Maiden Voyage, Day 5: The Ditch
The fresh morning air beckoned us to the rows of Christmas trees. I grabbed my mug of tea, donned my flannel jacket (the one that I bought specifically for mornings like this), and walked the tall grass. We visited the horses, smelled the pines, greeted our neighboring campers, and marveled at the vast field of corn down the hill. It was official; we had the camping bug.
To keep the camp-tastic feeling going, I had already taken to my trip planning apps and found ourselves a Harvest Host in upstate New York, on a combined ranch/animal sanctuary. Spending time with animals has been one of the most fun parts of RV life, and the scenery at this ranch looked incredible. So off we went, hitching back up and taking the back roads through Amish Country, to the interstate.
Unfortunately, the high didn’t last long, and things started getting bumpy. Really bumpy. The roads heading up through the Poconos had me feeling carsick. The change in road conditions made Anthony need to constantly adjust his trailer brake gain – something that we weren’t even sure we were doing right! We tried to be as diligent as possible, pulling off and checking our tire pressure, hitch, etc. Of course, pulling off is easier said than done when interstates 81 and 88 have no rest areas, and we’re 56 feet of length trying to navigate into backcountry gas stations. Thankfully, everything looked good, and adjustments to the trailer brake gain seemed to be helping, but this travel day was, without a doubt, the most tiring and tedious one so far. All the Zen from the Christmas tree farm had dissipated, and now we had our eyes locked on finally arriving to the ranch.
We have watched a lot of videos of mishaps on the road. The veteran RVers all offer the same words of caution: Don’t travel while tired, hungry, or needing to use the bathroom. Don’t feel rushed. When you get to a new spot, GOAL: Get Out and Look. I’ll preface the next part of our story with this: We did try to satisfy our hunger and fatigue. The lack of places to pull off made it very challenging. We were able to take turns using the restroom while pulled over to tend to our tires. I picked up some fast food, which Anthony ended up not being able to eat because there were no spots for us to park. Then, to add to our plight, our GPS started acting up again. I still rack my brain as to what we could have done better in this situation, because we felt forced to continue driving, when we knew we needed more of a break. But, I do know what we could have done differently once we arrived to our destination.
The greeting from the Harvest Host was everything we could have wanted: 4 happy-go-lucky dogs surrounding us with wagging tails and vivacious barks, and a host who is also an RVer, with her beautiful Tiffin sitting in the driveway. She directed us about 100 yards up the road and warned us to turn wide, as there is a ditch on the right side. With smiling faces we obliged and drove up the road, where she would meet us on foot.
Fast forward 3 minutes and we were not smiling anymore. What we thought was a wide turn was certainly not, and we had bottomed out the back passenger side of our trailer. To make matters worse, our trailer tilted into the ditch, hitting one of the side panels into a fence post. It’s a strange feeling, when the very situation you dread from the moment you pick up the RV, is happening right before your eyes. But you have a choice: freak out, or come up with a solution. Our host, who hails from Germany, quite naturally opted for the latter, and we will forever be grateful for her solution-focused mindset. Turns out that, when people put their heads together, a solution does in fact appear. We figured out a way to lift the back of the trailer out of the ditch, but we were missing the proper equipment. Time to call roadside assistance.
We’ll preface this next part by saying that, this was just our experience – and our first experience, at that – with roadside assistance, and we’re not about to discredit an entire company based on one situation. However, this is the truth of what happened.
The ranch had no service, but our host Judith graciously let Anthony connect to WiFi to make calls. He got in touch with Good Sam Roadside, who said they’d send a tow truck out, and he should arrive in 60-90 minutes. While we waited, Judith took me over to meet all the animals so I could get my mind off the disaster that we found ourselves in. While we visited the donkeys, horses, and goats, we talked about RV Life, and Judith assured me that accidents happen to every RVer at one point or another. Sure, it stings a bit more on day 3, but it happened, and we just need to use it as a learning experience.
And learning experience it was. Anthony and I took some time to scope out the scene of the accident, trying to figure out where we went wrong, where we could have turned better, and most importantly, how we should have gotten out and looked at the turn ahead of time. Rookie mistake. Judith and her friend Mark offered to saw down the fence post to eliminate any further damage to the side of the rig, and afterwards, we had a clear view of the damage, which was only a dent and a little bit of paint smudge. Nothing we can’t live with. The back corner of the rig was still in question, as it was bottomed out into the pavement underneath it, but at first glance we weren’t expecting much damage from that either. It looked like the road took the hit worse than the trailer.
90 minutes passed and there was no word from the tow truck driver. Anthony made several attempts to call and get his ETA, but was sent to a full voicemail box each time. Finally, he called Good Sam back, and after a few failed attempts on their end to reach the driver, we concluded that this was a bust. Anthony insisted that they try and find someone else to come out, as it was starting to get dark. They said they’d call him back when they found someone (spoiler alert: they never did). As the sun set, Judith’s friend Mark advised us to call a local tow company instead. He said they were reputable and would be able to get us out in no time, and he also offered to call on our behalf. Perspective is a funny thing, when Mark is talking to the towing company and says “Looks like it’s an easy fix” when referring to our trailer tipping over into a 3-foot-deep ditch. We just hoped he was right.
The local tow truck driver came from 40 minutes away and, after serving us many compliments on the sturdy frame of our rig, got down to business. Mark, Judith, Anthony, and I gathered wooden planks to help build a platform for the tires, and the tow truck driver attached cables to try and extricate the back end of the trailer out of the ditch without causing more damage. It worked – and was a true testament to what can happen when there is know-how and proper equipment.
Once we were officially out of the ditch, we broke a cardinal rule of newbie RVing, which is to never let someone else drive our rig. We didn’t care at that point. We trusted Judith, it was her property, and it was dark. She needed to be the one to navigate around the ditch. We all spotted her as she took the turn of dread, and seeing that even she was a mere 2 inches from bottoming out herself, in some strange way made Anthony and I feel better. It wasn’t just a newbie thing; it’s a really tough turn in a really difficult-to-maneuver rig.
Judith parked us into our spot for the night as we went to pay the tow truck driver – who only charged us $14 more than Good Sam was going to charge us, for the record. Next thing we know, Mark is running back to the truck driver, telling him to wait, that Judith got stuck in the wet ground out back. Now I wouldn’t say it was panic that set in. More like bewilderment at this point. Unfortunately, the tow truck driver wasn’t sure he could even help if the ground was that soft, but thankfully, right as he was explaining this, Judith came around to tell us that Clyde’s 4-wheel-drive kicked in and towed the trailer right on out. Props to Clyde the Beast!
We all breathed a collective sigh of relief, and the tow truck driver went on his way. We said good night, and Judith told us to not dare leave until she was around to help navigate us out. Our thoughts exactly.
We poured ourselves into bed, thinking the worst was behind us. We had no idea what was in store for us on day 2 at the ranch.
To be continued…
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Nicole Anderson