2012-10-09 freeway blowout on our way to Seneca

From Colorado Springs, we headed out to mom's in Seneca, MO. She sold her house, had a 30-day close (ouch) so we had planned to cut short any further exploration of Colorado. It's 12 hours from the Springs to Seneca. Our half-way point would be Salina, KS for a quick overnight stop at a Walmart. Unfortunately, about 1/2 hour short of our destination, we had a blowout on the trailer which took out most of the fender / sidewall as well. And we were stuck on the freeway for 3 hours. Our arrival at Walmart was somewhat later than planned.

New tires are on the agenda when we are set up at Amazon. After much research and investigation, I know the blowout was inevitable regardless of tire brand or mileage - we were travelling upwards of 70mph for 5+ hours, took a corner on the freeway at near 75mph, on 3-year-old tires which had essentially sat with RV weight on them for months. Though they were properly inflated and showed absolutely no sign of cracking / external wear, it was their time. We have learned a valuable lesson and the fender is a small price to pay. No one was hurt and we got to commune with some Kansas cows.

The repair was less costly than we thought; later in the Walmart parking lot I had that fender all fixed up. A little bactine and an advil....she feels much better now.

Limping on our spare, we arrived in Seneca on October 10 as planned. We set up at the new Indigo Sky Casino - Whispering Woods RV Park - $10 per night. Good deal and only a few blocks from mom's house.  Then spent 6 days packing (actually picking and packing, good practice for Amazon). Got about 25+ more boxes packed, and thank goodness Gary and I had packed up so much before we went out to Colorado!

Wish we had gotten everything packed but there was not enough time nor boxes. Mom arranged with the movers to finish the remainder along with the kitchen they had already contracted to pack. Moving day was scheduled for Oct 18 (movers come to pack everything) and Oct 19 (load the truck). However, we had already obligated ourselves to an Amazon start date of Oct 18. So we headed up to Coffeyville, KS.