Labor on Labor Day?

I hated Labor Day as a kid. We cleaned the garage, we weeded the yard, we cleaned the house, there was always a project to keep us busy. Why couldn't we enjoy a day off school and work by boating, or going to movies, or going camping or doing SOMETHING fun?!

Now that I'm an adult, I choose the Labor Day activity! :) This year, McKay and I decided to go camping. Why wouldn't we? :)

Our weekend began on Thursday. We drove the trailer up American Fork Canyon on Thursday night and left it to secure our space. (Trip #1) While we were leveling the trailer, it sounded like air was leaking out of somewhere...the tire maybe? We figured there wasn't much we could do about it that night, so we didn't worry. Instead, we drove back down the canyon, and went home. (Trip #2)

Friday. After work, we drove back up the canyon. (Trip #3) We enjoyed a yummy dinner and checked the tires on the trailer. Of course, one of the tires were flat. Lovely.

Saturday. We woke up early, enjoyed a yummy breakfast, got cleaned up and headed back down the canyon. (Trip #4) I know...we were at our camp less than 24 hours...but our niece was getting baptized that day. On the drive down the canyon, the Truck was hard to steer and sounded funny. We added power steering fluid and that seemed to be the problem. After the baptism, we headed back up the canyon to enjoy our camp. (Trip #5)

Sunday. We felt like we should visit family, so why not drive down the canyon again? (Trip #6) At the bottom of the canyon, the truck sounded terrible again and was hard to steer. When we looked underneath, there was power steering fluid all over. We called a friend who told us it may just be a hose that would be an easy fix. We drove the truck to his place, picked up our car and drove back up the canyon without visiting family. (Trip #7) Once we were back at camp, McKay decided to fix the flat on the trailer. When the trailer was jacked up and the spare was on, he realized that the jack he was using had sunk in the soft dirt and he couldn't get the jack to release and drop down because of the angle it was now sitting in! He decided to try digging under it...which wasn't much help. After a struggling with the shovel he figured out how to release it with a wrench instead. With that finally fixed, we felt good enough to go to sleep and enjoy a cool night in the mountains.

Monday. Morning started off with bad news. Our friend called with word on the truck. The rack and pinion steering had a gasket that had gone out and needed to be replaced. The ENTIRE steering needed to be replaced. Because we have only had the truck a little over 2 years, we figured the warrantee should cover it so we told him not to fix it. He said that it was too dangerous to drive though. Well, now we were stuck up in the canyon with a trailer and a car...which brings us to...you guessed it..(Trip #8) Back down the canyon we called Toyota. Closed for the holiday. We called friends and family for a flat bed trailer to tow the truck. Not big enough. We called the tow company. Twice as much on a holiday. We decided to leave the truck at our friend's house until the morning. We then drove to Centerville to get my Dad's truck and drove back up the canyon. (Trip #9) When the trailer was all packed and loaded we backed the truck up but because McKay's truck has a 6" lift and my dad's truck has no lift, the tongue of the trailer couldn't go low enough to hook up to my dad's truck.

We had to try to back the truck onto blocks to raise it, but we were on a hill and had to have momentum to get it there without hitting the trailer. By some stroke of luck we got it where it needed to be...and yes, drove back down the canyon. (Trip #10) We were tired. We were worn out and were convinced that we had just had the worst weekend ever. It was late. We still had to empty the sewer on the trailer while we had a truck to tow the trailer with. Mind you, its Labor Day. There was a long line of people. When it was our turn, McKay was ready. He had his gloves, he had the hose where it needed to be, he opened the cap...and was BLASTED with...sewer!! BLASTED!! I was standing behind him and I was blasted with it too!! So disgusting!! Gloves do no good when it all hits you in the chest.

What happened is, that someone had pulled our sewer release either while it was parked at the storage unit or while it was sitting on the mountain. Not funny. But I'm sure we were sheer entertainment to the nice people in line behind us.

When we got back in the truck, McKay summed it up perfectly when he said, "What a shitty weekend". I had to agree.