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...My Life as 'Drive away' driver
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.. the trip continues from HERE 221104 CA-IA 1 Bus to Ames IA ... spending the night at Rocklin CA Down for breakfast, and there is very little. This place never has much but the price is low so we don't expect everything. BB gets some dry cereal. I get some juice. I still have over half of my Swedish meatballs from last night to eat. I don't eat them all and we have no way to keep them cool so the rest goes in the trash. We spend the morning checking on trips, making calls, doing the math. We looked at going home via Grand Junction and picking up a truck there ... and then that trip was gone. There are also trips down by LA, hundreds of miles away. And trucks up in Salt Lake City that I called the shipper on, but never got ahold of the correct person. And other trips. Do we stay in CA until there is work? BB is watching the weather and wants to get out of town tonight. No more short trips before we leave. We get up to Livermore in time to eat a late lunch. We find a place in downtown called Dips and More (?) Interesting waiter :) We sat outside, too cold for all the locals. I had a French Dip with French Onion soup. Good food, way too much. Then we did a short walk around town, the most walking we have done for a while. ... and drove past the buses on our way to 'our outlet mall.' When 3 PM came, I called the bus dispatcher ... "call me back ... 5" ... ?? 5 PM? How many buses did he get? Are they that late in releasing them? 3:30 ... dispatch calls "I said call me back ... IN 5" Opps :) We have a bus going to IA. So we fuel the rental car and drive to the lot. Lots of buses that are not ready to go and a few that are. Next person to show up was heading to GA where she lived. Talked to her a couple of times. Her boyfriend (?) used to work with her but he had a few accidents and they let him go. Then a couple showed up, we talked to them a little. They guy was kind of quiet until we got on the topic of CNG. They have been driving buses since before my local company got the bus contract and they used to drive them out of Crookston. Lots of stories, but they still needed to get there buses ready to go. Dispatch shows up and we are ready to go. I call for a permit, and call, and call. The phone rings for a while and then disconnects. They are supposed to be open until 6:30 and it is only 5:30. I give up. BB leaves and I got check out with security. I give BB about a 10 minute head start and I follow. She is waiting when I get there. Different traffic today and I am not able to get all the way off of the street but no issue. Traffic. Somewhere along Stockton there is an area that used to be a used call lot against the freeway. 1st a check cashing place took over the building. Now, a few years later, the parking area is being used by about 15-20 food trucks with tables set up. It looked busy tonight. WOW ! Ever see a 'fire ball?' https://www.kcra.com/article/video-light-tumbling-down-in-northern-california/41874270# We were out in the middle of no-where and it came down right in ahead of us ... way ahead of us, but in my direct line of sight. We make to the Comfort Inn in Rocklin. Very empty tonight, lots of place to park the bus. Arby's next door ... again. I asked BB if she wanted to split something but she didn't. So I ordered another French Dip (?) and ate the whole thing. Load Board US - 158 IA - 1/0 221105 CA-IA 1 Bus to Ames IA ... spending the night at Wendover UT 3 AM - I wake up and soon need to run to the bathroom. And that is they way the rest of my morning goes. I even go back in one more time after I get the bus started. Breakfast is part of a cup of yogurt. 1st stop is Donners Pass. Snow above 3,500 feet but the chain restrictions were dropped sometime yesterday (?) Roads are clear but not dry. I had called in for a NV permit last night and the phone would ring and then disconnect. The company was still supposed to be open for another hour. This AM I call as soon as they open and someone picks up right away. I have my permit within 10 minutes. (Last week it was hours and we were sitting at the border) Because I was running a little slow this AM, the permit starts about an hour before I get to the border, usually I am within about 15 mimutes. 2nd stop is the Flying J in Fernley to top off my fuel tank. This is the cheapest fuel until we get to WY. Either the tank wasn't full or I am only getting 6 mpg, I usually get closer to 8 mpg. 3rd stop is the Pilot in Winnemucca for food. Poor selection. BB gets a Subway sandwich and I get another cup of yogurt and eat most of it. 4th stop is the Sinclair in Elko for the rest room. Pumps are all empty so I put in DEF. It is easier to drive in backwards when the pumps are empty than having to back in to the pumps where the station is full. 5th and final stop is the Quality Inn (again) in Wendover UT. They are almost sold out when we make reservations. The lot isn't full but it does take a few back and forths to get turned around to be able to leave in the AM. No food truck in the parking lot again today (?) As we are walking to the other food truck we realize we do not have correct change with us. So we walk first to the truckstop/gas station which has nothing we like. So we walk next door to a Mexican place and order chicken quesadillas. I ate half. We'll see how it sits with me tonight. Load Board US - 151 IA - 0 Tomorrow ... we are catching up to the storm that came through after we came through with our RV's. Donners Pass was clear, but eastern UT may still have weather tomorrow AM. ... and ... right now, about 100+ miles of I-80 in WY are closed to high profile vehicles. Wind gusts to 74 mph. Heard rumor that it was blowing over trucks but having found that in the news yet. We will go as far as we can. If the weather clears we should get to Laramie or Cheyenne. Then Monday to Omaha and deliver on Tuesday. 221106 CA-IA 1 Bus to Ames IA ... spending the night at Laramie WY Guess I'm better, I ate half the quesadilla last night and no issues. This AM we each ate half of our remaining half. That was our breakfast. ... during the night I dreamt that the roads in WY were all good :) We aren't in a big rush because we are still following the last snow storm, we leave at 8 AM home time. Which I guess 7 AM local so not so late. It is still before sun up. A mile down the road the scale is open, first open scale this trip. But other than having to stop and weigh we keep going. 1st stop is the Flyin J in Tooele for a rest break. Quite place today, usually the parking lot is full. We had planned on fueling here but we re-did the math. The roads are clear but wet heading to Evanston. The weather cleared before noon. Kind of followed a new (?) trucker up the hill. When they passed me, they were only a foot from my front bumper. Then watching them through the curves they didn't stay in their lane real well. Then when we got near the POE they slowed way down below the speed limit and then were a little slow on following the directions. Interesting to watch. 2nd stop was the Port of Entry at Evanston. While I was in there, I asked about running without a permit. $450 fine for passing a POE plus $150+ for no permit. While we were there, we used the rest of the half hour from eating the last 1/4 of quesadilla. 3rd stop was in Green River at Loves for a rest break. Saw two transporters there, they were getting ready to leave as we pulled in. We didn't talk to them. Yesterday the winds on I-80 were 75+ mph. Today at one point they were 1 mph. And the little there was was helping my fuel mileage. We did see one travel trailer in the center median. Not much left of them. We also saw a bus in the ditch ... not really the ditch, but a ways off the road there is a RR service road and it had slid off the service road ?? Saw lots of transporters today. Two looked like buses from our NY shipper, one looked like a tanker for my other company. Plus lots of motorhomes. We had planned on fueling here instead of Tooele but I checked the tank and we are good and the fuel is cheaper in Rawlins. 4th stop was the TA in Rawlins. Usually this place is packed, lots of spots today. I had thought I was going to only put in enough fuel to get to York. But decided it was worth the few $ difference it price to know what fuel mileage I am getting. 8.9 mpg. Better than the <> 6 mpg I got before the first fill. And likely better than I will get tomorrow. It will be windy again tomorrow. 5th and final stop is Laramie. We like the food at the Sinclair's but they aren't always open lately so we stop at the Pilot and Wendy's. Small parking lot in front where the gas pumps are. I had to back up once to get past the pumps. And there was not a lot of place to park, without blocking the air pump. I made sure I didn't ... and when we were walking in ... someone pulled up to the air pump. We order and leave. We check in at the hotel and eat ... sort of. BB ended up with a breaded chicken sandwich instead of a burger. And it was dry. While she was trying to see what was on the sandwich, she dropped part of it on the floor ... and then the rest of the sandwich landed mayo down on her i-pad. Not a happy person. She ends up eating part of my baked potato. Baked potato was good and so was my chili, the best I have had at a Wendy's. Tomorrow we hope to make it to Lincoln. Still not sure about a next trip, nothing on the load board out of IA. .. the trip continues HERE |
