Day Six: Wednesday, March 21: Flat Tire!

We got an early start the next morning for our longest drive yet to Guerrero Negro, and almost immediately after hooking up the Jeep and beginning to drive we got an alarm from our tire monitor – we had a flat tire!! We stopped and got out to inspect it, and you could hear air just streaming out of the tire!! I followed the tracks we’d made and found nothing that would have punctured the tire, so we pulled over to a spot where we would have easy access to the tire and unhooked and jacked up the RV with its built-in leveling jacks so Devin could crawl under and inspect the tire. It was no longer spewing air, and Devin figured out why – it was a deep but very narrow cut into the sidewall of the inside rear tire – probably happened when we pulled back onto the road over one of those rather sharp edges after pulling out. When we stopped before, all the pressure of the RV was on the tire and the cut was at the bottom, so it opened, but when the cut was at the top, it stayed closed, and when we had the leveling jacks down, the pressure was off the tires, so it stayed closed then, too. We may have had it for a few days before it leaked enough air to set off the alarm, but we sure wouldn’t want to get a flat tire in the RV while driving on the Baja Highways! There is really no place to pull over most of the time – we’ve come across broken down trucks that are just stopped in the lane with cones or triangles to warn traffic and the driver acting as flagger while waiting for some kind of help. We are very thankful for the tire monitor!! It could have literally saved our lives today – a wonderful Christmas gift from Devin’s dad.

Devin checking the air in the spare

Now the hard part is to find a way to fix it…. It’s not really repairable, since it’s a deep sidewall cut rather than a simple puncture. We do have a spare, but it came with the RV… checking it, Devin found that it is about 10 years old! It’s a new tire with the label still on, but has been sitting in the spare compartment of the RV since 1998. Some neighbors in the campground had a Sportsmobile with an onboard air compressor, so before they left, they came over and we filled the spare – no cracks in the sidewalls, so it’s probably good to go, but Devin is still nervous about driving the 18,000 pound RV on an old tire.

We drove into town in the Jeep in search of either a new tire, or more likely, someone to help us change the tire, since it’s a pretty major undertaking in an RV. We also needed to call our Mexican Insurance, because we had purchased the “Diamond Coverage” that included road service and repairs. The only phone in town was at the hotel, and they kindly let us use their front desk phone. Though we purchased our insurance from Vagabundos del Mar, an American travel club, the actual insurance came from Mexico, and when they answered the phone, it was not only in Spanish only, but it was a poor connection. Now my Spanish is conversant – enough to get by in most situations, but I am definitely not fluent! Telephone conversations are difficult under the best conditions, and with the poor connection, it was near impossible. Finally we got someone who spoke English and after much waiting and working on them figuring out where we were (Cataviňa was not on their map!), they said the nearest repair service was in Ensenada, 6 hours away! At least calling them gave us an excuse to go into the fancy La Pinta hotel – we of course took some photos!

We decided to look for more local help, and finding no one at the Llantera (tire shop) in the abandoned Pemex station, we talked to a guy who was selling gasoline out of the back of his pickup, with a sign that said “gasoline, aceites, mecanico.” The Mecanico part sounded promising. He said he could come out to Rancho Santa Ynez in about 20 minutes and help us – I asked what this would cost, and he shrugged and said it was up to us. I think this is not normally something he would do, but he was just being helpful. He showed up as promised with his wife and they checked out the situation – they didn’t have the right size lug wrench either, so they went back home to get another tool – twice! They were really nice and helpful, and I regret that I didn’t get photos – they seemed like down-to-earth good folks that had lived in the area their whole lives and appreciated its beauty and tranquility.

That night we met Ralph, who lives in the arroyo behind Rancho Santa Ines every winter – he had been out scouting the route for next year’s Baja 1000 and wants to have it come through Rancho Santa Ines next year! The people there were excited by the prospect because it would mean a lot of money for them. Ralph said the main guy behind the routing of the race was going to fly down that week to meet with him about it. He was very pleased with himself, and one of the great things is that it kept the race all on one side of the highway for much of the way – they don’t close any roads for the race and it must be really scary crossing the highway… or being on it when the race is on!

The best part about today was getting to watch another Cataviňa sunset:

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Go back to Day One of Baja Trip