Car Troubles

 

We left Montgomery, AL headed for Natchez Mississippi on June 1^st, but just west of Demopolis, AL we had a indicator light indicate that our car was overheating. We crept into Demopolis, bought some antifreeze and continued. But the temperature light kept going up and down from normal to overheated. So, we turned around to head back to Demopolis, but the car decided to stop running. Time to call AAA for a tow. We had lunch at about 1:00 in the trailer while waiting for the tow truck. It arrived about 3:00 and carried the car while towing the trailer on the back.

Our Car on the AAA tow truck

We dropped off the trailer in Cuba, AL on their lot and proceeded to Meridian, MS arriving at the Firestone car repair shop just before 5 PM. It was open and they took the keys and some basic information. We took an Uber to the Holiday Inn about 5 miles away. Calling in Monday morning, the manager said he probably couldn’t get to it today but would try on Tuesday. I called Tuesday afternoon, and there had been a communication issue, they hadn’t looked at it yet, but they would take a look now. Of course, we were imagining all the things that could have been wrong. Worse case had we fried the engine? What would we do? We had a trailer here, you couldn’t rent a car to tow a trailer that big. We decided we would repair the car up to an engine replacement, so we could keep camping for a few more years. About 5:30 we got a call from Firestone, the car had a leaky water pump, needed a new water pump, thermostat, and a radiator flush. The thermostat would be delivered the next morning; the car should be done that afternoon. Next day, we got a call about noon that the car was done at a cost of $1288. Another Uber ride to pick up the car and then we picked up the trailer, 18 miles down the road. We decided to do laundry at the hotel and then pick up our itinerary in St. Louis. This Natchez Trail camping trip would never spend any time on the Natchez Trail.

Our trail parked at the tow truck parking lot

We got up at 6AM this morning to get an early start to our long day of driving. We got out to the trailer and were boxed in by a vehicle and trailer in front, so while we could attach the trailer we couldn’t pull forward. And behind us was a fire truck, taking care of a diesel spill. We had decided to have cereal in the trailer for breakfast. While we were eating the fire trucks left and the owner of the car and truck in front showed up. Meanwhile the Enterprise truck next to us moved, so that we finally had a clear turn around to get out of the lot. We took most of the day to get to St. Louis, arriving just before 5 PM.