Day #5 -- Wicked Winds in Wyoming

We said goodbye to Star Valley Ranch before 10am and refueled at Alpine. Pleasantly surprised to see we averaged 7.4mpg. 

We retraced the route to Jackson up the Snake River,where we shopped yesterday. We were a little concerned about squeezing our 40' coach + tow car thru the shopping area, especially having to make a left turn in the middle, but since our Garmin (made for trucks and RV's) routed us that way, we trusted her and didn't have any problems making the turn. 

Just north of Jackson is The Grand Teton National Park. The Tetons are amazingly beautiful...still had a bit of snow at the top. Also saw lots of buffalo within a fenced area to the right of the road...many people had stopped to take pictures. 

There was plenty of beautiful scenery for about the first 2 hours of our drive today. Our route took us up to the Togwotee Pass at 9564' elevation, aka The Continental Divide, and the coach did great. I don't think we ever dropped below 45mph. 

But from there it was downhill, literally and scenery-wise. The greenery turned to brown with spots of green and the trees became bushes and weeds. 

After 382 miles we arrived at the KOA campground in Douglas, WY (just east of Casper) where we had reservations. This time the Garmin was taking us a couple miles out of the way because she thought the road to the KOA was unpaved. We decided to take the more direct route that Google maps showed and the road turned out be paved, taking us right to the KOA. 

We had another pull-thru site and they met our request to NOT face into the sun. After dinner while Rich was fiddling with the rear camera, the wind really started to kick up. Before we could retract our awning, the wind detached it from the top of the coach! It happened so fast! I jumped up, went outside and grabbed it to steady it and called out to Rich. Another camper came up to help me keep it steady. Rich hadn't heard me so I went to the rear of the coach to get him. A second camper came to help. We were able to wind it up and retract the arms but didn't have a way of securing it. Rich ran 20' of duct tape across the top of the fabric to secure it to the roof and then used wire ties, wire & screws to secure the arms to the coach as best he could. Those Wyoming winds are nasty!

After closer examination, everything appears to be ok except the 'soft-connect' which is the 4.5"x245" piece of fabric that connects the awning to the rig. It had sheared right down the line (after all, it's 12 years old). When it was all secure, Rich told the story about when he was on his motorcycle at another KOA in South Dakota years ago, and a hurricane came up during the night and flipped a 5th wheel onto its side. Needless to say, he's leery of staying at any more KOAs on this trip. 

Thankfully the previous owner of this rig had kept all of the manuals for all of the working parts of this coach in file folders in a carrying case. Rich pulled out the one for the awning and was able to identify the replacement part we need. Now we just need to figure out how to get it. Might have it shipped to his brother Jim's place on Harsens Island since we'll be there on Aug 11 for an extended stay...need to see how tomorrow's drive goes though to determine if it's truly secure enough to make it that far. Fingers crossed and prayers said :)

The wind died down about 30 minutes later and we had a restful sleep.

Having trouble getting the pictures onto this IPad, so come back to this day's events later when hopefully we'll have the pictures up.