Day Nine of the Utah trip was Saturday October 24 and was departure day. We got up early in the morning and hit the road for home. Rob was driving separately as he was heading back to his home in Vernon. Brad and I were in my truck, and we pushed it hard, hoping to make it as far as Great Falls. We probably would have made it if my truck hadn't broken down. I had been having minor issues with the clutch in my truck before we even left on the trip. I took the truck in to a dealership in Edmonton before I left, and had them go over it. I told them that I was going on a long road trip and didn't want to have any issues. I told them of my concerns with the clutch and asked them to check it. The dealership charged me over $1000 for an inspection and a bunch of maintenance work that included an engine flush, oil change, break fluid flush, etc. They assured me that the clutch was fine. The clutch slipped a little on the way down to Utah, but on the way home it got particularly bad. Every time we hit a bit of an incline the clutch slipped and regularly kicked out the cruise control. Brad was driving when we attempted to climb the big hill over the continental divide at Butte Montana. The clutch finally gave up and we only made it half way up the hill before we lost it. We had to roll back down the hill backwards, eventually finding a spot to roll across Interstate 15 to the downhill side and made our way back into town. By this point it was Saturday evening at about 6:00PM. We called for a tow truck to haul the truck in to a repair shop, and checked in to a local motel. As it was Saturday evening, and everything would be closed until Monday morning, we reluctantly and somewhat anxiously settled in.
With nothing to do on Sunday but wait, we decided to check out the sites of Butte. There wasn't a lot open at this time of year. We called for a taxi, to take us up to the Mining Museum. There must be only one cab in town because we had to wait for a while for him to show up at our hotel. In fact, when the front desk called for us, he informed them that he was busy with a passenger and would be about half an hour. Eventually he showed up and we climbed in, asking for a ride to the museum. There was no meter and he just charged a fare based on a zone system that divided up the town. He eventually dropped us off at the University. As he pulled away we quickly realized that he had dropped us off at the wrong museum. This was the mineral museum at the University, and it was closed. We walked about a quarter mile over to the mining museum and spent the afternoon there. Butte is referred to as the richest hill in the world and it had some large copper deposits, that included some silver and gold as well. One large open pit mine is still operating but all of the underground mines are now closed. This museum included a lot of equipment, artefacts and historical memorabilia from that era. It was really interesting. Unfortunately the tour into one of the underground mine shafts was not operating on this day. By late afternoon, when we had finished exploring the museum. We considered calling the cab for a ride back to our hotel. Rather than wait for him again, we decided to walk the three or four miles back to our hotel.
We walked through the old historic downtown of Butte. There were a lot of historic old buildings that dated back to the mining boom of a hundred years ago. This included hotels, shops and commercial buildings, as well as victorian style mansions of some of the mine owners. Under different circumstances I might have been inclined to photograph some of them with my big view camera. As it was I could only summon up the ambition to take a few record shots with my phone.
On Monday morning we walked the couple of miles over to the repair shop that was going to repair the clutch on my truck. Initially they weren't overly forthcoming with information, or particularly friendly. We hung around town for the day and by late afternoon it became evident that they weren't going to finish until Tuesday. There aren't a lot of restaurants in Butte, but there sure area a lot of casinos. There must have been about a dozen of them within a one mile radius of our hotel. Most of them were fairly small, not much larger than a double garage. Some were even located in gas stations and convenience stores. None of them seemed to be overly busy. Some of these had restaurants and between one of these, and some fast food places, we were getting pretty tired of the food.
On Tuesday morning we headed back over to the repair shop. We hung around there for most of the day, and learned that they had cracked one of the bolt ears on the bell housing of my transmission when trying to install the new clutch on Monday. By about noon on Tuesday the bell housing had been welded and machined and the new clutch was going back in. By this time, the staff at the shop were becoming a lot more talkative and friendly and we spent most of the day visiting with a couple of ladies there. By 4:00 in the afternoon the truck was done. After settling up the bill of $1500 USD we hit the road. We drove straight through, all the way home to Edmonton, and arrived home at about 3:00 in the morning Wednesday. I have to say that Brad was a pretty good sport about it all despite the fact that he missed out on a couple of days work. All the same it was kind of nice to have some company while having to endure this ordeal.
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