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...My Life as 'Drive away' driver
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Trip 76 - New Pete - Cement Truck ... to Fontana, CA ( LA ) I was supposed to be gone over the weekend thru Tuesday, so I had 'other things' lined up for Wednesday. Then when my truck died on Friday night those plans 'could' change ... Monday ended up being a 'dead' day ... moved my 'other things from Wednesday to Tuesday and by Tuesday noon it looked like I was ready to go. 2/22/05 Tuesday morning dispatch lets me know that the customer closes at 4 PM Fridays and is not open on weekends ... That got my attention. I didn't think I was going to be able to leave until leave Tuesday. Trip is 2,000 miles which means I would have to knock off at least 200 miles the first night plus do 600 miles for the next three days. I do offer to pass on the run if they have another driver, they don't ... they also don't have another driver to cover the third truck that is sitting there. But by noon Tuesday it looked like I was ready to go ... 3 by the time I was at the office but still a good jump from when I thought I'd be leaving. Dispatch tells me I may want to go the southern route ... nasty weather heading to Denver ... adds about 70 miles to my trip ... <> $30 / 1 extra hour for some piece of mind. ... "But I have some good news ... I just saved money on car insurance ..." (radio commercial that kicks in after a list of bad news) The truck is a Peterbuilt and not full of fuel .. and its an automatic. Ran a couple of Pete's to FL this summer and got 4.5 mpg. And who ever picked up this truck from the customer did not fill it ... not doing their job and I'm the one stuck with the bill. On both customers we move mixers for, we can fuel the trucks at their pump before we leave the lot. The prior driver was only moving it 5 miles from the customer to our office so I guess he didn't care ... ... but there really was good news ... this truck already had 1,000 miles on it, that should help the milage ... and the tranny is a six speed instead of a five, again, should give me more mpg's. Was able to get in 7 gallons / $14 of fuel in the tank, will turn it in in hopes the boss will pay ... hasn't in the past. not much chance of getting it out of the other driver even if I could find out who it was. Or this could be really bad news and the driver did fill it ... and the truck is only getting a gallon and a half to the mile. By the time I'm rolling its after 4 PM and rush hour ... I usually drive 50 mph, but decided to go with traffic ... sort of ... at about 60 mph. Then decided to burn the whole tank at 60 mph, wanted to get some miles behind me to make sure I get this truck delivered on Friday. Milage is doing good even at 60 ... last trips we were stopping every 150 miles, these things have a 40 gallon tank, makes for a lot of stops on a 2,000 mile trip. T-h-i-s ... i-s ... g-o-i-n-g ... t-o ... b-e ... o-n-e ... v-e-r-y ... l-o-n-g ... t-r-i-p. These Petes ride worse than most chassis ... and I-35E and then I-35 by Faribault are bad news ... some of the worst in the country in an empty truck. I was looking forward to the bridges, where I knew I'd have a couple of seconds of smooth road before ratting my brains again. The president of the company that paved these roads should make themselves available to drive our trucks over these stretches of road to remind them of what a great job they did. Seat-belts are a must if you don't want a broken neck from hitting the ceiling. Cement roads may last forever, but so do railroad ties and the ride is about the same. Got about 230 on the first tankful, made it Des Moines. Now I had to decide, south or to Denver ... I'm going south. Even though I don't need fuel yet, I always stop at Kearny, MO for for 'cheap' fuel. By the time I pull off the road I'm tired and decide to stop for the night. I have passed cheaper motels, Econo Lodge will cost me $35 plus tax. Nice, clean place ... one minor plus, it has a clock with numbers four inches high ... numbers on the phone are two inches high. Went next door to the AmBest for supper ... eggs and bacon ... blah, food, nothing special ... $7 with tip. 2/23/05 7 AM ... no alarm ... can't roll myself out of bed. Should have been rolling at 6 ... could have even fudged it from 5 AM. Dragging ... and now its rush hour in KC which costs me a little more time, not much but a little. For a while last night I had thought I'd make it south of KC but I'm still dragging from being sick last week ... or maybe just getting old. KS scale is open today but no problems ... this AM I have dropped my speed back to 50. Fuel again at Emporia ... 300 miles to Hooker ... not much chance of making it on a 40 gallon tank. "Could" have made it ... but I'm not up for the thrill today, I stop 20 miles short in Liberal and put in 5 gallons. then another 35 in Hooker. I would have been right at 40 gallons (usable) so I could have done it, but why chance it? No breakfast this AM so I grab a sandwich at Subway/Loves. There's a line when I pull up so I go in and order while I wait ... eat my sandwich as I fuel. Boss sent out another letter last week reminding us ... "NO SMOKING, EATING OR DRINKING IN VEHICLES" ... I do end up finishing my sandwich in the truck, but not while I'm driving. Guy at Loves asks me how much this truck is worth ... don't know, will have to ask ... $100,000 for the Pete, another $150,000 for the mixer ... just a guess. Bored today, been on this road close to a dozen times and am finally logging the motels and truck stops ... haven't done this on many non-Interstate routes, but this has become one of my most frequent routes ... sort of like I-80 East was a year and a half ago. By the time I get to the TX/NM line the scale is closed ... ahhhh ... too bad. I have been debating with myself where to stay in Tucumcarri. Stay cheep or pay $35 for a Motel 6 ... not really up for the adventure, the last time I stay cheep it was BAD news and I/we were too tired to go and complain. But I end up in Tucumcarri before my hours ;) miles are up so I push on to Santa Rosa, decision made. Motel 6 / Santa Rosa / $35 ... "Sorry cash only, our credit card machine is broken" was the sign on the door. Another decision made, have wanted to try the 'Budget Inn' across the street but ... I don't know why I haven't. Tonight I do ... sign says $30 ... "Sorry, all I have left is rooms with two beds" 'Don't care, I'm only going to use one of them ..' was my response. When I sign for the room I see that he has charged me for a double room ... $34. This guy wasn't going to be cheated out of a possible $4 ... was still cheaper than the M-6 and I didn't want to spend my cash. The Ramada next door had a sign for $39. Small motels in the winter ... turn on the heat and hope it gets warm ... run the water and hope it gets warm. DQ is closed, restaurant next door is closed, Denny's down the street is open ... but I'm tired. 2/24/05 Again ... no alarm, again sleep an hour past legal. Wake to the siren's ... A set of OVNT pups is on the side of the road by our exit. Bad news ... last night in Tucumcarri fuel at Loves was $1.89, and when I got to Santa Rosa fuel at Loves was $1.95 ... this AM it gone up to $1.99. But I will need to fuel in NM ... twice. Long road to Gallup ... 270 miles, no stops. Snow this AM ... up to a couple of inches on the road. I'm back to 55 mph today. Haven't done the math on any of these tanks but I seen to be getting over 7 mph which is good. Grab another Subway at Love's ... eat a few bites and save the rest for the scale-house a few miles down the road ... hate to sit. AZ POE ... trucks are backed up out on the Interstate ... but I'm still flagged in. Time to eat ... not sure what the holdup had been but they / she is waving them through now. Normally each truck stop stops on the scale, one at a time ... today she has her arm out the window of the scale-house waving drivers through without stopping. She does stop a few ... me she motions to park without asking me any questions. I'm not running on AZ plates today, we were out at the office ... to many trucks heading to AZ lately, made a special trip to the office Monday to bring my last one back because they were out. The good news (for me) is it's not the usual gal at the window ... and today no one cares if I have NM permit. Two guys working the desk and it's taking forever ... and when its my turn ... forever. Computers are s-l-o-w and then they have to re-enter the data. Plenty of time to chat, so I ask the big question ... "Do you need a CDL to drive a truck with airbrakes, but under 26,000#?" My guy refers it to the second, who refers the question to 'Sarge' who just happens to be walking through. After discussing it a minute he goes and gets the AZ drivers manual and gives me a copy ... but says "Just a minute." He comes back out with the Federal DOT book and asks ... "Does the vehicle weigh under 26,000#?" "Does the vehicle care more than 16 passengers?" "Is the vehicle hauling HazMat?" Yes, No, No ... you don't need a CDL or AirBrake endorsement. Finally an answer ... Andy finally have my permits ... $63 .. exact change ... "So you've heard we only accept exact change?" ... no, I guess I was just lucky. ... 300 miles to Kingman ... if I can make it to Flagstaff with a half a tank I 'should' be OK ... I'm right at a half at Little America ... 170 miles behind me ... should ... should. A few miles later a sign says 'Last services for 56 miles' ... Maybe this wasn't such a good idea ... just to save on a few stop. Coming down the hills into Kingman, a truck who has been following me passes, then stays in the passing lane with his flashers on ... ??? Am not sure what is going on so I switch lanes expecting a vehicle in the right lane shortly ... there isn't so I pass him. I barely get past him and there is a full sized steel culvert in the passing lane ... Whoa ... that'll get your attention ... so that's why the guy had his flashers on. Within a couple of miles I meet three squads and a highway truck with their lights on ... hopefully they are responding to the culvert, not to an accident due to the culvert. I aim for the 'J ... passing a couple of truck stops ... am over 300 miles on this tankful. and still 1/8 to go ... I'm getting well over 8 mph (turns out to be an even 9 ... WOW) ... vs the 4.5 I got in my last Pete ... I want to make it into CA yet tonight but I don't know where the next cheep motels are ... Kingman I know ... M6 ... others. When I get back in the truck I look at the clock ... I'm tired ... I don't want to drive any more tonight ... I want to crash. There is a motel next door ... truck parking ... $30 ... M6 is $35 ... Travelodge, others are a dollar or two more. I grab the parking spot closest to the exit ... easy out ... I now need to roll at 4 AM ... that means 2 AM CA time. I ask the guy at the motel where's the best food ... that's a step above Denny's or FJ ... there isn't any within walking distance. But first I have to get myself a plane ticket ... earlier today I called the driver who left a half a day ahead of me. He's on a 6 PM flight out of LAX ... need to be on the 11 AM train. Before I left I had checked my options ... no tickets under $150 ... only one flight out of LAX for that price, but I didn't know if I can make it. ONT airport is only 10 miles from our drop but tickets are $250 ... third option is LAS / Las Vegas ... flights are under $150 but a rental from ONT to LAS is $50 ... back up plan is LAS, most cheep flights, latest flights, four hours drive to get there. The other driver is on a 6 PM SunCountry flight ... I start with them ... I'm put on hold ... 20 minutes and the phone disconnects ... re-dial ... another 20 minutes before someone picks up ... by now I've almost been drifting off to sleep. Flight is up to $170 but I don't want to spend another hour or two calling for flights only to find that this one is now sold out. By now I am more tired than hungry and want fast food, I remember a McD's but not where it was, as I'm walking I see the sign ... and realize that the McD's sits along side / behind the motel. $1 hamburger ... dollar menu seems to be a thing of the past, for meat anyways. I'm s-o-o-o tired but I can't fall asleep ... 2/24/05 This motel doesn't have a clock with large numbers so I have to get out of bed to look at my cell ... 2 AM ... I don't thing I've slept yet ... ... as soon as the heater shuts off I will look at my cell again ... beep beep ... it's now 3:30 AM ... it's time to roll ... slowly ... I get ready. I forgot about any AZ scale ... its closed. CA inspection is open but they don't even want me to stop, I get the wave ... I've done a few hours driving after dark this trip ... all of it in moonlight. No 'supposed' to drive these trucks after dark, can't see if the drum is turning ... moonlight helps. It's a long time from 2 AM until sunrise ... Heading south on I-15 another cement mixer passes me ... its our other driver, I was supposed to call him this AM when I got to the customer, now I won't have to ... he's ahead of me ... I'm holding my speed at 50 again today, that will get me 300 miles and leave the customer with 1/8 a tank of fuel. Did call the customer this AM to check which way on I-10 they are ... East 3 miles. By now it's 8 AM ... rush hour ... stop and go. Gives me time to finish my paperwork. The other driver has already found out where to park the trucks when I get there ... the inspection is done ... we have delivered two trucks without a breakdown. Other driver did loose a mirror a few miles back ... We thought about grabbing breakfast at the truckstop next door but as we are walking there we remember the locals had told us that there was a major auto race in town and we may have problems even finding a cab. So we headed back to the dealership, skipped breakfast and called a cab. Cab arrives, but doesn't want us to put any of our luggage in the trunk, we tell him we want to go to the train station ... he asks if we have an address. We don't, but tell him it should only be a $15 cab ride. (The other driver was here a couple of weeks ago.) About the time the cab meter gets to $15 the guy makes a U-turn and says it must have been the other way on this street. The other driver says "No problem, we are on the 11 AM train, we just don't want to pay for going the wrong direction." So the cabbie shuts off the meter. At this point I'm kind of wondering why I can't see any train tracks, we are on a street that runs parallel to the tracks, if the station is on this street I should be able to see the tracks ... We go a few miles the other direction and the cabbie pulls into a Schneider lot and says "Here you are ..." ??? He claims he heard us say 'truck station.' So the guy restarts the meter and we are off ... we do at least one more U-turn before finding the train station. The meter is just under $17, I give him a $20 ... he's burnt a lot of gas going in circles. After we are out, I comment to the other driver about the cabbie having a bad day ... "The reason we couldn't put our luggage in the trunk was because 'all his worldly possessions are in the truck, his wife through him out last night' ... that's what he was telling me when he picked us up." Now we have a couple of hours to kill, the 10 mile cab ride only took us an hour ... ... And we do what we shouldn't have done, we bought our tickets ... They are only good for a set amount of time and will only have a few minutes left when we board the bus. The bus ride is free as long as there is time left on the ticket. But now we sit ... things don't look good when a State Patrol car pulls up and lets out three guys, but they aren't any problem. We could have taken the bus to get here, bus picks up right across the street from our drop, but we would have to make a transfer ... maybe if we do enough of these we will try it. Train cost us $6.50 at 11 AM, had cost the other driver $8.50 at 8 AM last time ... off peak I guess. Only a few people board, and we are sitting so that we don't see many others board ... trip takes an hour plus. Lots of buildings flying by, about a dozen or so stops before we are at Union Station in LA. Huge station, left over from when the rails ruled ... down to the buses, the guy forgets where to go, this kills a few minutes but we find our bus and wait. But only a few minutes and we are rolling ... flying low would be a better way to put it. Cheap thrill ride ... seemed like 60 mph down the city streets, a couple mph less if he was turning on to a side street ... after the first few miles we moved to the rear of the bus, we knew we'd be on here a while ... once in the rear of the bus, every so often I'd go flying off the seat as we'd hit a bump in the road ... ouch. Those long days had taken there toll on my back side. Interesting area of LA ... one I could not live in ... give me a town of 50 people in MT any day. Crowded sidewalks ... open store fronts ... all stores have roll-up steel doors ... and graffiti ... everywhere ... bottom three floors. Not a place you'd want to get lost in. Did see a little bit of mud slide damage, nothing compared to what makes the news ... And after the first half hour the city changed ... the bars were gone from the windows, the houses had yards ... there were houses instead of apartments and for the most part the graffiti was gone ... some walls looked like parts of them get re-painted daily. I was wondering if this bus driver was late, or crazy the way he was driving ... an hour and 14 minutes after we boarded at the train station we were at the airport station ... the computer said it would be an hour and 15 minutes. So this is how the drivers have to drive to stay on schedule ... sit in the back and close your eyes ... Another short shuttle ride to the airport ... On the bus from the train down there were three guys that had caught my attention ... looked like maybe they'd be truck drivers, but they didn't make it on the shuttle so we lost them for now. At the airport we have a couple hour wait before the ticket counter opens ... but if we don't catch the morning train, we are cutting it way to close. After an hour a line starts to form by the ticket counter so we get in it. About the time the counter is to open someone comes past and changes the way the line runs ... a guy who had been second in line was not 10th and was not happy, so the first few people moved to stay in the front of the line ... thought the one guy was going to get himself booted out if he didn't shut up. We stayed where we were, going from about 5th to 10th ... still got a window seat. By now the three guys I thought may be drivers were at the end of our line ... heading our way. Security ... I was flagged, the other guy not ... the line was short but once they started checking it took a while ... this is the first time ever that someone has opened all my bags of dirty clothes ... and gone through my paper work. It's also the first time when they were done looking, they said "You're OK, now YOU can re-pack it." ??? Sometime while we were in the airport, dispatch had left me a message that I could do the same run again on Monday ... 8:30 dispatch ... due to no cell service in the ticket area, I was not able to get the message / and call back, before they closed for the weekend. It is now about 4 PM and we have not had anything to eat today (except one breakfast bar about 2 AM) ... very little choice ... personal sized pizza for $8 or McD's ... single hamburger is $1, the other guy finds a grilled chicken that meets his diet standards. Before we sit down, we see the passenger who had been the loud mouth in line at a table ... doing his log book. So the other driver said hi, and we talked for the next hour, before we ate, as we ate, as we waited for the plane. Turns out this guy works for a company we had never heard of, but is within 10 miles of our office. Just as we are going to board, one of the three guys who I had thought were drivers from the train station, comes over and asks if we are drivers. So are they ... Here we had six drivers, working for three different driveaway companies, all had delivered mixers from the midwest to LA, and were now all on the same plane ... Wow. Didn't have time to find out much about the last set of drivers and we were airborne. Friday night ... midnight ... home again, safe at last. For stats on this trip, see bottom of page for Trip 77 |