We left our campground this morning, headed toward Palo Duro Canyon. Fully recharged.  Spirits were great. The RV was running. The miles were rolling by. We stopped and filled up for under $3 per gallon.  High fiving over “cheap” Texas gas. We were already thinking about today’s views, the next campground, the next story. Life was good.

Then the engine lost power.

Again.

We remained optimistic enough to believe we might just lose a few hours.

Instead, we lost the trip.

We lost our RV.

The verdict was brutal.

New engine required.

Seventeen thousand dollars.

Seven to ten days before they could get the replacement engine in stock.

Five days of labor to swap it out once they had the engine.

Just like that, months of planning collided head-on with a hot block of metal buried under the hood.

There is a special kind of disappointment that comes when an adventure doesn’t end. It simply stops.

No grand finale.

No final campsite.

No victory lap down our street, where whoever is driving stops the car a hundred yards from home and claims to be too tired to finish the drive, begging for someone to take over. (It gets funnier every time, you’ll have to trust me on this.)

I won’t lie. It IS a gut punch.

The money is the money. Do I have a loose seventeen grand stuffed in a sock somewhere? No. It hurts.

But surprisingly, that’s not the source of disappointment.

This trip wasn’t just a line item in our budget.

It was ten National Parks.

It was adventures, new roads, and stories we hadn’t lived yet.

It was early mornings, late nights, and spending time with people we love.

It was asking, repeatedly, “I wonder what’s around the next bend?”

Today, the definitive answer turned out to be a Ford service bay in Decatur, Texas.

That wasn’t on the itinerary.

The funny thing about travel is that it teaches you flexibility, whether you want the lesson or not.

The fact remains, the memories don’t disappear because the engine died.

We still crossed the Mississippi River on foot.

We still wandered the grounds at Graceland.

We still explored the forests of Hot Springs before most people had their first cup of coffee.

We still spent a day doing almost absolutely nothing.

We still laughed.

We still got lost.

We still made our way West.

Maybe that’s the lesson.

The destination is never guaranteed.

The adventure shouldn’t be measured by how many miles we completed or how many parks we checked off a list.

It is measured by the days we were given.

Would I rather be writing tonight from Palo Duro Canyon?

Absolutely.

Would I rather be staring out at the second largest Canyon in the US?

Without question.

But tomorrow we’ll put our well-loved and formerly trustworthy RV on a trailer.

For those of you playing along at home, the tow bill for 1500 miles is $5000. (Fun fact, Good Sam roadside assistance will only get you to a place of repair. Once we were at the Dealership, that was it for all of our towing coverage even though they did NOT tow us to the dealer. I will be having a conversation with them when I get home. Their Platinum Roadside Assistance with Travel Assist did NOTHING for us today. Read the fine print.)

However, with that said, we cannot spend 15+ days in Decatur, TX to spend $17,000+ fixing the camper. Just not an option.

IF, that is the final cost, so be it, but it needs to be done in our town by our people. I need a second opinion at least. Right?

I do plan to fight a little with Ford as well. This truck only has 48,000 miles on it. It came from the factory with a 60K/5 year warranty, so we exceed the years, but not the miles. It may amount to nothing, but I feel like a phone call or two, and maybe calling them out on Twitter, is in order before I write another check. Right?

So, now we are at a cheap motel in Decatur, TX. (To add insult to injury, the Ford Dealer here would NOT let us camp the night in their parking lot. I will forgive them the $195 diagnostic fee they charged to ruin our trip, but c’mon…no camping? They could take a lesson from Walmart.)

I have spent the past hour canceling tour and lodging reservations. Tomorrow, we will meet the car hauler at the dealer to pick up the RV.

Our son is going to meet us there and carry us back to DFW where we will hopefully fly home tomorrow evening and start picking up the pieces.

I try to remain upbeat.

Truthfully, I’ve been somewhere between holding back tears and actively crying for most of the afternoon.

It feels silly to write that as a grown man sitting in a budget motel room in Texas, but there it is.

We’ve spent months planning this trip.

Months of researching campgrounds, plotting routes, making reservations, checking weather forecasts, buying gear, cleaning, tweaking, packing, upgrading, fixing little things on the RV, and dreaming about places we’ve wanted to see for years.

Today, I spent my energy canceling reservations.

Tours.

Campgrounds.

One cancellation email after another.

That may have been the hardest part.

Not the diagnosis.

Not the estimate.

Not even the tow bill.

The realization that the trip we’d been looking forward to for so long was suddenly over.

I know, no good story ever started, “Remember when our RV DIDN’T lose an engine in Texas…”

And somewhere down the road, after the frustration fades and the credit card bill stops making my left eye twitch, this will evolve into a fondly remembered family episode. Right?

We’ll laugh about the engine that self-destructed in Texas.

We’ll laugh about the hotel.

We’ll laugh about the tow bill.

We’ll probably even laugh about me crying into my pillow.

But tonight?

Tonight it just feels like a loss.

Plans change. That’s part of travel.

This is part of the story now.

I just wish it wasn’t this chapter.

Right?

So we’ll head East instead of West.

That wasn’t the plan.

 Still. Palo Duro Canyon will be waiting.

Maybe not this week.

Maybe not this year.

But someday.

Tomorrow, the Adventure continues.