Wagon wheels have wooden spokes!

As we have been traveling across the country I keep thinking of what it must have been like for the people traveling west in search of a brighter future. Instead of a minivan they had covered wagons and traveled in groups for safety. It must have been some tough traveling across the Great Plains with all the ditches and gullies to avoid. Of course they made it to the promised land, but yesterday we got a reminder of the dangers of travelling in those days. One of the spokes on our wooden wheels broke! Fortunately it happened just as we were arriving in the frontier town of Sheridan, Wyoming. So today were have to find a blacksmith to make a new spoke and repair our wheel. It could be days before we are on our way again, but at least this did not happen in the GIANT mountains that are looming before us. OK, we don't have wooden wheels but we did get a flat tire from a stray Phillips head screw and it will only delay us for a few hours, but it did make me think about those hardy Pioneers who came before us and wonder how many broke a spoke and ended up staying. Hmm, I think it's time to get out Dodge, or Sheridan as the case may be.