A Rock and a Hard Place (Not So Happy Camp)

On Saturday, Kelvin and I drove the 120 or so miles to Happy Camp, CA (just a few miles, as the crow flies, to the Oregon border) to check out a doggie. More on this later, but let it be said that we have been actively looking for a family pet and will likely bring our baby home just after Christmas!





It was a lovely drive there on Highway 96, known as "Big Foot Scenic Highway" (with the most the Bigfoot sightings of any region in the country), alongside the Klamath River, and through the Trinity and Six Rivers National Forests. The weather was clear and fabulous and despite the curviness, we made pretty good time through the small towns and Hoopa Indian land.
We were amused by this decorated pine tree highway-side!



On our way home, we had a most unfortunate thing happen-- my Prius went over a rock in the road, which immediately caused some impressive smoke to spew into the car, and which triggered the "PROBLEM" light and an oil signal. We appeared to have a pretty good oil leak. Now, it was around 4:20 p.m., and just about 4 miles south of Happy Camp (population 1100) , which was about the biggest town (and with the best cell-phone reception) for 50 or so miles, so we actually had a few things going for us.

It could have been a lot worse:
- It could have been dark already
- It could have been rainy or snowing instead of clear
- We could have been in MN and not CA in December
- We could have not had our warm coats with us
- We could have had children (or a dog) in the car with us
- We could have had NO cell phone reception, rather than just spotty reception
- We could have had to work that night
- We could have been farther than the 120 miles away from home

However, what ensued was still rather frustrating. We called AAA immediately, who reported that they should have someone out to us by 5:00 pm and, since we were by a highway, they'd make us a priority. That was fine. It was still light out and my phone still had battery life. But when 5:30 came and went, we got a bit nervous. We called them back and the ETA was moved to about 7:00. Then, at 7:15, the ETA was around 9:30. I understood that we were in a rather remote area, but we really felt like we were getting the run around. We had no idea if anyone was going to get us, or where we'd go from there-- we were sure there were NO mechanics in about a 50-mile radius. (As a side note, we were worried, but let me put things in perspective when Kelvin reported that he still felt that "This is WAY better than when we were in India!").

We were also freezing (thankful, though, for blankets we kept in the car, warm jackets, and gloves). We were touched my the number (no fewer than seven, actually, and probably 60%) of cars which stopped when they saw our emergency flashers, to ask us if we needed help. There wasn't a whole lot they could do, but we needed a tow truck to get us out of there!!! We had a couple of "false alarms" with a Cal Trans snow plow truck that passed us, one time in each direction, which we really thought was our tow-savior, but alas, it was not (either time).

FINALLY, around 9:40 p.m., over five hours after our original call, a tow truck from Ft. Jones, CA, close to Yreka (one of the northernmost towns on Ca's Hwy 5) rescued us. We were so elated to see that truck. We discussed that at 10:00 p.m. in middle-of-nowhere, CA, there were no mechanics that would probably look at the car until Monday (and I was on call today), and so we were kind of stuck with towing the car back to Arcata which, at $4 per mile (apparently my AAA basic membership covers a measly 5 miles of towing), was not cheap! I also got quite carsick on the very winding roads on the way home, but our driver, David was quite good-natured about having to hose off his truck's side after I tossed my cookies. Ugh. David had the bright idea to tow our car straight to the Eureka Toyota dealership which has looked at my car before (and which has an after-hours key drop), and then he dropped us back at home. We were in bed by 3:00 a.m., after a very looong day.

Lessons learned:
1. Do not drive over rocks
2. Always have your phone charged
3. We need to invest in a better AAA membership

I'll probably find out tomorrow how much damage there was to my car but we are thankful to be home, safe and sound.