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...My Life as 'Drive away' driver
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.. the trip continues from HERE 221031 IA-CA 2 RV's to Gilroy CA ... spending the night at Rocklin CA We are up at our usual time, but based on local. We can't call for our NV permit until 7:30. We do call at 7:30 and someone picks up right away. Good sign. In the past we have gotten our permits within 15 minutes. ... an hour later I call back ... I am 'next on the list' ... ??? I had to be close to the first call they took this AM. What list? It was another half hour before I got my permit but BB's did not come. We waited another half hour and I called back. I got someone else and they were able to find BB's permit and (re?) sent it. Almost three hours from the time we called until we left the hotel. So much for this being a short day. Good thing we only have 500 miles today. 1st stop is our usual Elko at the Sinclar. Because we are so late we eat here at Port of Subs. Good food, good bread. But first I called the drop and set up appointments for delivery for tomorrow at 1 and 2 PM. Everything was good, bread was fresh. But everything takes time and I don't have time to eat my whole sandwich before our half hour is up. 2nd stop is the Pilot in Winnemucca for fuel. Today is the last day of $.10 off per gallon. It all helps. 3rd stop is the Flying J in Fernley for final fuel if we need it. We don't, so this is a restroom stop. ... Whoa ... Traffic is stopped just west of Fernley. We sit in traffic for an hour while an accident is cleared. We had made a reservation while in Fernley so we were going to do the last 150 miles non-stop to have less dark driving. :( 4th stop is now Donners Pass rest area. It is already dark and we have another hour plus to go. 5th and final stop is the Comfort Inn in Rocklin. It is 9:30 PM home time, we try to be off the road by 5:30. Another long day. As soon as we check in, we walk next door to Arbey's. From the time we get to the hotel to lights off is about an hour. It's past our bedtime. (this is being written up the next AM instead of the usual evening write up) Load board US - 167 IA - 12 Tomorrow we have 150 miles to go, stash one RV, pickup the rental car and then BB will stash the rental car and pick up her RV. One of us will walk back to the the rental car. Then we call the bus dispatcher and see what happens next. So far, Tuesday AM, there is no snow so we pushed for nothing. The odds we play. 221101 IA-CA 2 RV's to Gilroy CA (delivered) ... spending the night at Gilroy CA Tried to sleep in. BB was up by 5 AM local (7 AM home time) I was up by 5:30. We were down for breakfast shortly after they opened. Cheese omelette and sausage plus juice. Juice was not good enough to drink both glasses that I took. But not bad enough to make me sick. By 8 AM we pull out, an hour before we had planned. And because of today's traffic, we are taking a longer route than previously planned. Can't drive in CA without mentioning the homeless. The firs thing today I noticed was a double dumpster on the side of the road. Looking closer I saw that everyone was wearing hazmat outfits. The area looked more like a burnt out homeless encampment than a crash site. In this area of the country there does seem to be homeless area's anywhere there is an area that is not a park or already in use. Pond area's and highway shoulders seem to be a favorite. Some area's are not too bad, other area's just stack their garbage outside their tarp. When we fueled in Winnemucca yesterday, I was about 10 miles short of the drop based on miles to 'E.' By Fernley, I had more range than I needed. By the hotel last night I had 60 miles more than I needed so I was thinking I had put in two, too many gallons. But this AM, half way to the drop the fuel light has been on and I loose my range. 1st stop is the rest area near Westly. That is part of the reason we went this way. Rest area and truck stops. Here we only stop long enough so that I can tell BB I need to stop for fuel. So does she. 2nd stop is at Westly, a Velaro. It is on the correct side of the road, there are two truck stops on the other side of the freeway and one has gas for less. But we are only putting in a few gallons, I put in six and BB puts in three gallons. When I head out from the station, I now have 80 more miles range than I need. But I start loosing that quickly. By the time I get to final fuel, the low fuel light is on again and I have lost half of that excess range. So between the two of us we spent $50 more on fuel today that we had not planned on spending. But we will still do OK. 3rd stop was the Chevron for final/dealer fuel in Gilroy. Then we go stash BB's RV across the street from the dealer. From there, BB gets in my RV and we drive the two miles to the rental car place where I drop BB. 4th stop is the drop/dealer. I am an hour early. No one else is ahead of me, I leave my paperwork and my keys and walk back to BB's RV. They still had to clean our car so BB had to wait. By the time BB got back it had started to rain. By the time I was taking BB's plate off her RV it was raining pretty good. And it must have kept raining the two hours it took to check in our two RV's. Because no one was ahead of me they started on my at 12:30 instead of 1 PM. That had us done by 2:30. One hour per RV, even on the small ones. Lots of little stuff written up but no driver issues. As soon as we are back to the car I call the bus dispatcher. Nothing, "try again tomorrow if you are still in town." Like frequently happens, we do not eat until after we have dropped. It is now 2:30 here, 5:30 east coast so we do not send in our paperwork. It is only later that we realize we could/should have gotten our release numbers before 3, if we had thought of it. 5th stop was In-n-Out Burger. There is one close and we are delivered. Routine for us. It is still raining pretty good so we do the drive thru. It doesn't move very fast. When we get to the window we find out why. We had ordered at the speaker but by the time we got to the window they had no record of our order. Which meant that is whey the started on our food. They had us pull around the building and someone brought our food out later. Well over a half hour wait in line. 6th and (almost) final stop was across the street at a 'new' Comfort Inn. It used to be a Super 8. They dropped that connection and the next one fell through or got put on hold, so for a while it was called the '835' which is their address. It has only been the Comfort Inn for a week. Nice place, completely redone. Maybe the pictures on the walls are from the Super 8 days but everything else looks new. And cheaper than the Quality Inn where we have stayed at before. Once we are done eating at the hotel we head to Garlic World to pick up our yearly supplies. Lots of them. Raw garlic, olive garlic, diced garlic, pickled garlic ... plus some dried fruit and some chocolate covered fruit. No meal tonight. BB had a 'double double' at In-n-Out and it was late. I'm good. AFTER we are in the hotel we look at the load board, there are a couple of short trips that we could have gotten closer to if we had looked ahead of time. At first CA was just checking for chains, but a few hours later they were required. We would have had a few hours this AM to cross but that would have been chancing it. Long days but it was worth it. Load board US - 159 IA - 3/2 CA - 5 Plan is to be up by 5 AM local to call the east coast dispatcher where it will be 8 AM. IF we get that trip, it is three hours to get to the truck and another 3 hours to the drop. Even if we were closer to the shipper we would not have been able to do both trips tomorrow and still be ready to take a bus if there was one. So we will do one truck tomorrow and be set to either head to a bus or be close to the shipper for Wednesday. Did hear from another driver that they sat for five days waiting for a bus, then got one going 300 miles and are now sitting again. We can drive past tomorrow to see what the bus lot looks like. 221102 CA-CA 2 Pickups to Fresno CA (1 delivered) ... spending the night at Manteca CA Called, and called, and called dispatch this AM. Sent them a text. Then thinking their phone might not be on, I sent them an email ... the called right back. Actually it was just timing, they had 'things' going on this AM and hadn't started working at 8 AM their time. This AM we decided to do both the rental trucks instead of just one. We had heard late last night that only one driver got a bus last night so that means the whole crew is still sitting in the hotel. Hmmm ... we did go down for breakfast but all they had was juice, fruit and a bag of snacks. My guess is the setup was of other breakfast stuff was just for show so they could get approved to be a Choice Hotel. IF I was still in the hotel review mode I'd do a write up on this one. The are missing a few key things to operate like a Comfort Inn, but they do look like one. Looks only go so far. We did hear that we got the two trips before we headed out but we did not get the paperwork. Traffic was heavy but not too bad. Because we were so close, I had to drive past the shipper. Lots of buses but not as many as I had expected. They must have been able to clean house before this latest back-up. We saw a few Milwaukee buses, we didn't see any more Davenport buses. Did see a few other's we knew where they were going. Lot's to move once they get parts or whatever the hold up is. 1st stop was actually before viewing the buses. We stopped at a Chevron in Livermore for fuel. $10 of fuel at $6.29 a gallon. We needed to return our rental at one half tank. Then we stopped in Livermore to 'return' our rental. Actually just to change the paperwork from a one way to a local. That will save us about $30+ a day by doing that. We kept the same car, they didn't even come out and look at the car. Just had to start a new rental in the computer. While BB was doing that, I had gotten my paperwork in an email and was able to call the shipper. They are no longer on the jobsite but will meet me there. 2nd stop was the Loves in Lodi to print the paperwork. I didn't ask the shipper if they wanted a copy so I assumed they did and got two copies of everything. $18 because we didn't get the documents printed at the hotel this AM. 3rd stop was the shipper. The guy was waiting with my truck running when I got there. He didn't the paperwork but took it because I had extra. Quick inspection and we are on our way. Just a mile before the auction house as we are coming off the freeway ramp we can see the homeless encampment below. Trash is knee deep all around the tents. But at a couple of other places, people were out raking 'their' area to keep it looking nice ... 4th stop was the auction house in Fresno. Similar to the one by us but not the same. I'm done and waiting by the time BB gets there. She had stopped for fuel where it was a buck and a half less than this AM. While I was waiting, I called the bus dispatcher who confirmed that only one bus had left last night ... and that he has 15 drivers in the hotel waiting for work. I told him we were still in town and not looking for work today ... so he said call back tomorrow. He's not writing me off yet. 5th stop was the In-n-Out Burger in Mercer. This time we went in to get our food. Here we were in and out :) in less than 15 minutes. Not sure why, but my food today was not the best I have every had there :( We pulled off somewhere and called the shipper to say we would make it yet tonight. When we had talked to him this AM we were not sure if we could pick up yet tonight. But he told us he had meetings tomorrow AM so we wanted to get it done tonight. And everything went as much like clockwork as it could have today. 6th stop is the shipper in Acampo. Our contact is not there yet, so we park down the street. He had called and told us he would be late, but so were we, so he thought he would be there before us. I think he was. He had parked at the house next door and finally walked over to open the gate about 15 minutes after we got there. I'm thinking he got to the house and they started talking. It looks like the crew had rented a corner of this farm for this job and he may have gotten to know them some. This time I was rushing and forgot to take my pictures and write down mileage at pickup. We pulled out and then stopped a couple of blocks away at the fire house for BB to make a hotel reservation and for me to do some of my paperwork. Not going to need any fuel on either trip this time so more money for me. Haven't see what I'm getting paid on these but it's always been good. Got more money for a referral today. Second one now in a couple of months. They equal about two good days of work so it all helps. Hotel reservations ... BB had looked at lots of hotel reviews and all were mostly bad and most of our hotels were $100+. Finally we decided to stay where we have stayed before, $$$, and the reviews were just as bad as anywhere but here we knew the place was OK. 7th and final stop was the Best Western in Manteca. We could have gotten further tonight but we are ahead of where we had planned on being and have nothing else lined up for tomorrow. Once we were checked in, we drove to Mr Pickel for to-go food. Load board US - 186 IA - 5/4 Tomorrow we have two hours to get to the drop and then nothing else planned yet. Last I heard the chain laws were still in effect but hadn't expected them to be lifted until sometime over night. 221103 CA-CA 1 Pickup to Fresno CA ... spending the night at Santa Nella CA :( Woke up to a dead phone that won't charge. I had this issue a few months ago and at that time a new charger fixed the issue. I'm guessing it is not the charger. So far, after two hours I still have no charge. Plan for today is to get this pickup dropped before/around noon. And then call dispatch. I did hear from the only bus driver I keep in contact with that they are heading to RI. So at least one person got a bus last night. Breakfast was good this AM. The juice was actually good today. Plus bacon and eggs. Eggs were OK, bacon was good. They also had 'real, local yogurt' you could add your toppings too, plus the packaged stuff. We head out about 9 AM local. An hour and a half later we are at the drop. Today I do see two 70 mph signs. BB see's three, yesterday I did not see any. It doesn't really seem to make much difference. People drive the speed they want to, or can, based on traffic. Didn't see anyone passing on the shoulders today. I didn't mention this yesterday, but while we were at the hotel I saw someone 'brake checking' another driver. The hotel is one building away from the stop light and I heard something that made me look as two pickups went down our side street. The 2nd past the 1st in oncoming traffic and then got in front of them and hit the brakes, and again, until they were almost stopped before speeding off. 1st stop was the drop in Fresno. I was here yesterday so I know the routine. And it is the same one check in guy. Today I parked behind two other pickups that are owned by the same rental company. I didn't see anything else on our board so we must not get access to them all. As BB is waiting for me, she sees two pickups from MN to WV. We are not there but I mention them to dispatch when I call. Those ended up getting flat bedded. We are optimistic and head back in the direction of the buses instead of taking more work. 2nd stop is in Madera at the EZ Trip, they are part of the Pilot/Flying J network so we get a discount on the gas. We only put in four gallons as we thought that was all we would need to get to Livermore and return the car. We did end up using more than that, I may have been driving faster? Or we mis-guessed. 3rd stop was in Livermore at a cheese steak place, The Cheese Steak Shop. It was now 2 PM. Good food, a little messy. We ate in the car, we are doing that most places again. From there we drove past the bus factory. Still lots of buses, a lot of them lined up by the drop location now. I called over a half dozen times to the dispatcher, to the office number. No answer, it kept going to voicemail. Finally I called his cell and he answered right away. Only one bus again today and still lots of people in the hotel. :( Instead of looking at all the options while we were sitting there, we made a reservation in a town an hour away for half the price. There actually was one hotel in town we have stayed at once that was close in price but we rarely stay at that chain so it didn't come to mind right away. It did after we had a reservation and were on the road. 4th and final stop is the Quality Inn in Santa Nella. Usually their little dead end street is packed with trucks, or buses, or homeless RV's. Today it was almost empty. After we checked in we went down to Anderson's Split Pea Soup. BB got the soup and I got Swedish Meatballs over noodles. The special was over rice but I did a sub. I only ate half of it and I was still stuffed. So we/I now have breakfast. This place doesn't have any thing special usually. Eggs, biscuits and gravy. Load board US - 172 IA - 2/1 CA - 4 Lots of talk about the 'what if's.' I mentioned that it might be a parts issue with the buses, (and in that case it could be weeks before things are back to normal) So BB wanted to look at all the options. We likely will head home Friday night if there is no work tomorrow. We could stay but between a car and a hotel every day the money won't last long. And if most days they are only shipping one bus, and there were 15 drivers ahead of me plus ones that may be coming back from a prior trip ... it could be two weeks before I get a bus. Or if the resolve their issue, the could release 20 buses tomorrow. The rental dispatcher does have two more from southwestern MN back to the cities, but we are in CA. ... my cell phone. We played with it all morning trying to get it to charge. Finally BB found something on the web that we tried and we got it to start charging. We got it up to 20% before we had to leave the hotel. Then once in the rental car after the drop it would not charge again and it was down to 13%. Just about back to Livermore it started charging. It was back up to 20% when we stopped to eat and then wouldn't start charging again. But when we got to the hotel it charged right away so I'm letting it get a full charge before unplugging it. No idea what the issue is. And I have a setting issue on my phone where I can't shut it down/off. But today it not only shut off, it reset the time on my phone by about six weeks and six hours. Which means all phone calls and pictures today were dated with that old date ... .. the trip continues HERE
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