Elk Hunt 2014 - The Road Trip, Day One..Hartland to Fort Morgan, Colorado

They say that when life gives you lemons, make lemonade.  So on day one of our 2014 elk hunt, Dad and I made lemonade.

We started our day as planned. We departed Hartland just after 4:00am, with a goal of making it west of Cedar Rapids, Iowa before making our first stop to empty coffee from our bladders.  All was going according to plan as we navigated our way through the dark, foggy and misty morning.  We witnessed an awesome sunrise as we rose out of the Mississippi valley into Iowa.  After we hit  westbound I-80, we finally decided to stop at the next Rest Stop.

As I pulled off the freeway and was nearing the parking area I suddenly lost the power steering.  Thankfully this wayside had  parallel parking rather than angle parking, which allowed me to ease the truck into a parking spot without too much effort.  As soon as we stopped, Dad noticed steam coming from under the hood.  We popped the hood and quickly determined that we were going to be here a while.  The serpentine belt was very loose, and there was a fairly steady stream of antifreeze leaking from somewhere.

After a call to AAA, and a flatbed tow truck ride, we met the Service Manager at the Noble Dodge dealer in Newton, Iowa.  They were able to pull the Dodge into a service bay right away, and shortly thereafter informed us that the water pump had failed and that they would need a couple hours to fix it.

So, rather than wallowing in anger and frustration, we made lemonade.  We walked the new and used car lots looking at cars.  We took a 2014 4-door Jeep Rubicon for a test drive, and swapped stories with the sales and service team.  The time flew by, and next thing we knew we were on the road again heading west on I-80.  A total of 3 hours and 20 minutes of lost time.

We stopped in Fort Morgan, Colorado to buy our Colorado hunting license, and decided to stay at the local Comfort Inn. A total of 942 miles today.....not bad considering.