​Day 3 - Sun Valley, ID, to Park City, UT

We had hitched up the trailer the night before, anticipating an early departure. That made morning preparations fast but, when we turned the key in the truck, the battery was dead. 
The refrigerator had alarmed at 2 am, complaining that it had no gas. We determined that we had plenty of propane. After fiddling with the fridge controls for a bit, the machine was inexplicably satisfied. We returned to bed.  

In retrospect, we think the fridge switched from running on propane to electric when we swapped an empty propane tank for a full one earlier in the day. The fridge draws a lot of current. It drained the trailer battery AND the truck battery, since we had connected the wiring harness the night before. We didn't know the trailer would draw current from the truck when the engine was off! 

Luckily, Angie's mom gave her a Bolt portable jump start battery several years ago and it worked like a charm. So we were soon on our way. If she had not packed that device, we would have had to hitchhike or walk a few miles to get a cell signal so we could call for help. It pays to date a smart woman!

Another 300-mile day of driving seemed much more pleasant after having a day off. The weather was great and we got 30% better gas mileage by draining our holding tanks before starting the trip. We arrived at our Wasatch State Park campground around 3 pm.

What a difference in weather! It was 71 degrees when we arrived. We were able to open the windows, enjoy happy hour on the patio and lounge by a campfire. We have a view of snow-capped peaks in the southwest and a field of sagebrush and scrub stretching 100-yards to the northeast to the entry road and mountain bike trails on the other side.

I wish we had such well-equipped, sparsely-populated campgrounds in Washington. The sites are large and level. The roads and driveways are paved, even if a bit worn. The tent sites are large enough to park two cars. They each have two flat, sandy tent pads, running water and 20-amp electric circuits. Someone has even raked the trails and the dirt around the driveways!

The mountain bike trails behind us climb about 1,500 feet to a ridge crowned by sprawling homes that look out over the valley that slopes down over three miles to the Jordanelle Reservoir. We saw a couple riders descending the switchbacks after dark under headlights.

This was the first campsite of the trip with a working water hookup. That gave us a chance to figure out how to properly connect the water regulator and filter. It was  harder than it sounds. There are four components to arrange in proper sequence - the regulator, a short connecting hose, the filter cartridge and the hose itself. Then you have to assure each joint does not leak.

After happy hour and a delicous dinner of beef brisket we took a hike around an unoccupied loop in the campground. We saw piles of fallen branches someone had cleared and stacked, which gave Angie the idea to build a campfire. This was starting to feel more like the camping we had in mind! We carried armfuls of wood back to our campsite.

Hank eagerly began to erect a pyramid of tinder and kindling that was intended to start with one match without the use of paper. He had to scold Angie for haphazardly dumping wood on top of the carefully crafted structure, which he then had to reconstruct. There is an abundance of dry, dead wood - some of it hardwood - in this high desert climate. We quickly had a blazing fire in the oversize ring.  

Previous visitors had left behind a stuffed mallard dog toy that Streak and Charlie played fetch with for hours. They had a blast!  We saw a white tail deer within 40-yards of our pad climbing through the brush toward the road. While playing with the dogs, Angie found a deer skeleton.

​Today we're going to explore Park City.

After a short walk around the mountain top campground with the dogs, we hit the road by 9 am. The day before, it appeared that we would have 90 miles range left in the truck gas tank after arriving at Emigrant Spring. Gremlins or wildlife must have stolen some fuel overnight because, in the light of day, our instruments told us we only had 40 miles range left. Luckily, the gas station was only 18 miles away.

The scenic drive through the Snake River canyons brought us past signs commemorating the Van Ornum Battle. https://www.legendsofamerica.com/utter-van-ornum-massacre-idaho/ Having never heard of this story, we learned via Google that the Van Ornum wagon train was the most tragic emigration story since the Donner Party. The group endured a weeks long battle with Shoshone and Bannock Indians, who killed or captured 29 of 44 emigrants over the course of this extended battle.

Angie's route planning and research took us to an excellent public dump station in the town of Hailey, ID, where we were able to prepare the trailer for a couple of nights of dry camping at a primitive campground outside Ketchum, near Sun Valley. This stop gave us a chance to make a couple more rookie mistakes:
- Hank initially filled the fresh water tanks from a standard garden hose meant for washing the outside of the trailer.
- Then, while back on the road shortly later, Hank noticed in his rear view mirror that he had neglected to close the door of the compartment where the holding tank hose was stored. Luckily the flex hose didn't fall out on the roadway!
A third mistake wasn't discovered until we arrived at our campsite. Hank had left a kitchen cabinet door open and contents were strewed inside the trailer! Luckily, nothing was broken.

The campground Angie had chosen in the Sawtooth National Recreation Area had rave reviews. Unfortunately, we discovered that the road to the campground was still closed for the season due to snow. Hank had to back the trailer up about 100 yards in order to make a 90-degree turn into a driveway off the one-lane dirt road. He discovered how difficult it is to back-up in a straight line over an extended distance.
 
We found an alternate campground just a quarter-mile away - a lovely primitive site near a river and shielded from the quiet two-lane road. We had it all to ourselves! But only one spot was sufficiently clear of snow to look appealing. It took quite some maneuvering to get our trailer backed in, though, due to snow cover up to 8 inches deep, a narrow road bordered sporadically by large rocks and a low hanging tree branch. There were times Hank feared we may have to get towed out of trouble, which would have been problemmatic given that there was no cell phone coverage. But we made it! Angie repeatedly marvelled at our accomplishment. Good teamwork! We stayed calm, communicated well and brainstormed next steps together.

We were initially thrilled to be able to let our dogs run through the campground free of the leash, but multiple posted warnings of black bear activity in the area gave us pause. We armed ourselves with bear spray and kept the dogs on leash after that. 

Temperatures were forecast to drop below freezing and our heater initially was blowing only cold air. In our first night of dry camping, we had to learn how to configure the heater to operate without AC power. The manual was little help. It suggested that we were either out of gas or the regulator had failed. We had no internet or cellular access, so Google was not available to rescue us. Hank removed the access hatch and discovered a switch that needed to be set to allow operation on propane only. We enjoyed a peaceful and warm night!

Today was the first day off from driving. We enjoyed exploring Sun Valley Resort and the town of Ketchum. The dogs were happy to stretch their legs, too. Ketchum seems to be a mix of wealthy skiers/2nd home owners and blue-collar locals. We arrived in "Slack" season, between winter and summer sports, so things were pretty quiet. It was so nice to sleep in, have a restaurant meal and hang out with Internet access!
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It's back on the road tomorrow for another six-hour drive to Park City, UT.

We finally rolled away from our home in Kirkland at 1:15 pm - more than four hours later than planned. Hank was focused on loading the truck bed with bulky or heavy items, while Angie was focused on loading the food. She had a much bigger job. 

Hank  grew more and more anxious, as he is prone to do. With increasing urgency he periodically said, "We've got to get going!" 

Consistently, Angie calmly replied, "What do you want me to do?" 

This calm but firm response was powerful. Even Hank could see that there was nothing to be done, except to let Angie continue her work to pack a mountain of fresh, frozen and packaged food items into miniscule cubbies and cabinets in our tiny 19' Lance trailer. Solving the puzzle of making everything fit - and remembering where it was placed - was a one-person job.

Somehow she got it all in the trailer! And there was nothing loose to fly around inside during our journey. This must be one of the skills she developed during 20 years in the Navy. She even managed to heat up some lunch for us and to suggest that Hank disconnect the battery in his car, which we left behind in our garage. What a woman!

We purchased a bike rack for the trailer. Hank installed the rack on the trailer coupler in advance. But in the flurry of all the other preparations - which included planning and preparation for a memorial service for two of Angie's high school friends - we had not previously tried mounting the bikes on the rack. Of course, the bikes did not fit  right on the first attempt to mount them on the rack. This required disassembly and reconfiguration - further adding to our delay.

Let me interject some explanation about the memorial service, which was held the day before our departure. Steve and Mike Hurter were popular twins who were  partners in a real estate agency. They contacted COVID in January and died within five days of each other. These boys were Angie's high school classmates. One of them had been her prom date. Over the years, Angie had remained friends with the boys and their family. While grieving with the boys' mother, Angie offered to compose a memorial slide show for the funeral. This involved many long days of gathering photos, identifying all the subjects in the photos, composing a multimedia slide show and coordinating the display of the slide show with the church's AV team.

Among Angie's many talents is that she is an amateur family historian and geneologist. She has a flair for creating multimedia slide shows - a skill that she honed while creating shows for her own uncle and grandmother. She takes great care and pride in creating these tributes. As a result, Angie spent a whole day attending this funeral and then paid a good-bye visit to her own mother on the eve of our departure.
Back to the saga of departure day. In his haste to hit the road, Hank installed the ball mount (sometimes called a "stinger") in a position too far outboard of the truck bumper. This mistake became evident after we hitched the trailer and discovered that the safety chains wouldn't reach the truck. We had to unhitch the trailer and reposition the stinger.

Finally, with Hank still in a heightened state of stress, we launched ourselves in the direction of Starbucks to get properly caffeinated for the 4-1/2 hour drive to our first campsite. Upon exiting the coffee shop parking lot, we heard an alarmingly loud scraping sound. We pondered the source, but decided that perhaps the bikes had jumped or bumped the rack or the trailer as we crossed the dip in the driveway.
About 20 minutes into the drive, Hank noticed that the trailer brake controller we had installed in Angie's truck was flashing a strange message on it's display - "00" followed by ".c." followed by "00". Perfectly clear, right?

After several miles of fretting and pondering, we decided that this probably meant the unit was not serving its intended function of applying the trailer brakes when we applied the truck brakes. This was alarming given that we planned to cross two mountain passes and another 1,500-foot hill on our first day. We did not want to begin a 13,000-mile trip by overworking the truck brakes on the first day.
The brake controller had not been calibrated since the technician at the dealer had done it for us when we picked up the trailer in March. We had to Google the calibration instructions. Thank God for the Internet at times like this!

Armed with necessary knowledge, we pulled off the highway into an office parking lot to correct the problem. Easy fix. While maneuving around the parking lot to the exit, we crossed a couple of speed bumps. There was that loud scraping noise again! This time, we were in a location where we could get out of the truck to investigate. We discovered that we had not fully retracted the trailer hitch jack. The foot of the jack was barely above the surface of the road. Another rookie mistake. Thankfully, another easy fix.
Back on the freeway, our attention moved to the next highest priority problem. Our back-up camera wouldn't pair with the receiver mounted on our windshield. Google to the rescue once again. We learned that the back-up camera was powered by the running lights, which were not swtiched on. Doh!

As we began our climb up Snoqualmie Pass on I-90 east of Seattle, Hank noticed that the truck engine was revving at quite a bit higher RPMs than we had experienced when we drove the trailer back from the dealer in Yakima. After some consideration, we realized that this difference was likely due to the weight difference between an empty trailer and a fully loaded trailer and truck bed. We decided to reduce speed on upgrades to keep the RPMs below 4,500. Angie's poor GMC Canyon had never worked so hard. And we were only on the first hour of the trip!

Fuel efficiency was also reduced from 13 mpg on our first trip to 10.1. We are very glad that we decided to rent out our home in Kirkland during our trip. Otherwise, the fuel costs alone would have consumed our retirement savings!

Our route took us from I-90 to I-84 southeast to Yakima and the Tri Cities before crossing the Columbia River into Oregon on the way to Idaho. Our route choice was influenced by data that gas prices in California exceeded $6 per gallon. We saw a herd of Elk southeast of Yakima, while chatting with Angie's Navy friend, Tracy.  This trip is going to give us lots of opportunity for phone calls to catch up with with family and friends. If we don't call you, call us! We will welcome the diversion, believe me.

Our chosen route took us along the old Oregon Trail. We climbed Deadman's Pass to Poverty Bluff and reached our campsite at a state park at Emigrant's Pass at about 5:45 pm. We began to feel some empathy for our forebearers who crossed this route in the opposite direction nearly 200 years earlier. Our prarire schooner is a lot more pleasant conveyance, thank God.

The campsite had electric and sewer hookups, but no water. There was still trace snow on the ground at 3,500 feet. There were about a half dozen other trailer campers around us. We met a 70-ish man from Gig Harbor, who was travelling with his wife to national parks in Utah in a new A-line trailer.
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Angie heated one of the many pre-made caseroles and smoked meats that we had crammed in the fridge and freezer. Good thing our furnace worked well, because Hank had elected not to pack sleeping bags, given that most of our trip will be in warm summer weather.