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...My Life as 'Drive away' driver
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.. the trip continues from HERE 2023 09 01 MN-IL 1 trash truck to Aurora IL (delivered) 2 RV's to Hershey PA ... spending the night at Charles City IA ))) site was down Friday, will update later ((( (It's now later ... this was written Friday, but cut and pasted a week plus later) Load board US - 115 IA - 10/9 MN - 4 WI - 3 Alarm woke us both up. Breakfast was OK. We get out to do my truck inspection and the alarm that was on yesterday is still on ... plus I now have the back up alarm going off. At 7:30 AM. I'm guessing it was the wakeup call for a few at the hotel this AM, sorry. I shut the truck off, all power off until I was ready to go. Then started the truck and threw it in gear. BB said the back up alarm went off as soon I start moving. I don't realize it is off until I am pulling on the freeway. Then all the alarms go off for a few miles. 1st stop is five miles down the road at the TA, only one truck at the pumps so no waiting. Not sure how much fuel I need so I fill. From here it is a non-stop trip to the drop. I have both ear plugs in by now, the beeping never stops for long. I do have two of the turns written down but don't need them. Basic freeway to freeway, then three turns once we are off the freeway. I get to the drop and someone talking on their phone outside talks to me before I am ready to get out of the truck. They get someone else to tell me where to park and then once I have my things cleaned out a third person does a quick inspection. 15 minutes and we are ready to roll. We take care of our paperwork and then head west. Dealing with the alarm and having to fuel cost us a little more time than we had planned but we're still good. By now BB can see that her tolls for the car have come through but only one of mine for the truck has. A little later another one comes through from the truck but not on the transponder ... somehow they emailed us we owed them money. I was told that if the could see my plate, they would match it to our transponder. That did not happen. Then BB paid it so now we can't get it matched up to the transponder for billing the shipper. And the final toll hasn't come through at all. 1st stop with the car is Loves in Rochelle for gas and shelf food. Not wanting to make a lot of stops so combined rest break, gas and food. BB has already been assigned her RV trip but I have not. 2nd stop was the rest area near Cedar Rapids. I was going to call my clinic back but couldn't find the number on my phone (found it later on biz card in the car :) ) Did finally call dispatch about my RV, after putting me on hold for a while they finally assigned me one. I wanted to make sure I had a reason to rush back to IA. Somewhere after than I get a call that my RV will not be ready until after 5:30 ... so we decide to eat something first. Culvers is our 3rd stop. Ice cream only. At the shipper my RV is still not ready. We finally take it as is about 6 PM because it is getting late and we are getting close to me running up against my 14 hours for the day. BB is tired. She wants to stop ASAP. But the cheap hotel in Clear Lake is full and the better ones are $200+ ... so we will go the extra hour plus down the road, after we fuel. Fuel at Loves, mine takes $200+ for the first fuel. Comfort Inn in Charles City is the hotel. Shelf food from Kwik Star is our food. It is now almost 10 PM 2023 09 02 IA-PA 2 RV's to Hershey PA ... spending the night at Holiday City PA BB is in a rush this AM to get down for breakfast ... and we get down before they start. As do a few others. Once the eggs are there we grab some and head back to our room. We pull out at our usual 7:30. Last night we had our day all planned out. First stop was going to be the rest area as it is easier and faster to get in and out of. But I decided we'd stop at Center Point instead. Usually not as crowded and I'm looking for mostly vacant area's to stop this trip. BB uses the rest room and I stay with my RV. 2nd stop was the Loves in Davenport for fuel for BB. I realize now that I would have saved another $10 by fueling there, but I still had enough to get to OH so instead 'I stayed by my vehicle.' 3rd stop was the Loves near Ottawa for food. Should have stopped at the QT a few miles before as it was much more vacant. Nowhere to 'stay by my vehicle,' so we ate inside at Subway. 4th stop was a quick stop. As in I stopped quick. Slow motion, I see something in the air, then bounce and CRACK. Whatever it was hit the windshield. Good sized, maybe a 4x4 block of wood, either kicked up by a car or off the semi ahead of me. I pull over and call dispatch after hours right away. No answer, so I take a picture and send it to them. Then I try to call the number on my paperwork ... they do answer. This is going to a show so they need to check on what to do. 'Keep going.' But first I tape it up, inside and out. I use some of my placard tape but that isn't very strong. So I pull tape off the floor of the RV and tape it to the outside. of the windshield. And use the lighter tape on the inside. On the picture I took from the outside, the windshield almost looks like powder at the point of impact. I'm afraid that if I don't get it taped up, the smaller pieces are going to start blowing into the RV. I had a shattered window in a city bus once I taped up. That was OK until after it rained. The tape held so much rain/weight that it finally fell out and I had to stop on the side of the road and take the whole window out. That was a cold ride the rest of the trip. That stop took about a half hour. Next stop was the oasis in Indiana for a break. When we got there I did not see a place to park away from everyone else, but as we were leaving I saw that on the other side of the building I could be away from others and 'stay by my vehicle.' So I did for another few minutes. From here we decide where to get a hotel. Plan was to stop in Fremont but hotels were twice as much as 20 miles down the road. Plan also was to stop in Eden for fuel at the Loves but for a few cents more we can fuel tomorrow across the street from the hotel. Hotel is the Quality Inn in Holiday City. I've stayed here a number of times under various hotel names. This place still has a restaurant attached. I think it was built as a Holi-dome, it has that look but the pool area has been filled in and is just a meeting area now. Food at the Winn was good. Not too many choices. Soup and lasagna for me. Then I go out and 'stay by my vehicle' for another hour (?) This is getting old. Last trip, yesterday, two of the three I-pass locations wouldn't read my I-pass. So we were worried we'd have issues again today. BB looked up to see if we could stop and get new I-passes but they are only open M-F. But no issues the first five stations. BB did have some trucker honking at her for a bit, no idea why. We did pass one RV heading our way. They were actually going the speed limit. We usually do, but we push it a little more in the CGO traffic. Mostly an un-eventful day. Load board US - 112 IA - 3/2 MN - 3 WI - 3 Tomorrow ... get another 500 miles to the hotel close to the rental car and the drop. 2023 09 03 IA-PA 2 RV's to Hershey PA ... spending the night at Harrisburg PA After breakfast, I went out and 'stood by my RV' until BB got out there. Then decided that was it. No more for me. BB needs fuel now, I do not so she goes and fuels while I am doing my inspection. BB had made all the plans for today, last night. Now this AM we see that fuel is a lot cheaper in Perrysburg so she is putting in just enough fuel to get there and I have enough fuel to get there. Less than an hour later we are at our first stop, Loves in Perrysburg. $.30 less than by the hotel. I was guessing I was actually getting 8 mpg, but BB didn't think that was enough fuel so I put in more. Easier that way. That was an extra stop, we decided not to re-do the whole day's stops. 2nd stop was now the Oasis in Amhurst for the restroom. BB wanted to make sure that where we stopped for lunch had a big enough place to park and by now we were off the toll road. So we end up at the Country Pride at the TA. This was the first one we have seen today, the Country Pride locations have all gone ma-pa places. I have breakfast, BB has fish. It was good, but took a little longer. 4th stop was a Sheetz gas station in State College PA. No where for me to park, it looked bigger online. There should have been room next door at the Cracker Barrell, but I headed down the street. One lane so no where to park their either. I ended up backing into a construction site. But was on what would be a road so people kept stopping to let me go. I just waited for BB to add more fuel. From here I let BB and her GPS take the lead. Two hours of non-freeway and a dozen road names. I had looked at the route and noted the major roads but not how far on each and most did not have 'exit numbers.' I would have been OK until the last two miles or so. That I had not looked at close enough. But if I had been leading I would have just kept going to the airport and been able to see the hotel from the final exit. Comfort Inn Harrisburg. They have a free shuttle every half hour so we'll both ride that in the AM and then move our stuff when we have the car. Sheetz. Is the only food within walking distance. They do make sandwiches to order but BB found a wrap she wanted on the shelf so I got a chicken salad sandwich off the shelf also. They also had egg salad and ham salad besides tuna salad. Not great, but food. My windshield is now cracked the full bottom to top on one crack, the other cracks didn't seem to expand. I did hit a road gator/tire today. But I sit high enough up that I don't think I did any damage. Lots of cops out today, lots of drivers stopped. When we got to the hotel, BB started to say "if we do this again ..." I stopped her, I knew what she was going to say. And I was right. We could have taken the freeway/toll way all the way here. Almost no mileage difference, but about a $20 toll difference. Worth it for us. We will likely go back that way. Load board US - 157 (TX put out the 45 new ones today) We have a 9 AM shuttle set up for the rental car. Hopefully have the 1st RV at delivery by 10 AM ... MAYBE ... the 2nd at delivery by 11 AM and then get back to Cleveland or Toledo before getting a hotel. 2023 09 04 IA-PA 2 RV's to Hershey PA (delivered) ... spending the night at Maumee OH Breakfast, we came down late because we had no where to go. And we found out why the hotel was full and the parking lot was empty. Tour bus(s) Two people working to keep the food items full. I got the last of the bacon, then they switched over to sausage. At 9 AM we got our ride to the airport. We are only a couple of blocks from the airport but but between here and there runs the electric train. So walking across the tracks is not recommended. The rental agency's open at 9 AM so no reason to get there earlier. One person in line ahead of us. A few questions and they hand us the keys. Back at the lot we throw our stuff in the rental car and head out. I hadn't like the way the computer routed us so I made up my own route. Still not the best route but I got there. First I fueled, the place was small and I had close to a 40 footer. My camera didn't focus so I didn't get a picture of the sales tag. As I pull up to the drop, I can see our other RV's so I know I'm in the right area. But we have to go all the way around one of the big event buildings and then end up in the line with all the people going to the amusement park which opened at 9 AM. This place is made for cars so I had to take up two lanes to make the final turn. First they need to wash them. I get in the line and then am told to bypass the line I was in. It looked like today was 'our day,' so we got priority. The other drivers from other companies had to wait until none of us were waiting to get washed. Looks like I was there a little over a half hour, so not too bad. Back to the hotel to get BB's RV. We found a better way to go than I had taken. And then BB wouldn't let me take the rest of the way I had taken but that isn't what the GPS was saying ... now. But we got back. Then on the way back to the drop, BB forgot how we had planned on going so we still have not gone the best way. This happened somewhere on the route that we took three times ... 1st time I noticed a small dead deer. 2nd time I noticed a guy with his bike standing near the deer and also a car parked near. 3rd time was a few cop cars and an ambulance. BB saw someone wheeling a bike away and someone being loaded in ... we are guessing the person on the bike got hit. BB ... she knew the routine so that made it easier. But the line was gone and so were the people who were checking us it. My dispatcher had called just before we got to the drop to give us another cell number because the inspectors were moving around and may not be there when we got back. We know them and they knew we were bringing another RV. Not sure if the 2nd RV even took 15 minutes to inspect and wash. And we were gone. ... and this time we are taking the freeway back, not the back roads the company routed us on. Less than an hour down the road and we stop at an Oasis for Roy Rogers. I thought they were all gone. They have changed. No more shelf food. Pretty much like any other fast food now, order and wait. Not great, but OK. At least they were open. The Sboro's and Aunt Annie's next to them were closed. We stop again just for a break, here two other food chains were closed. Not sure why but I've been getting tired the last few trips when traveling in the rental car. Not rumble strip tired but wearing. Another oasis, more fast food. Jimmy John's ??? so that is what we got. But they were all out of the 'slim Jim' size so we had to get the regular size. Then I got a smoothie from the 'Fresh' place next to it. This Oasis also had a Wendy's and a Dunkin. All busy. Another couple of hours and we are at Maumee at the Comfort Inn for the night. But 1st we stop in Perrysburg at the Loves for cheap gas. Still the cheapest until we get back into Iowa. Two more hours to go to where most of the work trips are in Indiana. We will call in the AM to see what pays and what is left. We have the car for a week and as of Friday the only work in our area was a trip of less than 100 miles. The way it looks we will try to keep busy near here for the rest of the week. If there is long work somewhere we may grab it and ditch the car, otherwise we plan on being home by next weekend and not do any long trips until after mid October ... 2023 09 05 IA-PA 1 RV to Burlington WI (delivered) ... spending the night at Rockford IL BB is up early so we are down for breakfast and back before 8 AM local. Our plan had been to move whichever RV to MI had the latest close time ... but dispatch didn't have any idea when the close times were. Luckily, I remembered to ask how much the trip paid before taking the trip. Not enough. Not even half enough. Pay was on par with what my local company pays when they supply the shuttle driver to get me back. And fuel is reimbursed so no way to make money on the fuel either. Pppppfffffffffff That let the air out of that balloon. So we are heading in the direction of home instead. Then it makes less difference how much it pays. We get the trip we wanted, the other two to WI can wait. 8:30 AM and we are pulling out. There was supposed to be a stop at the oasis in Howe but BB and I were talking and both missed it. So now A restroom is the priority. We are kind of pushing it so BB says she can wait until we are in Elkhart. But only wait until we get to the first gas station, not wait for the nicer ones. Because of the extra stop we get to the shipper/dispatch office a little after 10:30. Not sure who's who so I waited for the wrong person for a few minutes. Then get my paperwork and find the RV. It's a shell. No insides. It takes us an hour to do the inspection and call the drop. The drop does not know what time they close and can't find anyone who does know. So we leave without knowing ... Different unit so just finding the oil dip stick took a while. And there was not a VIN plate anywhere, plus one of the marker lights was out. Just little things but they all add up. I have enough fuel to get to the drop but with this dispatcher we need to leave the unit at the same fuel level as we pick it up at. Current mpg shows as '2.' Next stop is the Pilot in South Bend to put in 15 gallons of fuel. That is a guess that we will get 10+ mpg. I can top it off before delivery, I have enough fuel to get there. I mention to BB which route I plan on taking ... I'm guessing she didn't hear me (more on that later) My I-pass works on the toll gates as long as I pull all the way up to the gate, but I always go through the cash lane just in case where I can. Not really any traffic issues today ... So I take I-80, I-294 and I-290 as I said I would ... then I see and remember that I-290 ends at I-90. No problem, it becomes a four lane IL state highway. Then that ends ... now that IS a problem. Instead of stopping, I guess as to which way to go. Then after a couple of miles I starting thinking I picked the wrong way. My reasoning had been to get back to I-94, but that was quite a ways back and I am less than an hour from the customer. I am better off to now take the back roads directly to the drop. So I look at a map and memorize about where I should turn. I did OK, no U-turns or re-directs once I looked at the map. But it was 45-35 mph roads. And my fuel was not enough, so I stop and add 3+ gallons at the edge of town and then head out again. I am less than a mile from the drop when I finally realize I have been here before. But came in from the opposite direction. I get there right at 3:30. After I am inspected, I ask what time they do close ... 3:30. Whew. Good thing I didn't take any more wrong turns. Not knowing what time they closed meant I was not worrying about it :) Nothing new on the load board today ... so we will likely do the Huntly to Des Moines tomorrow. But for tonight we head to Rockford. Rockford? Nice hotel, good food. And centered between Janesville and Huntly. 1st we stop at Loves in East Troy for the restroom. Oh, I haven't eaten since breakfast but now it is too close to good food to eat anything to tide me over. In Rockford we first go to Jason's Deli. Chicken Pot Pie for soup today instead of Potato. Good. Still had the chicken salad sandwich. Then we got strawberry shortcake to go. We had waited until after 5 PM to make our hotel reservation, just in case something good showed up. It doesn't. The hotel is the Sleep Inn. Now we are looking at my hours. My 'cheat sheet' is on my other computer and I don't follow how the program it's self is doing my hours. So as of now, I know I can work 12 hours tomorrow but don't know about Thursday ... maybe it's BB's turn to work :) ))) Got paid for one of my trips. $55 instead of $5 for tolls. I called, they said it was more trouble to change it than it was worth ... Thanks ((( Load board US - 134 IA - 3/2 MN - 4 WI - 3 .. the trip continues HERE
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