A few weeks ago, I made my annual trip to upstate NY to meet my brother-in-law for a week of fishing.  Trip normally takes me about 7 hours.  About ½ way into the drive close to the PA/NY border – BAM!  I see a lot of white smoke in the rearview mirror.  Pull over immediately to find one of the leaf springs on the boat trailer snapped.  It was Sunday late morning and it took me several phone calls to find a tow company to rescue me and fix the trailer - maybe.  After a 2 hour wait, he arrived and loaded the boat and trailer on his flatbed and we went to his shop.  Turns out he had a used leaf spring that he could put on.  I didn’t have many options so I said do it.  90 minutes later I was on my way.  I got lucky.

 

90 minutes later on I-81 near Syracuse, NY – BAM!  White smoke!  Same stinking thing happened!  What are the odds?!?! Now it’s 4:30 on a Sunday afternoon, raining a bit and getting colder.  I called at least 10 tow companies and only 1 answered.  After a 2 hour wait, he arrived and loaded the boat/trailer on his flatbed.  Tow company was great and kept my boat on his flatbed in their fenced in yard overnight – no charge.  He told me there’s a great trailer shop in town that could definitely fix it in the morning.

 

First thing next morning I went to the trailer shop.  They had everything needed in stock and would try to get to it soon.  3 hours later I had new triple leaf springs (trailer only had single) and a new wheel bearing (1 was bad).   I was finally on my way.

 

So, after paying almost $1,500 for 2 tows, 2 repairs and 1 hotel room I arrived at my destination – 30 hours after leaving.  At least the fishing was good.
 

I feel your pain RobA.  Mama said there'd be days like this.  Sometimes ya just gotta laugh, life is a series of adventures. Not all of them are good. Glad you got to catch some fish!

FM

Wow, that's a rough, and expensive, start to your trip!  To be honest, though, I'm shocked at how well it turned out.  I would never expect to even make it to the lake with all that trouble.  I think you should have stopped for $100 in scratch offs.  

I’m in upstate NY… sorry to hear about your trouble getting here, but glad the fish treated you well. Where were you fishing? 

That's crazy.

With triple springs that problem should never occur again.

22 minutes ago, JackstrawIII said:

I’m in upstate NY… sorry to hear about your trouble getting here, but glad the fish treated you well. Where were you fishing? 

Black Lake.  Been going there for 14 years.

23 minutes ago, Bird said:

That's crazy.

With triple springs that problem should never occur again.

Repair place was really surprised the trailer was only equipped with single leaf springs.  It's not a heavy boat but I didn't want to go through that again so I got the triple springs.  They were not expensive.

1 hour ago, RobA said:

Black Lake.  Been going there for 14 years.

Very cool. I camp up on the St. Lawrence in that area, but never fished Black Lake. Glad you had a good time. 

Yikes! Got any fish pics?

15 hours ago, Swamp Girl said:

Yikes! Got any fish pics?

I do not.  Bass fishing before June 15th in that part of NY is not allowed - even catch and release.  We didn't know that the first tear we went.  So we target pike, crappie and anything else that bites.  We do catch a lot of accidental bass but don't want them out of the water to take pics.

21 hours ago, RobA said:

So, after paying almost $1,500 for 2 tows, 2 repairs and 1 hotel room I arrived at my destination – 30 hours after leaving.  At least the fishing was good.
 

 

Well, it COULD have been worse.

 

That's what I try to tell myself when life throws you knuckleballs, not even curveballs. 

If you own a boat long enough we all have been stuck on the side of the road.  Sorry to hear but not surprising!  

Wow, that stinks, but at least you got it taken care of and didn't have to leave the boat somewhere for an extended period of time waiting for it to be fixed.

Wow, that’s a rough trip for sure.  But at least you got all the bugs ironed out in one go. 🤪

Holy cow! Two spring failures in one trip(?!!!).

 

Glad things worked out!!!

I’d have drove that SOB all the way to the lake 🤣🤣🤣

That is rough but hope the fishing was good enough to ease the pain!