Our patience was rewarded in Southern Washington, when we finally came again to winery country. The new tires purred over the lovely american roads. We headed ever southward, hitting a few wineries on the way. We had now come about 1600km so far. The RV was running fairly well, with the Auto Park issue that had troubled us on the way home from Burn in the Forest not reappearing. There was a parking feature that locked the driveshaft when the vehicle was in park. Very handy for keeping the beast from rolling away. The idea was that it unlocked when you shifted into drive. We had found that in the chilly morning near Mount Robson we had stayed the night at, the auto park did not want to disengage. A little bit of fussing between reverse and neutral, and the auto park had released. It was on the list of stuff to do, but so were tires! One thing at a time. I was more worried about the old coolant system overheating on the steep hills that we were criss crossing. So far, so good. There was a decent amount of passing lanes, and no one had to be stuck behind us for too long.

One issue we did have to face with the RV was sometimes very small parking lots at the wineries. They were usually on fairly steep hillsides, and the owners were understandably reluctant to carve out some of their grape growing hillside to accommodate larger vehicles. Here, the tour buses had paved the way, and most wineries had sufficient space to park our RV, if not always the ideal amount of space. We drove and sampled, purchasing bottles that tickled our fancy. We had a wine case tucked into our shower in the RV, and we slowly filled it with bottles. Then we had to get another case box! We took turns sampling more and driving, and our pace was sedate enough to allow this. The wineries were reasonably spaced out here, not nearly as dense as south Osooyos. It was a lovely time, and eased the knots of preparation from my shoulders.

Finally we ended up in our last camp site of the trip, Scarce 100km away from the event, we had reserved a site weeks ago, and parked there for one last night. A few of us had been planning on meeting there, and sure enough, we found familiar faces! That night, we took on a friend who had driven straight down, giving her a couch to sleep on, instead of having to unpack her tent and sleeping bag. The next morning, we met another friend we hadn’t seen since Burn in the Forest. She had been hoping to do early entry on the Wednesday, but her ride share hadn’t been keen, or hadn’t been able. Since the early entry pass had cost an extra $70 CAD on top of the festival ticket price of about $400, it was sad to miss out. We mentioned we had extra carrying room, and she eagerly hopped aboard. The early entry gates were set to open at noon on Wednesday, with dire threats for anyone who came earlier than that. We filled the massive gas tank one more time, and rolled out for Eclipse Festival at about 11am. Soon!

The northern end of Washington turned out to be barren of wineries. I was shocked, as the southern BC wineries had run right up to the border. On this side however, the land was given over to fruit trees. We drove past them, searching in vain for a tasting room. Ah well, maybe in the next state. As we had been fussing the RV that morning, I had chanced to look at the drivers front tire. We had been mucking about with the airbags that assist the front suspension, and that had given me a good chance to see the tire. I had known there was some inside shoulder wear on that tire, and had taken pains to check for a loose ball joint when inspecting it before purchase. I hadn’t found one, the RV drove straight, so I wasn’t much worried. However, it appeared the wear had accelerated rapidly during our last BC trip. The inside shoulder was now dangerously worn down. Well, RV tires may be expensive, but towing an RV is even more expensive. We stopped in the town of Omak, and set about finding two RV tires. Two hours and a little over a thousand US dollars, and we were on our way again. The cost stung, but we congratulated ourselves on avoiding the tow bill… well, avoiding it this time for this reason. I won’t tempt the car gods by claiming to have avoided a tow bill altogether! The future is uncertain, especially where older RVs are concerned.