Through the flats and other repair issues: Venice to the Jersey Shore

One flat tire is no big deal. In almost 40 straight hours of motoring from Venice Beach to Columbus, it’s sort of a nice break. With our newly-acquired sponsor HeadBlade (The Ultimate Head Shaving System), we were much less attractive to drug-searching State Troopers who had given us three driving breaks in ’04 (see last year’s travel diary).

This being our first flat in the Airstream, we were careful not to change it too quickly – a second flat might be a source of disappointment if it took longer to change than the first. We set the bar at 90 minutes, including some adjustments to the hub cap and some star gazing in the open country sky. Should another tire fall flat, we welcomed the challenge of setting a new record.

We left a few days early for the Cincinnati AVP tournament to work on my grandma’s house in nearby Columbus. After a couple days of cleaning house, we were on our way to pick up our friend and co-ed partner of choice, Susie Turner. On the way to the Columbus airport, we suffered breakdown #1. Hardly being bashful, the home decided to spew her transmission fluid in the middle of the busiest intersection of Ohio State University.

AAA is a fantastic service, but in the time it took for the oversized tow-truck to arrive, we had had company over, sent Jack and Susie out for dinner, they had eaten, and returned after getting ice cream. Just as a young but ornery officer paid a visit, suspicious that we were merely shamefully attempting to get attion for our new sponsor (www.HeadBlade.com), our tow-truck rescuer arrived at our corner of 17^th and High St. After towing us 8 blocks to grandma’s, the driver discovered that a transmission line had merely become unclamped. Jack had it clamped in under five minutes, (pretty high bar) and we were off to the sand courts on campus to play with the locals. The locals, after some ill-advised betting, ended up treating us to more ice cream at the local United Dairy Farmers.

The Cincinnati AVP venue was tricky to find, but well worth the effort. We were told to look for the tennis center, but turns out the 10,000-seat tennis stadium that was retrofitted to house the volleyball tournament sits within a golf course. Thanks to cell phones and a number of fellow players arriving at the same time, we managed to get there and park within a stone’s throw of the outer courts.

Accommodations for golf and tennis players appear to be a step up from the usual beach volleyball Players’ Tent. We were treated to a fantastic food spread, TV w/remote, air conditioning, and unbelievably, indoor showers. The promoters apparently didn’t get the memo that qualifiers don't eat, drink, or bathe. Even once showers were taken off the menu, we were still feasting on roast beast and fighting over the remote.

After splitting our matches in the Friday Qualifier, Jack, Susie, and I were free to race to the Jersey Shore for a $7,500 event in Asbury Park, New Jersey that started the next day. With time to spare, we were cruising along highway 70 until we realized, with the aid of Flat Tire #2, that we were driving without a spare.

Somewhere in West Virginia exists a town 70,000 people. Despite having 14 tire shops, this town had not a single tire that would fit the home. Ordering one was a possibility, but we had to cover 300 milesby morning, and it was 6 p.m. To be fair, Jack had pointed out our lack of a spare when we had passed a Wal-Mart somewhere in Columbus. To increase our pre-tournament sleep, and vaguely cognizant that the right tires wouldn’t be stocked at Wal-Mart, I had vetoed stopping. I therefore felt the full weight of the RV on my shoulders when our temporary hometown failed to produce a single 19.5-inch tire.

A truck-stop attendant assured us that truckers routinely cover ground with one functioning tire on a set of 2 dualies, so we expanded the phone search by a hundred miles. Miraculously, after 2 hours of calling we found a truck-repair place with two(!) of our tires in stock. We white-knuckled it on half a dualie for an hour, then pulled up at arguably the best tire shop in the world for our purposes. It not only had two new tires, but also had two used tires with decent tread for $60 each (the new ones were $160 each). Up $200 dollars, armed with a spare, and with the weight of the home lifted off my shoulders, we were on our way.

Sorry to point out: when we were driving on the flat, a friend had called. “Didn’t you just have tire issues?” she asked. “They've put in lots of miles….They were tired.” Needless to say, as we pulled up to the beach in Asbury Park at 3 a.m. for the 8 a.m. tournament, so were we.