Day 7 - A day full of mercy and grace and blessings - once we stopped and looked for it

Day 7 - We were headed from the Grand Tetons to San Francisco. I (despite Ryan's protesting - before we left home) that we couldn't do the 15 hour drive - it would just be too much. We only had one afternoon to spend in San Francisco so I wanted to be as close as possible. So, I picked Reno. I don't know why exactly but it was about the distance I wanted. We got up early - we had 749 miles to travel - approximately 11 hours and 49 minutes. Ryan and I got up at the crack of dawn and headed out. It was cold, cloudy and lots of snow on the ground. We had been driving about an hour - making pretty good time when we started noticing signs for warnings that we were headed for the Teton pass. We started seeing signs of a truck on an incline. As we progressed, we started seeing that it started giving grade percents. The final portion was a 10% grade up and a 10% grade down. My normal, go-with-the-flow, nothing-ruffles-his-feathers husband was sweating it! We were going 5 miles and hour. Then, it started snowing. It was absolutely crazy. But my rock star handled it like a pro!

The landscape when we were leaving the campsite right outside the Grand Tetons.

The view headed up the pass.

When it finally leveled out before we began the descent down. Well, about half an hour after catching our breath, we were headed into Idaho. All of a sudden, there was a loud crash and everything started bouncing around. Ryan pulled over on the side of the road and another car stopped up ahead of us. Two men got out of the car and came to see if we were alright. Apparently, unbeknownst to us, a large rock rolled off the mountain, bounced over the barrier and crushed our tow dolly tire. I mean crushed. At this point, we had only owned the crazy thing for a week! It never occurred to me to have a spare tire!

It was 40 miles to the next town. So, forty-five minutes and 3 stores later, we were back in business with a new tire and rim. All in all, it added three extra hours into our already long day. We were so grateful that it hit where it did, though. And thankful that the people stopped to tell us what had happened and helped give us a name / direction of where to head. Did I mention it was pouring rain and a temperature of 38 degrees? As Ryan and Ian headed in search of a tire, the rest of us sat on the side of the road waiting. Oh, and we "thought" we had Good Sam - roadside assistance, where they would have brought us a tire and rim but come to find out, we only had the discount service package not roadside assistance.

Did I mention that it was 38 degrees? We were turning into popsicles by the time the guys got back!

I had told little man that as soon as we got back on the road, he could cut. We had barely pulled back onto the road when he got to cutting!

Our 11 hour drive ended up taking 15 after all. We ended up getting to Reno at 11 pm. The manager there was so kind to us. We had reserved the last space in the whole RV park and he was afraid someone would come in and take our spot (which happens way more than I realized). He parked his car in our place to reserve it and then I called him when we were almost there. I told him our plans, that we were headed out, again, at the crack of dawn - trying to get to San Francisco before the day was wasted. He checked us in and out then. So, all in all, our 7 hour stay in Reno was a positive experience!

Our view as we were setting up camp.

Just to prove we really were there. Here's our 7 hour pit stop site! On to San Francisco...