That Was Exciting!

The adrenalin rush of feeling the truck jolt sideways and hearing the crunch of impact as a white blur careens to your left. Let me just say, everyone is fine and my truck has been healed.

This beauty has been coy with me all month but finally came out
to say goodbye the morning I left Sun Meadow.

It seems that I have a picture like this on about the same date from each year!
All hitched up and ready for the next great adventure.

I left camp at Sun Meadows on Monday 10/15 early, meaning some time before noon. After a stop at Les Schwab in Moscow to find out why my right rear tire was leaking and a subsequent $100 wheel replacement, I was back on the road and enjoying some of Idaho’s most beautiful landscapes.

Overlooking Lewiston, Idaho and the confluence
of the Clearwater River and the Snake River.

It was Tuesday that things got interesting. I progressed from Lewiston toward White Bird, where I hoped to visit the Nez Perce Battleground again. It is an amazing site and there is an overlook half way down the eight-mile 7% grade from the summit to the town.

The Nez Perce Battlefield at White Bird from the overlook on US-95.

Reference points for the locations in this story:

A. Sun Meadow, Worley, ID; B. Lewiston, ID; C. White Bird, ID;

D. Nampa, ID; E. Twin Falls, ID

We were moving very slowly down the incline at about 30 mph behind a big rig when the pull off came up. I signaled and moved into the left lane to slow down and make the turn. The driver behind me thought I was just pulling out to pass the big rig and wasn’t going fast enough, so pulled into the oncoming traffic lane to my left to pass—just as I turned into the parking area.

Crunch, jolt, keep control as he flashed past me with my mirror scraping along the side of his truck. We came to a rest in the parking area.

I don't know how he avoided ripping up the door and front fender
but even the white scratches proved to just be some of his paint
and washed right out.

His F250 SuperDuty was a little taller than mine, so when he
took off my mirror (and his) it scraped all along the side of his truck.

After exchanging insurance information, I stayed at the overlook and rested for a while. Then I made my way back onto the highway to finish the trek into White Bird where I stayed at the Swiftwater RV Park and spent the afternoon exchanging messages with two different insurance companies an RV Park in Nampa, Idaho, and the Ford Dealer in Nampa. The next day was a long drive (150 miles) to make with no mirror on my left to see if there was traffic when I changed lanes. I booked into Garrity RV Park in Nampa and took my truck to the dealer.

In addition to the mirror, I was having difficulty with my check engine light coming on again and the fan starting its running at triple speed. Problems I’ve had fixed three times in the past month at a cost of $2,000. Corwin Ford promised they’d get to the bottom of it and fix it.

They did. Turns out the air intake flush valve (that has some other name that engine fanatics would be appalled I don’t remember) was stuck open and sending too much air through the engine. They replaced it. They also discovered my thermostat—replaced in Seattle at a cost of $350—had been installed incorrectly with the gasket on the wrong side and was leaking coolant. (Apparent cause of the fan running so fast.) They had to re-replace the thermostat. Along with a couple of other minor repairs, like replacing my wiper blades, my total for the trip was $1,002. The insurance company should reimburse about $385, but that was still a big chunk of change.

By this time, I’d spent two days confined to the trailer and immediate environs and I collapsed in bed Friday night to get some rest, knowing things were finally fixed. The next morning, I arose without a care in the world and spent the morning writing. Then I decided to go out and see if I could find mirror extensions to give me a wider view of the highway behind me.

That’s when it struck me that I’d only booked into this RV park for three nights and I was supposed to be on the road. The park is full, but fortunately, they were able to let me stay another night. I sometimes forget what time it is when I’m writing, but seldom what day it is or how long I’ve been somewhere. I did, however, get the mirror extensions and now I feel like the guy would have had a bigger target when he hit me.

I feel like I have wings sticking out on either side of the truck.
Will have to remember to fold my mirrors in whenever I'm parked.

So, today when it gets light out, I’ll be back on the road again, headed for Twin Falls, Idaho. I’m anticipating a leisurely Sunday drive. Got that?

Spending three days stuck in one place with no ability to leave did give me a lot of writing time and I finally exceeded my 2018 goal of 600,000 words. Pretty remarkable in my book. It isn’t even November yet and I still have the draft of Wild Woods to create during NaNoWriMo.

That little number in the upper write corner is
how many words I wrote. THIS WEEK!

Which brings me to the finale of today’s post. There is still time to sign up to follow the daily writing of Wild Woods in November! I’m very excited about writing the sequel to City Limits and expect the words to flow rapidly during the month. Become a $10 patron at www.patreon.com/nathaneverett. Or make a $10 donation at www.paypal.me/aroslav. Be sure you leave your email address so I know where to send the links to new chapters!

As a special incentive, you can now read City Limits online at http://www.nathaneverett.com/releases/citylimits/index.html. FOR FREE! You’ll want to be caught up with the story before you follow Gee Evars through the next adventure.

One thing is certain; Gee isn’t the type of person

to look at life through a mirror, thinking only of the past.

Neither am I.