Windy Days

[richfaa]

Lonnie.. In the Northwest tier counties of Pennsylvania where I am from we call all that stuff "scrub pines"No offense intended. N.M is beautiful country..Did not realize it was so "hilly".I did not know there was any wind till I stepped out of the truck..never felt a thing driving..You folks who have experience handling these things in windy conditions were right and I was dead wrong.. however your caution is well taken when the 18 wheelers start pulling over we are with them.

[LonnieB]

Hey Rich, no offense taken, that was part of what I found humorous in your last post. Yes, most of the state is " hilly ", some is downright mountainous, and some is flat as a pancake. There are pretty drastic scenery changes from one part of the state to another, keeps things interesting.
I've enjoyed following your journey reading your posts, it's interesting and humorous. Keep them coming. Safe travels.

[Ozz]

,
Yep, been there last year, same deal. The stockyards West of Amarillo were blowing all the smelly stuff all over the roads, dust clouds everywhere, but it started to blow snow, Sue and I thought we would be blown into the ditch, couldn't find any Pink antifreeze, panic all around. We were pulling our 30' Keystone Sprinter with a 10 cylinder Excursion. What a nightmare, from Amarillo to Albuqerque, I had the accelerator on the floor, it was screaming, I was a nervous wreck. I stopped for a gas break and asked a woman at the station if it blew like this all the time, she said with a practiced tone, 'Nope, mostly blows harder.' I laughed, and nodded my head.
We were rolling at 50 MPH, floored, all the Diesels pulling 5ers and TT's were passing us like we were standing still. I asked Sue "How much do we have left on the credit cards?" I was going to trade the lame TV off at the next town. Didn't have the title with us This was the trip that we made, when the wind tore the awning off the side of the trailer. You know you are in trouble when the washes and canyons have wind socks alongside the road.
We finally got to Albuquerque to the American RV Park, the tumbleweeds were bouncing OVER the TT, no Pink antifreeze at Wal*Mart, so I bought a gallon of vodka, and a few bottles of Cranberry juice and winterized with Vodka.............Worked.
SO, Rich and Helen, I know what you are going through, at least the Mule is a puller.
Stay safe, Ozz & Sue

[richfaa]

Ozz..very funny but we can relate.. The smell in Amarillo caused us to lose our appetite for 100 miles. I like the Vodka/ Crandberry solution..You would have a great drink right out of the tap.. The V-10 was screaming at times but held the speed limit..Passed a similar F-350 Diesl pulling a Large open roads on one of those long N.M grades..and he radioed me what my turbo temps were..said we did not have one of those and he was impressed...Guess he could not hear the V-10 screaming at @ 4400 RPM's..The value of a diesel light duty truck pulling a heavy load up steep grades is noted..hope the 08's are going to be OK...we will have one if so.

[refocused]

In our experience traveling mostly across the deserts in CA, AZ, and NM, the wind blows hardest in the afternoon so we try to get our day's traveling in before noon. (of course, ya'll already knew that!) Coming back home last year in September from AZ the worst part of our trip was a whole day of wind all the way from Ft. Stocton, TX to San Antonio - just slowed 'er down and made it back just fine!

[richfaa]

We are learning..Now know what the wind socks along the road are for..We use trees for that up north.Hi winds and dust storms today..Don't know how hard they were blowing but we all slowed down. The Montana and the big F-350 did well..no strain.

[mjflora]

Thanks for all the input guys! We arrived today in Texas and we had no problems with the winds. There were high wind warnings all thru WY and we did great! Probably 40-45 consistent with gusts. Also wind thru Kansas and OK, but not so bad. Our mileage was acceptable too - ranged from 8 to 10.

This is our first trip with this rig (we had a motorhome for a short while before) and it's SO much better. We are truly happy campers!

After a month here we head to Tucson - so we'll get to experience those NM winds.

Happy Holidays to all!

[panhandlevern]

I tell my wife the aroma from the feedlots and dairies in the Panhandle country is the same smell as green dollars. Just hold your breath for awhile. We were in Montana a few years backand had a light breeze, they were all complaing, and I told them to try the wind in the OK panhandle. It blows and them it really blows. You get used to it. When in doubt, wait awhile.

Vernon & Martha
02 F250 PSD 7.3 4x4
00 3280rl Montana

[sreigle]

We have managed to never experience those feedlots west of Amarillo despite towing through there numerous times. However, south of Dalhart, TX, on US 54 we always seem to catch the feedlot odors. And our very first night of fulltiming was in Dodge City, KS, just south of a feedlot with wind blowing from the north. Fortunately our Montana kept those odors out.

We've towed that same stretch in NM numerous times, too, and have experienced heavy winds throughout this country. Also in our first week of fulltiming, while towing from Roswell to San Antonio, NM, we had strong gas sucking headwinds and no gas stations. We ran that V10 on the low fuel light for a very long and nervous stretch. We had quite an experience. It's documented in one of Vicki's epostcards...
http://geocities.com/stevereigle/Mar...Roswell_NM.htm