It was finally time to head west. I rented a small Uhaul trailer, loaded it and my Jeep with all my prized possesions, and left for the mountains, with Sarah as my copilot.
We made a stop in St. Louis to visit the St. Louis Arch, but didn't get to go to the top because of our poor timing. It is a very impressive structure though, and I recommend that anyone who gets the chance visit and take the ride to the top.
So far, everything was going smoothly and the Jeep was running great. Well, near the end of the second day of driving, my luck ran out. The nut that holds the ball to the hitch had backed off on the highway, and one big bump sent the trailer out of control. Turns out those safety chains do actually serve a purpose. The trailer tugged and jerked in every direction, yanking the back of the Jeep, but I managed to wrestle the whole caravan to the side of the highway and get it all stopped. I was afraid to see the damage that the tongue of the trailer had inflicted on the back of my Jeep, but after looking, found out that I had gotten rather lucky. Two small scratches/dents on the left side of my bumber were the extent of the damage. Now, what to do about the broken hitch? The nearest town and our destination for the night) was 40 miles ahead (Colby, KS - near the west side of Kansas). There was nothing behind us, as anyone who's driven through Kansas can attest to. We'd just passed an exit with a gas station and a truck stop and decided to go back and try our luck there. I blocked the wheels on the trailer, unhookoed the chains, and drove the Jeep across the median. We struck out at the gas station, no hitches, but walked over to the truck shop with our fingers crossed. They didn't have any ball hitches either. Damn. Well, a trucker inside the shop heard our quandry and asked what size ball we needed, he just might have one in his tool box. "Two inch," I said, but thought there was no chance a big rig trucker would have a two inch ball hitch in his truck. After a couple minutes of digging around though, he pulled out just that. I parked my jeep next to his rig and he helped install the new ball hitch, using a sledge hammer this time, to make sure the nut wasn't going anywhere. He wouldn't accept anything from me in return, but hopefully knowing that he litterally saved our trip will be enough consolation for him. It was rather refreshing to experience such generosity from a complete stranger. Pay it forward, anyone? After that fiasco, we made it to the cabin with no more problems.
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