There and back, and there again....

There and back, and there again...., originally uploaded by jfinnan.

Where do I start? We made a 150 mile run today with the trailer before deciding to turn around. It became apparent that anything greater than a 6% grade was too much for the truck to handle. On one particular climb, I was in the lowest possible gear, and we were dropping in speed very quickly. We were down to 20 MPH and still dropping when we reached the top of that long climb! After a similar incident further down the road, we made the decision to abandon our quest. Not a bad decision considering that we were heading into even steeper terrain. I guess a"5000 lb. towing capacity" rated by the manufacturer does not take into account high ambient temperatures and semi steep grades. Not willing to abandon our vacation, we headed back to Grand Junction to drop the trailer and regroup. I bought a new tent, and we packed the truck over again for extended tent camping. Both Jill and I had seriously considered calling this day quits and just head home, but we have decided to persevere. It took us about 4 hours to pack again with camping in mind, but we got back on the road at 6:30pm. We wanted to make some progress today. The reason for the title is that we are in Green River, Utah, and we have been here three times today. Once this morning with the trailer on our original attempt. It took us 2 1/2 hours to get here... 105 miles... half tank of gas. That worked out to about 8 MPG. I normally get up to 20. Our second visit was on the aborted return. Our third, and hopefully last, visit is now. We are back, staying at a Motel 6, on our way to Zion National Park where we will be tomorrow afternoon. I should mention that the truck is now running great, and we made the run here at 70 MPH.
- Taken at 8:51 PM on July 29, 2008 - cameraphone upload by ShoZu