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...My Life as 'Drive away' driver
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201128 CA-PA 1 bus heading to Pittsburg PA ... spending the night in Edwardsville/East St Louis IL 6 AM alarm, 7 AM breakfast on the weekend. We pick from a list and they bag it. Yogurt, pastry and juice. All of 10 cars in the lot, no trucks. Hope it is enough to keep the doors open. 60 mph minimum on the OK toll road now. 80 max. 1st stop is in Tulsa at the Flying J. Car lot is full of trucks like usual. And a few cars that look like they are being lived in. We make our own parking spot for the couple of minutes we will be there. For as busy as this place is, there never seems to be much traffic coming or going from the lot. Oyo, a new hotel chain, had taken over a large hotel in Tulsa. Today it was the only hotel that did not have any cars by it, other than the Pear Tree hotel which was boarded up. I was surprised by how many cars the small ma and pa places had. Maybe they are catering to the homeless now a days. 2nd stop is at the I-44 / Petro truck sop in Joplin. Besides an Iron Skillet Buffet, this place also has a Blimpie's Sub, DQ, Taco Bell / Pizza Hut. We went for Taco Bell. Once we had our food, we moved the bus to the 'back 40' to find a place in the sun. This place lists it has 475 parking spots. Not sure what they are doing here, where we usually park is now under construction with a new building. Somewhere along I-44 today, we saw two semi's side by side, in the trees, heading the wrong direction. If they had been on our side of the road, it would make some sense that one pushed the other off and into the trees. But not sure how they got turned around, almost a complete U-turn. Traffic for that side of the highway was backed up for miles. 3rd stop was a rest area in Conway. 4th stop was a rest area in St Clair. 5th stop was at the Flying J for shelf food in Pontoon Beach. It was the closest food to the motel. We ended up with pizza again tonight. This time I only got one piece, and a Oreo ice cream sandwich. The last one. If there hadn't been one, I was planning on getting a Cinnabon. We had to make our own parking spot here too, in the car lot. This place was also full of trucks. Ah, almost full moon tonight. Clear night. Almost clear sky's all day. No fuel stops today, all stops were 'off duty.' It helps with the hours and not having to do a shut down while on the road. I fueled the last thing last night and will again the first thing tomorrow. That should be my final fuel stop that I pay for. 6th and final stop was at the Sleep Inn in Edwardsville. When I tell the clerk that we have reservations, they say my name. I am the last person with reservations. It is 5:30 on a Saturday night and there are five cars in the lot of a 100+ room hotel. We eat our food before going back out to get the rest of our luggage. Load board 119 down from 141 yesterday. Surprise, the best ones are gone. But we expect they will keep adding more to the load board as parts come in. Looking at the numbers from the load board for the last few years, it has made it down to -0- sometime between the 1st and the middle of the month the last four years. If we are going to get another trip in, we need to do it now. But we will see what there is and where they are going. Last full day is tomorrow, another 500 miles. Not sure where we will stop yet. Depends on if we want to get up at 5 AM or 4 AM. The down side of heading east, changing the time zones. 201129 CA-PA 1 bus heading to Pittsburg PA ... spending the night in Belmont OH Breakfast is not until 7 AM, again. Means more driving in the dark in the PM. Breakfast was ready and waiting when we got down/over. Nuked sandwich, juice, yogurt. Checked out at 7:30. There was only one room left when we made our reservation last night, this AM there are maybe 10 cars in the lot (I didn't count them) in a 100 room hotel. Not sure what is going on? 1st stop is the TA in Troy for fuel, 10 miles down the road. Good thing we could see it from the freeway or I would have headed the wrong direction. Their only restaurant is closed. Duncan Donut is in the parking lot. 6.25 mpg. The mileage is not getting any better. I was hoping for 8-10 by now. This time I am watching my fuel filling much closer, when it bubbles, I stop. But am able to get in another eight gallons before I think it is full. So I likely could have gotten in a whole lot more fuel the stop I only put in 50 gallons. We have been going just over 500 miles between each stop. After I fuel and get my receipt I want to wash any fuel off my hands so I head to the rest room. Before I get there I can hear two people yelling but I can't understand either of them. They both have an accent. When I walk in, the room goes quiet. They are each using an end sink to wash up for the day, there is one sink between and I use that one. Then they start yelling again. I finally figure out why. One of the guys had blown his nose into the sink. The other guy thought that was disgusting. They are still cussing at each other when I walk out. 2nd stop was for a rest break at a Loves in Greenup. This time it is I standing next to someone at the sink when he blows his nose into the sink ... I don't cuss or yell, I just walk away. According to the pictures on their website, this Loves has an IHOP for food. Not anymore, it is now a Naf Naf Grill. Serving Mid-Eastern food. Grandkids love the one near us. Not my kind of food. This location was quiet enough on a Sunday morning that I was able to park in the car parking area. If Naf Naf, Chesters (chicken) or Godfathers isn't to your liking, there is also a BBQ next door and a DQ across the street. 3rd stop was at another Loves, this one near Mooresville. Subway or McD's. I did look at the McD's before ordering Subway, because the outdoor sign said something about McRib. BB looked it up after we left. McRib is back Dec 2. I know where the sign is that gives the travel time near Indy. Today it is two minutes faster to stay on I-70 right through downtown. I drove at the posted the whole way, everyone else was going well over. No scales open today, or so far this whole trip. One less thing to slow us down. 4th stop is a rest area near Eaton OH. 5th stop is a rest area near Buckeye Lake OH It is going to be dark, but we push to make the 500+ miles. 6th and final stop is the Sleep Inn in Belmont OH. A little over 10 miles from the border and 70 miles from my final fuel and wash. For food we walked next door to the gas station which had a Quiznos inside. The signs on the door said something about our staff does not wear masks for medical reasons, if you are not comfortable with this, we are sorry. Nothing very exciting today. No accidents, no road rage, no major cop gatherings. We did see a lot of transporters today, first we were meeting them and then once we were past Indy they started passing us. RV's, short buses, some trucks. No change on the load board. BB has been looking at the weather and it looks like OH will get hit with snow tomorrow. So we will have to deal with that on the way out. Tomorrow. Likely up at 4 AM our time. Breakfast and then an hour and a half drive to the wash. At least a half hour at the fuel and wash, maybe three hours. Monday AM is listed as busy, but we have no choice. We are guessing we will be there by 8 AM, leave by 9 AM. Pick up the rental car and get to the drop by 10 AM. Leave the drop by 11 AM and get to Joliet IL by 7 PM. That would have us heading against traffic for the AM drive. 201130 CA-PA 1 bus heading to Pittsburg PA (delivered) ... spending the night in Ottawa IL 4 AM?? (5 AM local) It doesn't sound like such a good idea this AM. 6 AM we go down for breakfast, they have the old usual, they just have to dish it up for us. Scrambled eggs, sausage, yogurt, juice. Still dark out when we pull out. Another motel with only 10 cars in the lot. Slight rain this AM :) :) because that means a shorter line at the wash. 1st stop Pilot / Blue Beacon at Bentleyville. That was about an hour down the road. We pull in and half the pumps are closed, but there is one open that I can back in to. No DEF. So I fuel first and then pull out of the way to add DEF by the jug. Over twice as much by the guy and it takes longer. 1st I buy to jugs and it brings the tank up to 3/4. DEF has never been an issue not being full at delivery but I think I have room for another jug so I go back in for a 3rd jug. It doesn't fit, so I bring the rest with. No one has pulled in or out of the truck wash while we have been here. No one in line. We drive up, wait a few seconds for someone to open the door and we pull in. Now with Covid they want us to wait in our 'truck' until they are done and we have pulled out of their building before going back in and paying. This AM this has taken about 45 minutes with the only waste being the time it took to add DEF. We are ahead of schedule. 2nd stop is the rental car place. A little over a half hour and we are at the rental car place. BB almost steered me down a wrong road a few feet before the correct road. This location is inside a huge hotel. Plenty of room to park the parking lot is almost empty. So I wait a couple of minutes and she has the car. Quicker than most places. From here I am following my hand written directions. I miss my turn, I hadn't looked at 'street view' and didn't see what I thought I was looking for. So I head off into the city until I find a street wide enough for a bus. Then I doubled back. Luckily I knew that my road was a service road up against the freeway. But once back I could not remember where to turn, almost turned twice the wrong way but did not. BB had been following me, she had seen the sign I missed and knew what turns I should be taking but had no way to talk to me. 3rd stop, the drop. When I got to the correct place there was no place to park. So I called from the street with my 4way flashers on. When I told my contact that he said he would be right out. About that time someone moved their pickup so I had an open spot to park. I got it as close to the lines as I could on the 1st try and then asked if I should try again. They said 'no.' When I talked to the inspector on Friday he was upbeat. Today he only said what needed to be said. At one point he said I was going to have to go re-fuel the bus as it was not showing full on the diagnostic software. When I said I had been running it on the ground and started looking for my receipt he said it would be 'OK.' This time when I was fueling I had been kneeling/squatting by the bus and when it was full, I tried twice more to add more and it ran out both times. Not sure what else I could have done. Filled a million dollar bus at the corner 7-11? A few minutes after 10 (local) we are on our way. Almost one hour ahead of schedule. 4th stop is the welcome center / rest area in Ohio near New Springfield. Something is on the windows that doesn't want to come off with the windshield wipers or fluid. So I try using the scrubber at the gas pumps. Finally I think it is the all day rain that wore it off. It looked like something the rental car place may have used to 'clean' it. 5th stop is the rest area near Clyde / Vickery OH for food. Made to order pizza, DQ or Panera. We choose Panera for sandwiches, and I choose DQ for a Blizzard I had wanted a apple pie malt but when they didn't have that I didn't want to walk away empty handed. Before we leave I dig out my paperwork and when she is done eating, BB finishes my paperwork and gets it sent in. Within two hours we are paid. Good money. Good month. Coming across OH there was a snow plow with salt sitting about every 10 miles in the median, also lots of cops. But not enough snow yet. BB has been watching the weather and if we had left a day later we would have been fighting the weather all the way from the west coast to the east and back home again. But we managed to stay just ahead of it. Today was the only bad weather we have had for a long time. 6th stop is the rest area near Howe IN Ohio was supposed to have been the worst of the winter weather. But somewhere on the west half of IN I am trying to pass a semi when I hit the snow at the edge of the lane. It throws me a little but I hang on, no harm done. As soon as I am past I pull in front of the truck. That is when I realize that the road is now ice pack where the tires run. I slow down, the semi has already slowed way behind me. Within a mile or so we see a van in the ditch. All traffic has slowed. And then within five miles or so the roads are clear again. But it does take traffic a while to speed up again. 7th stop is at the Flying J in Lake Station for fuel. It is cold out. Why didn't we head south when we dropped the bus ;) ? Traffic through most of Chicago was just below the posted. I like it that way, then I am not the target that everyone is trying to / not to / hit. By now it is dark but we are trying to make it home on Tuesday night. BB tries to order online at Cracker Barrell but it said 'one item is not available' but doesn't say what it was. After a couple of tries we decided to eat Culvers instead. 8th stop is the drive thru at Culvers and the the Comfort Inn in Ottawa. We now have about eight hours to drive tomorrow. Load board US - 231 IA - 112 MN -0- WI - 1 5 runs to OR, 11 to WA, 3 to ID, 5 to MT, 8 to UT. So lots of pairs. Also a lot going to the east but not to the SE or SW. As of now we still want to get home for a night, or two, before deciding to head out again. I think it has been three weeks since we have slept in our own beds. BB is sure there will be more CA runs as she watches very close what is being shipped and what isn't. CA has not gotten any of the larger RV's yet and their lots are empty. We will see. Sometime during the day there was an RV being returned to IA from TX. Why not ever from where we are? 201201 CA-PA 1 bus heading to Pittsburg PA (delivered) ... spending the night at home Awake before the alarm, that is what happens when you are heading west. We ended up getting going an hour earlier than planned. We grabbed breakfast on our way out instead of eating in our room. No yogurt as I was driving. Got a cheese stick, pastry, fruit cup and juice. BB had similar but included yogurt and fresh fruit. Some of the cars had frost but ours was face to the building so no scraping on the front and camera on the back so not scraping. 1st stop is at the Iowa 80 Truckstop in Walcott. Closer in miles to where we wanted to stop than the rest area's. 2nd stop was in Janesville at a Kwik Star / Kwik Trip for the rest room. BB went in, I didn't. She turned down free samples, I wouldn't have. 3rd stop was the Pilot for fuel. We weren't empty but would be close by the time we got to the rental car place. Also gas is usually cheaper here, but today it was awful close in price. Then went across the street to McD's for burger and fries. 4th stop is at the office / lot to pick up our van. Breaks are still shot. No one picking up RV's while we are there. 'Our' lot is full so about 100 RV's. Our overflow lot is close to full so that is another 75. And those are not showing on our load board yet. Usually they do once they are parked there. AND the shipper is now lining up RV's in their employee parking lot, maybe another 50 RV's waiting for ?? Plus all the partial RV's sitting by their buildings. Today we saw a total of 5 RV's heading out. Not many for having 100+ in the lot. We also saw two buses from my local company. Actually one was not our company, it is shipped from St Cloud heading to LA. The other might be ours, heading to Des Moines. If we end up in town a couple of days I will call and see if we can get one. BB heads out first and I call our local shop, they can look at our van before we get back from our next trip. BB has to fuel and also has stopped at a rest area and still pulls into the rental car place right behind me. No more stops with the van, needs to get dropped off. When we get home we unload the van and head to the shop. While I am dropping the van, BB looks at the emails and sees the receipt for the rental car. She had not waited for one at the drop as there was a line behind her. Because we dropped the car on the date prior to what we had said, they billed us one day at the daily rate and then by the hour for for the partial 2nd day. Hundreds of dollars more. When BB calls the local office, she is told that if they had charged her for two full days they would have been 'over charging her,' and that there is noting that can be done about it. Not good customer service. When we get home, BB calls the main office and gets it corrected. Not likely to use that drop location again. It's quicker than dealing with the airport location but they need different help. Load boards US - 233 IA - 108 MN -0- WI - 5 Nothing was loaded on to the IA loadboard until sometime after noon when we stopped watching. So no idea how many were added and grabbed right away. Now there are 3 CA's but all different locations. The other long runs are still out there. As of tonight, we have not set a date when we are ready to go again. Hopefully we decide before they put something on the load board, then we can just grab it. I'd like to be gone soon and back by mid month. BB's glasses should be in by then and I need to get to the clinic by then. Once back we will work for our/my local company either local or we may trip a road trip for them this month. ... and the new pictures are posted on my main website. Covid - MN has had a sudden drop in deaths the last couple of days. Down from 75-100 a few days ago to 20-30 the last couple of days. It may just be a reporting issue? Covid reaction varies greatly. At the one truck stop in MO almost no one was wearing a mask, way less than 25%. Today in IA Mc'D's is back to drive thru only. Tonight a Zuppas Cafe we can order inside. But only five people in the store at a time and someone is more or less letting them in. We didn't know and that person had stepped away when we got in. Zuppas was fully staffed and doing a booming business of curbside and walk-in. Potbellies in the same parking lot was closed. A couple of other food places looked closed also, no cars, no lights. Our 'house guest' that tested positive a couple of weeks ago is still not back to work. She works two jobs and one has her back on the schedule 10 days from now and the other hasn't said. So they are going way beyond the two weeks. ... and I saw on FB another person I know closer to my age had Covid about the same time. He had it almost exactly two weeks before his step daughters wedding. Timing on that one. 201202 MN Load board tracking 8:00 - 108 (includes all IA loads) 8:30 - 105 9:00 - 104 9:30 - 104 10:00 - 113 (we are heading to CA tomorrow) 10:30 - 109 11:00 - 108 11:30 - 107 12:00 - 107 12:30 - 107 1:00 - 102 1:30 - 101 2:00 - 112 (the 3rd Davis is still there, now also 3 Gilroy and 3 Westminster CA) 2:30 - 112 3:00 - 111 3:30 - 124 4:00 - 132 4:30 - 132 5:00 - 131 We had not talked about leaving yet when 'our' trips showed up on the board. BB was in the middle of a conversation with someone else when I saw them and I wanted to call right away. I didn't even have my phone close to me, I had to run and find it. I called, we got the runs, there were three to Davis and we took two. Based on the numbers above, they added nine and three hours later they are down 11. Not like the days when 40+ are flying off the board. Last week we called on a similar run after noon on Thursday and were able to pickup, and get to Des Moines that day. This time we will likely stay home again tonight, leave in the AM and get to Omaha or Lincoln the 1st night. People on Facebook are saying that I-40 is closed this morning. One person posted that they got past before the road closed, only to get behind an accident. Last they posted they had been sitting on the freeway for the last three hours. Shouldn't be much planning needed for this trip. We just did it two weeks ago. We got all of our errands runs today. BB had to cancel a dentist appointment for next week and then she tried to re-schedule it. Nope. For whatever reason, now dentist appointments can only be made for the same month you call. BB didn't like that idea so she called my dentist, same thing. I don't know if it is a Covid thing, or a new insurance thing? It wasn't a problem for either of us six months ago when we were in. They just gave us an appointment for six months out. |
