a different quality.

Hope to see more of your travels one day. You've done a fine job, here.

.

[SteSpot]

Originally Posted by REDNAX

11,000-miles and 21-states! Some trip! Thanks for posting it all. I try to keep up sometimes by riding around on CrawfordGene's shoulder (he's sure to find good threads), but only found your thread today. Thanks for the pics, it was great to see a Uwe-trailer in such fine use.

So this trip is not my idea of an Airstream trip, but after I got over kicking and screaming we are actualy having some fun.

I'm still laughing. I recall my mother's reticence in the mid-60's at traveling with a trailer (even though her parents by this time had a gorgeous Streamline); her emphasis on the words emboldened above would have held a different inflection, ha! Train, airplane, all were okay, as was car travel with nice hotels at each end. I think it might have taken a couple of years before her conception of what it should be, and what it was, was allayed by meeting some high $$$ specialist physicians we knew from home and church (Dallas) and that they were combining business & pleasure in their trailer travels. So though your conception differed in essence, the principle was perhaps not so different as revealed by experience.

Cell phones and Internet certainly make this easier today. Although I can wish for the tiny percentage of commercial traffic seen yesteryear, and the wide-open wonderful Interstates of the late 1960's: no advertising, no chain restaurants or service stations, mainly small business owners on the up and up (for the most part). An all too brief window of See the USA in it's majority.

For the next long journey, keep in mind Larry McMurtry's dictum about US car travel: that a line extending from Washington D.C to Cleveland denotes the boundary between open roads and congested roads. The population of the Bos-Wash Corridor, and the Great Lakes Midwest, work as a barrier to long distances easily covered. (They also don't know how to drive when from cities where cars aren't really needed).

On the other hand the Revolutionary and Civil War battlefields -- as an example -- are practically on top of each other. Which is all to say that the daily grind behind the wheel has a different quality.

Hope to see more of your travels one day. You've done a fine job, here.

.

Actually I loved being in the Airstream and much prefer it over plane/hotel travel. We had our own bed and stuff every night. What was not my idea is THREE MONTHS. AND JULY IN THE MIDWEST..... I love to travel especially the back roads but I am into our grandkids and 3 months is a long time without seeing them......but that was helped by our meeting in Michigan the beginning of August. And, yes, I did whine some of the time but seeing all of the stuff about the Lewis and Clark trip made me realize we had it so good in comparison. And, the Airstream was my idea in the beginning and my DH has been a good sport about coming along with the Airstream idea...

Yes, Uwe's trailer held up very well. Also the disc brakes and equalizer hitch worked very well. We had the 2006 Toyota Tundra V8 checked out today and the brakes were barely worn.....the Prodigy brake controller did a fine job of stopping the trailer....even once when our truck brakes were wet from a heavy rain. We had no sway with the equalizer....even in high winds and by big trucks....and the Tundra did fine over the mountains.....it went as fast as we needed to go....we installed an extra transmission cooler....our AC threatened to go out on the way home but repaired itself and the freon was a bit low.....

Uwe made sure we had everything we needed.....we had a full bathroom, propane heat for cooking and refrigerator, big enough tanks to not have to hook up if necessary, fantastik vents for main source of cooling, solar when we needed......batteries that are still charged......we wanted the trailer to work besides being nice looking......also, car stereo when boondocking, dimmers on the lights to conserve......

The only thing that wasn't 100% was the under the bed airconditioner....it was 11.5 btu and was not made for 108 degree heat in OK City. But then would any AC have been enough? We have discussed putting in another one under the dinette.....but we seldom use it here in California....

Thanks for the kind words.

I also have some more photos of the end of the trip....hope to post them soon....am having withdrawal symptoms from being in SteSpot, I think.

[SteSpot]

We will see how good our Progressive Insurance policy is that we have on SteSpot......I called them today about the window and they put me in touch with the company, Duncan Systems, in Indiana that handles window replacement. When I spoke with the woman at Duncan and I started to explain how it is a 1968 window and is not just any window and she said that they know all about Airstreams and they might have what we need in their warehouse....of course, I am not sure that they know about vintage Airstreams.......at any rate Uwe faxed her the dimensions and we shall see if they can beat the rimless ones being offered. Our year has frames on the curved Corning windows.....have my fingers crossed. It would be really good if they have such a window.....29 1/2 inches across.....p

[SteSpot]

Originally Posted by CrawfordGene

The glue should come off the skin with some rubbing and WD-40.

We are poised to go to the mountains.

Gene

Where are you now? p

[SteSpot]

We returned to California after a journey of over 11,000 miles, visiting 21 states, and taking almost 3 months. As was a working trip with Ed speaking to Bar Associations across the country on Law Practice Management issues, we had sightseeing time but we had a schedule that included cities—not your out of the way national forest campgrounds although we did find some National Forest roads to drive on.

The issues we encountered were traveling in extreme Midwestern heat (108) in Oklahoma City with a boxer that doesn’t do well in heat, finding nice campgrounds near big cities, having a broken window (not easily to replace the 1968 curved Corning window), a brake controller that stopped reading but not working and thunderstorms.

We dealt with these issues by finding suitable doggie day care places for Bandit, sometimes parking 1 ½ hours away (like Volo, Il near Chicago), taping up the window with package sealing tape (duck tape peeled right off our shiny Airstream), replacing the brake controller in Colorado, and using our handy dandy Cal Meuser recommended Oregon Scientific Weather Station.

The highlights of the trip were the people we met—we found kind, gracious, helpful citizens all over this country, the scenery we saw---from majestic mountains, the prairies (sand dunes in Northern Nebraska and Western Michigan), wonderful food (lots of fish), grandchildren we met in Michigan, cousins (95 year old aunt) in Chicago, friends who went out of their way to meet us along the way, and other Vintage buffs looking for ideas from our trailer. We actually ended the speaking tour in Nebraska parked at the venue—the U of Nebraska-Omaha campus. Then we headed for Rte 20 across Northern Nebraska for a back roads treat. We drove many many backroads much to our delight instead of the Interstates…..the rule was, if paved, it was okay. Even National Forest Road 39 from southeast from Joseph, OR....just a short 9% grade.

We made it fine with our equipment. We towed with our 2006 V8 Tundra with an additional transmission cooler and disc brakes in our Airstream with an Equalizer hitch......no sway not even passing big rigs with wind gusts......we took it easy and SteSpot stayed right behing us all the way.

Uwe built a fine trailer for us.....all of the careful forethought paid off. It met our needs pretty well...which is amazing because you don't always know what you are going to need.....we could boon dock and we did.

Thanks to all who sent encouragement along the way-especially Sean and Nikki the couple we met in Ok City who are homeschooling their children in their Airstream with their two dogs and one is a Great Dane.....we were all dying in the heat....but we shared a vintage connection in a sea of white SOBs.

It was a journey of a lifetime.....

The photos were from Rte 20 in NW Nebraska Grass covered sand dunes and formations that are not flat; sunset in Rawlins, WY;....Taping the window was on I-80 with 25-35 mph winds...paula

[rebelstand]

We are just waiting until the next time we run into SteSpot at a campground.... and hoping it won't be 106 outside.