Just a-Waitin'
~Tuesday, August 9, 2022~
Day 786
Day 50 of Alaska Trip
The day started off addressing the underside of the trailer. In order for us to make today’s trip to Soldotna a successful one, Jeff needed to take off the bolt that attaches the lift kit to the axle which in turn all connects to the trailer. It wasn’t easy, but he managed to get it off with the little help of engine grease along with his brut strength. 💪
Soldotna is about 40 minutes away from our campsite, not too bad when you’re desperately in need of tools to fix a problem. Luckily, he was able to find exactly what he needed without having to buy an entire set of wrenches. All for the price of about $50. And since we were back in cell reception, we could follow up on any emails from Lance. We had received one message from Raeshell in the parts department at Lance. “It looks like the shipping cost for those SWING-OUT BRACKETS will cost around $55 and the part itself…..$58.” Wait a minute. We didn’t order swing-out brackets. Oh my goodness, she’s sent the wrong part. After all the detailed drawings and photos we had sent, how could this happen? Immediately, we got on the phone unable to reach her in our timeframe of having reception. So we left a message and an email hoping to have an answer tomorrow. We’re really keeping our fingers crossed that she actually did send the right part and simply got our email mixed up with someone else. And we’re also keeping our fingers crossed that we don’t have to pay someone to drive out to our campsite for the repair. As Jeff says, it’s not a terribly difficult job and is about 95% sure he can fix it. If it all goes as planned, we really dodged a potentially dangerous, costly situation. Believe me, we’re grateful it is only delaying us a week.
It was good to respond to a few emails and return a few phone calls before heading back. Jeff had a few items to pick up as well for his heavenly creation of French Onion Soup, a perfect rainy day selection. I’d share the recipe with ya’ll, but he never seems to use the same ingredients twice, always improving on his technique. This weather is really becoming a downer. I think since it’s compounded with being stranded at a campsite where our pace has come to a halt, it’s making it harder to be without that good ‘ol sunshine.
Before launching into dinner mode, we had a break in the rain to take an early evening walk around all 3 loops of our campground. Out of 60 sites, there are probably only a handful of campers staying here, a far cry from the full campground we saw last weekend. But, it’s summer and the kids are still out of school. Where is everybody? And it’s summer. Maybe the rain is keeping everyone away. I’m sure as we get closer to the weekend, we’ll see more of an influx of people. Sadie relished in the fact she had the whole lakeside beach to herself while Jeff and I enjoyed the jumping fish entertainment from shore.
Oh and the soup 🍲…….soothing and deeeeelicious!!!!