We Knew It Was Gonna Happen...

Blown tires...they are as common to RV'ers as a cracked foundation is to a Houston Texas home owner. It's not if it's gonna happen, but when!

Our first experience happened shortly after leaving the Columbia River Gorge museum at about 6:30pm on highway 84 in the middle of nothing as far as the eye could see on all sides. You hear a pop and the shaking is unforgettable and all you hope for is a big enough shoulder to get out of harms way and some help as soon as possible. We had both! Luckily I had been nursing a slow leaking tire since our morning began and knew that I needed to drive much slower than usual until we could make it to Kennewick, OR where there was the closest tire center for the next morning. That was not to be!

Luck was on our side though! We had enough cell signal (a rare thing in many of the places we have been) to find out that the next exit two and a half miles away had a Loves truck stop. That is all that was there and so with it now almost 7:30pm we had a safe place to boondock if our Good Sam roadside assistance couldn't make it out before the next morning. Turns out they couldn't get our size tires until the following day and wanted to charge us $777 for two replacement tires. We needed it so I agreed, that's what is great about Good Sam, they cost a fortune but make sure you get trustworthy repair done in a remote and unfamiliar territory. I recommend having the $99 a year platinum coverage for this very reason!

We made the best of our time at the truck stop as you can see...catch with a football in 30 mile per wind gusts and tumble weed chasing! Our experience was really great though and the very kind manager, Loren, at the Loves tire shop connected us with his connection for auto tires (the RV uses a truck/auto tire size and not a semi tire that they stock and service at Loves) at Les Schwab in Hermiston, OR. After getting their commitment to come out right away, I was able to call and cancel (with full refund) my Good Sam order gratefully. No hassles! The Les Schwab techs were incredible people and I highly recommend their shop. Their tire tech, Jeremy, came to Loves and put four new tires on for $976 and sent us straight to his shop in town for balancing. After about a 16 hour delay we were back on the road headed to Spokane, WA.