June 25, 2013
Halfway between Ketchum and Stanley is Galena Summit (8,701 feet). This is the highest summit of a highway in the Northwest (according to Wikipedia). Ray commented on the way to Ketchum that this was not a friendly road for RVs our size (24,000 lbs truck and trailer total) and he was glad we didn't select this route to Stanley. He always comments "Put that in your blog." Ray is confident 1000's of full time RVers are reading my blog -- I don't think so.
One the way back to Stanley, Ray found another reason to dislike Galena Summit. A falling rock hit our windshield and shattered it. Neither of us saw the rock hit. Ray saw a bright light as the windshield shattered and I just heard the loud noise. There was a pullout 10 yards away and we pulled off - far enough away from the cliff so no more rocks could hit us. I spoke first and asked Ray if he was alive (Of course he was alive, he was driving but the noise was that loud). 
The windshield had huge sunburst. I looked down in my lap and there was pieces of glass. Ray and I jumped out of the truck and assessed that we were ok and went into cleaning and shoring up the windshield. 
What I love about Ray is he always has stuff tucked away that we might need. Out came duct tape and we used it to pick up glass and stabilize the windshield. We were lucky that we are self sufficient and were not hurt because NO ONE stopped to see why we had emergency flashers going. A total of seven trucks/cars passed us including three forest service rigs. A courtesy stop to check we were ok or offer to relay a request for emergency services would of been appreciated.
We had no idea where to go to get the windshield repaired. So we decided to go to Stanley (home) and figure out our next steps. Its a little unnerving to travel with a shattered windshield but what choice did we have? This was not the type of adventures we were talking about when planning our year of full-timing travels.
We arrived in Stanley at 5:30 p.m. Mountain Time. Thirty minutes before our insurance company closed in Oregon (pacific time). We met up with our friend, Mary Ann, who went into overdrive to help us find resources to repair the windshield and a place to sooth our nerves.
The insurance company emailed us a name of a glass company. Ray called them Wednesday morning from the land line at Torrey's office (no cell service at the RV park) and believe it or not, they had a windshield in stock. It is twenty or fifty miles away -- Ray kept on changing the story. He grabbed his rod, some flies from my box and headed for a day of windshield repair and fishing.
I'm finishing this blog entry and going to do the laundry. I might go down the river at Torrey's RV to see it I can catch my first fish.
NOTE: Ray says 20% of his retirement has been dedicated to repair. First the slide on the RV and now the windshield. He is feels this is not the retirement he was expecting. I reminded him that we could be sitting in a house and that would lower the risk of repairs but also lower the excitement of visiting new places and experiencing all sorts on new things...including a rock in the windshield.
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