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...My Life as 'Drive away' driver
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2023 11 22 MN ... spending the night at home I did watch the load board all day (numbers below) BB was gone for most of the day. Very little change for most of the day. When it was close enough to the end of the day we decided we would pick a less ideal trip so that we would have work for Friday. I call in and it goes to voicemail, all lines are busy with people on hold. I call back and get put on hold ... almost 10 minutes. I'm about ready to hang up and call back when they pickup. ... and ... against everything they have ever done since we have been there ... they will not allow us to get a trip until the SAME day we can pick it up. ??? I tried to question it, it was not what I had been told earlier in the week. IF, if we could have the RV's off the lot before 7 AM on Friday ... But we don't want to work that bad. There is lots of work 3 to Fremont CA, 5 to Davis, 4 to Phoenix, 3 to Los Vegas. Now we have time to do the math. Unless we eat too much tomorrow, we should be on our way before we call in for work on Friday. Weather 'looks' OK for going I-80. Deliver on Tuesday and ready to head out with a bus on Tuesday night. Load board US - 272 IA - 81 MN - 6 WI - 9 (four of the MN trips are ones that I would do if we were not heading to CA) 07:00 - US - 236 07:30 - US - 242 08:00 - US - 238 / IA - 27 08:15 - US - 234 / IA - 24 08:30 - US - 235 / IA - 21 08:45 - US - 232 / IA - 21 09:00 - US - 224 / IA - 20 09:15 - US - 218 / IA -19 09:30 - US - 218 / IA - 19 09:45 - US - 215 / IA - 19 10:00 - US - 211 / IA - 19 10:15 - US - 209 / IA - 19 10:30 - US - 206 / IA - 19 10:45 - US - 205 / IA - 19 11:00 - US - 211 / IA - 24 11:15 - US - 208 / IA - 24 11:30 - US - 208 / IA - 24 11:45 - US - 208 / IA - 24 12:00 - US - 211 / IA - 25 12:15 - US - 209 / IA - 25 12:30 - US - 210 / IA - 25 12:45 - US - 215 / IA - 28 01:00 - US - 212 / IA - 28 01:15 - US - 212 / IA - 27 01:30 - US - 215 / IA - 27 01:45 - US - 215 / IA - 27 02:00 - US - 215 / IA - 27 02:15 - US - 231 / IA - 40 02:30 - US - 232 / IA - 39 02:45 - US - 232 / IA - 39 03:00 - US - 233 / IA - 40 03:15 - US - 230 / IA - 39 03:30 - US - 231 / IA - 39 03:45 - US - 227 / IA - 39 04:00 - US - 225 / IA - 40 04:15 - US - 240 / IA - 55 ... 05:00 - US - 272 / IA - 86 2023 11 24 IA-CA Spent last night at home ... We both started dialing at 7:58, I got through once but it ended up going to voicemail. Then at about 8:04, BB got through again and got our trips. But ... the one we wanted was already gone so we will both be driving the same kinds of units. ... last night. I was packing and noticed when I grabbed my extra meds that something was not right. After searching for more pills we finally looked closer at the bottle I did have and saw that for the last refill, I was given a 3 week supply instead of a 3 month. And the store doesn't open until 9 AM so we are not getting going at 7 AM ... 2 RV's to Davis CA ... spending the night at Waukee IA On the way to the store, first I am following someone who's tire is almost running on the rim so I'm watching it closely. They turn off before the street goes to four lanes so I can't wave them down. Then at the only four ways stop ... someone blows right through it as I am next to go ... Not a good start to the day. 9 AM I call in and they can have what I need ready in a half hour. When I get there, I find out that they only have me a small amount of pills again. Not going to deal with it today, next time. Next stop is for fuel and food at the Loves in Albert Lea. It is cold enough that we want to leave the fuel tank just about on full. And we might as well eat as long as we are stopped. Nothing good on the shelf that can be eaten while driving so we go to Wendy's. Not fast but fresh. We are at the shipper. The lots are full. Guess what. That RV we wanted? It had stayed on the load board all morning and was still there when we fueled. The driver who got the trip ... didn't have their logs up to date in the computer and the main office is closed until Monday. That driver can't work at all and had to give up their trip. I had asked BB many times if I should call ... 'no, they are busy and just behind' ... Shipper is working today. Sounds like there will be at least another 200 more RV's on the load board this month. Should be something left for us when we get back. We are a little behind getting here, every few minutes counts. We had hoped to be out of here at 1 PM and it was 1:30 when we were ready to leave town. Neither of us were in a big rush. Only talked to one other driver, he saw me parking my car and said he had one that brand ... drove it 300,000 miles, towed it another 300,000 miles and then sold it to a co-driver who drove it another 200,000 before it died. My wife had around 400,000 on a previous car before that one died on us. BB doesn't have enough fuel to get to the next cheap fuel so we fuel in town at the Kwik Star. I put in 11 gallons and she puts in 17. The Ankeny rest area had been closed because of road work so we stop at the Story City rest area about 20 miles before it this trip. Plan was to get to Council Bluffs tonight but we are running behind enough that it would be an hour after dark by then. And the deer are still moving around a lot so we decide to shut down early. None of our class hotels between Des Moines and Omaha so we get the last hotel out of town, Waukee. The Sleep Inn. But that means we will not make it to California by Monday night unless we start or run in the dark. Once we check in, we walk next door to the Hy-Vee gas station / coffee shop. Good food. Made to order. Today the soups are not anything I would eat, but something BB would eat and she rarely gets soup. I had a chicken salad sandwich. No desert. Load board US - 332 IA - 101 MN - 5 WI - 9 Lots of good no-tow trips that would have paid better than this. But it is always a 'do we take what there is, or wait for something that may not happen.' We took what there was. Now there is ... 9 - Rancho Cucamonga (LA) 8 - FL 2 - Duluth MN 2 - Bend OR 20 different cities that had two our more RV's going to the same place. Choices. Tomorrow we will try to get to Sidney. Just over 500 miles. Unless the weather shuts us down sooner. We are at the time of the year where 500 miles takes us 8 hours of driving, plus two hours for inspections, rest breaks, fuel and lunch. That is the 10 hours of daylight. Add anything to that and we are driving in the dark. 2023 11 25 IA-CA 2 RV's to Davis CA ... spending the night at Sidney NE Spent last night in Waukee IA at the Sleep Inn. Today my breakfast is a small cup of yogurt. Too much food earlier in the week. It is light outside by 7 AM but breakfast doesn't start here until 7 AM so we wait. By 7:30 we are ready to pull out. Lots of stops today, things are not well spaced. 1st stop is the Loves in Shelby as we are not likely to make it to Omaha without walking. These are diesel so we both fuel using the same pump. When I come back out, BB is talking to someone instead of fueling. I fuel hers, I fuel mine, I go in and pay and by then the person she is talking to has moved from waiting in line to being done fueling and she is still talking to them. Or listening. It is a driver we met in Indiana when we were picking up once. We had talked to him thee for about a half hour before we decided to keep moving. This conversation was not that long but longer than our 10-15 usual stop. About halfway through Lincoln it starts to snow harder, there had been wisps of snow as soon as we got to Nebraska but now it is staying on the road. First we see a pickup tight to the median, too tight to have parked there intentionally. Then within the next couple of miles we see a couple of damaged cars and one in the ditch. Traffic slows to 35-45 mph for quite a while. I just go with the flow of traffic and follow a ways back. Can't say it's a 'safe distance' as how far is that on ice? Or packed snow? We never do get back up to 65 mph before we pull off for fuel. 2nd stop was in Seward at the rest area, this is supposed to be a trucks only rest area but there is a steady line of cars coming and going. And because there is not any car parking, they seem to think the travel lane is a good place to park. 3rd stop is Aurora for fuel and food. BB was right, people are traveling and the Loves are packed with people that don't know truckstop protocol. We try to park on opposite sides of a pump but that took some waiting, then both sides opened at once. This is a small Loves and the car lot is full, people filling in one of the drive areas also. So we go around back to park with the trucks. That is a zoo also but we find a spot before the fuel islands so we don't need to deal with most of it. ... and then I order a larger sandwich, none of the shelf food looked good. So we ended up spending an hour here between fuel and food. Half that is our goal. Arby's. Before our next stop we see a couple of trucks in the ditch, one of them on it's side. Then I saw something I don't think I have ever seen before, a truck on the side of the road with both left rear tires flat, (or four if it was duals) It was sitting on the rims. Hmm ... Unrelated but in the same area that was an old man waving his thumb up and down, at the time I thought about calling the cops when we stopped but by then I forgot. There was a pickup on the opposite side of the freeway and my guess is he was the driver. And not dressed for standing outside at 20 degrees with wind. Also thought about stopping but not until we are long past. 4th stop is the Loves in North Platte for fuel. Another zoo, here BB had to pull in behind me as there were not opens across from each other. The car on the other side of the pump was sitting there, empty when we got there. Someone with a long trailer pulled in behind them and was asking ... some one's easy parking spot I guess. When we were done fueling, we pulled off to the side while I paid and BB made reservations in Sidney for tonight. Going past Ogallala tonight I noticed that Runza has moved to a new building. Their former building used to be a Best Western on one end, the Runza and The Farmers Daughter back to back in the middle and a gas station on the other end. The whole area is now vacant. I missed this one. In Big Springs there is a new Maverick gas station that opened across the freeway from the Flying J. I looked to see that the gas was the same price both places and the diesel was $.30 less at the Maverick. What did not click with me, but did with BB, was that the price of gas was $2.39 vs close to $3 on Ogallala. Somewhere along here, one of our RV's pass us. I don't see it coming so I only get a quick look. It is wrapped so it is new, neither of us see any placards or a plate. We run at 65 mph so they were doing 70-75 mph. That was it for transporters today. We are heading off into the sunset, luckily there are clouds most of the way so it is only a problem for a few minutes tonight. We end up getting to Sidney at 6 PM, last light. Not a huge issue, once the Denver traffic splits off the road is mostly empty, we know the road and very little wildlife. We've had this desk clerk before, we she sees our name she has to mention the $$ money ones in Denver. As soon as we are in our room we walk to Taco Johns. We eat there so the food is warm when we eat it. Tonight the beef is too spicy for me. We eat at one once in a while near us and I don't remember that being an issue. Shortly before we got to Sidney, the temps dropped to 15 degrees but then came back up a few. This year the cold is really hitting me hard. I had my heat on high and my jacket zipped up all day to stay warm. Every so often I would put a hand in front of the vent to take the chill off. Load board (weekend) US - 310 IA - 91 MN - 5 WI - 8 Plan is for a 5:30 alarm, leave out at 7 AM. We plan to get past Evanston if possible. We've never stayed between Evanston and Salt Lake City before but that is the plan this time. We stay here a lot, not sure if we usually stop short or push past SLC. BB will be watching the weather. Not just the snow but high winds are forecast and we are 'high profile.' 2023 11 26 IA-CA 2 RV's to Davis CA ... spending the night at Coalville UT Spent the night at the Comfort Inn in Sidney NE. Alarm was set for 5 AM local but we were up before that. All this place had for yogurt was diet, but they had other good food. The 'ham patties,' is what I call them. Like sliced ring sausage but without the spice. And cheese omelette and potatoes. Just in case we don't get a good meal at noon. The temp did rise again during the night so it is back above 20 degrees. Lots of travelers yesterday but the hotel was not too busy. Our two RV's, four pickups with trailers, one decked semi tractors and maybe a dozen cars. We are ready to pull out at 6:30 local, all the way across the street to fuel at Loves. The tow away driver we were talking to yesterday is in the front lot at Loves, either sleeping in the cab of his pickup or in the travel trailer. Next stop is an hour plus down the road at the POE / Port of Entry for Wyoming to get our permits. In the office, they ask BB for something we don't have, BB answers once, then twice and then the officer was like ... Duh. It finally clicked why we didn't have what they asked for. We did see two tow away drivers here with travel trailers. That was it for the day other than two stacked/decked sets of semi tractors. The scale house usually has their screen on showing the road conditions. It was off line. So BB tries to bring it up on her phone, it can't connect. So today we will be going by what the overhead signs say. 1st one says 'slick spots - slow down - shut of cruise. But a few miles after that the variable speed limit signs are set to 55 mph instead of 75-80 mph. Sounds good to me. After a few miles of that the signs are up to 65 mph, about the same place the overhead signs say - gusts to 40+. And the roads were worse. I stayed at 55 mph until we were almost to Laramie. When we get to Loves, we drive around the fuel pumps a few times trying to find a place we will both fit. Once we find a pump (that the screen doesn't work on) and get it turned on, we notice all the other pumps are now empty. One car that was sitting here when we got here was just leaving. Timing. Another hour and a half and we are at our fourth stop of the day. Burger King in Rawlins. Fast food, fast. We are in and out in our 30 minutes. Cheyenne to Laramie was our bad roads for the day. Still windy but the roads are clear and the traffic is light. Saw one coyote carefully crossing the road today. Also saw lots of pronghorn deer grazing. Lots of changes in businesses. There is a new Maverick gas station in Laramie that had not even been started the last time we came through and now it is open. 5th stop is the Loves in Green River. Something happened today that we have not had happen before. They would not turn on our fuel pump inside. If they don't do it that way, we do not get our fuel discount which amounts to ?? $20 per stop. We had to fuel with the big trucks to get the discount. We needed fuel before there would be another station or we would have just left. We fuel at Loves with the RV's because we can fuel at the auto pumps and we have small RV's. IF we need to fuel with the trucks, we will go where fuel is cheaper, and it is rarely Loves. The stations likely don't care but truckers can have an attitude about us being in with the 'professional drivers.' BB does the math and Coalville is as far as we can get by dark. So the Best Western it is. When we get to the hotel, BB realizes she was looking at sunset, not last light. We would have been able to get to Park City were there is a lot more food choices. We have to cross a weigh scale before the hotel. BB can't see the signs as the sun was right at the sign level. She thought they might be coming after her as she just left ... (no, there are other lower signs that light up if they want to see you in the scale house.) Once we check in, we ask about food ... Park City. Everything in town is closed on the weekends. When I asked about Subway, they thought that was open. So we drove there and it was closed. So I stopped at a gas station and they did have hot food. BB was sure they would not so she did not go in. I got a two piece chicken and some cheese sticks. BB ended up nuking something from the hotel fridge. When I told the desk clerk that Subway was closed, they said ... 'but I see you found some hot wings.' BB caught that, I didn't. They were to hot/spicy for my tastes. Luckily there was enough cheese sticks to lessen the bite. Fuel. We are getting paid assuming the RV's will get 13 mpg. So far every tankful has gotten either 8 or 9 mph. Hopefully we are saving enough on the fuel that the cost of the fuel will offset the miles lost. ---------- Tomorrow we will try to get the 500 miles to Fernley, that will leave about 200 miles for Tuesday to get to the drop. Tomorrow we need to call for permits, call the drop and the bus dispatcher. 2023 11 27 IA-CA 2 RV's to Davis CA ... spending the night at Fernley NV A two yogurt day. One was frozen but I guessed it was OK to eat so I did. This AM we got to see the moon setting, and got to watch it rise last night. Full moon, it's been in the news for some reason. Sun not quite up yet. Rough night last night. The heat seemed to be set with a 10 degree range. So if we set it to 70 degrees, it would heat until 75 degrees and then drop to 65 degrees before it would kick in again. No extra covers so we spent the night covering and un-covering if we were awake. Sounds like BB tried to adjust it a few times ... Spent last night in Coalville at the Best Western. They told us at check in that they were slow because the first two ski resorts just opened last weekend and the rest are not open yet. When we went through Park City we could see that some were making snow. It was about a 45 mile/minute drive to the Loves in Salt Lake City. Never been here before, not sure how long it's been here. I THINK I stayed across the street at a now closed hotel when I was doing my Salt Lake City to Denver trucks a few years ago. And next door to that was an ABF trucking terminal that was completely empty. Either they just moved out or are just going to move in. Only one other car at the auto pumps when we got there and when we left. I was expecting it to be a zoo being in the city, it is only a mile or two from the airport and just off the interstate. While we were stopped we called to order our NV permits ... I can't tell if Salt Lake is up or down. The reservoir near Coalville was full, first time I have seen that in a few years. So some of the new brush is now under water. Not much to see from Salt Lake to Wendover. Stay awake reminder signs. People used to like to drive on the flats but the highway department is slowly putting up cables. Some of the junk is still on the flats. The tire/sea monster, a cross, but I didn't notice the skeleton fishing this time. There is a tree with large balls on it, not sure what it actually is. There is a sign on the freeway reminding people there is no stopping on the freeway. And since we were past here last time, there is now 1,000's of 'things' hanging on the fence around the tree. I have never seen that before. Our next stop is the rest area. I had hoped to get a good picture here of the RV's but as soon as one truck pulled out, someone else pulled in. This place is now a row of out-houses. Cold this AM, sitting in the outhouse. Sign inside the hotel at Coalville this AM said it was 9 degrees. We have our permits, they came in a half hour before we needed them. Scale, both the entry and exit weigh scales are were open in UT this trip. AFTER we are at the scale, there is a sign that says 26,000# and over need to weigh. We aren't and there isn't a sign on the freeway saying that. I need to make a phone call. 10-20 miles west of Wendover there is an old truckstop that was over grown with grass and weeds when I started driving 20 years ago. Today I noticed that they still have 'security lights' on the building ... and they were on. ??? When we first got into NV I noticed some high fog or low clouds against one of the hill ranges. Then later we went up into other fog/clouds. It was pretty looking back in the mirror as we rose above the fog/clouds. Lots of picture stuff that we can't take while driving. Yesterday it was the snow covered trees in the early sun. But how? There were 40+ wind gusts and the trees were still hanging with snow. Today it was the frost on the ditch weeds before the sun hit them. Our first stop in Nevada is for fuel at the Loves in Wells. Here they take my fuel card ... but mess it up on their end. They can't get it cleared so I had to go get BB to come in and pay on her card. (They did say 'don't leave now' as I walked out the door to get BB :) ) Less than an hour down the road and we stop again at Elko, this time for food. Port O Subs. Always good, there deserts are too so we got one brownie and one cookie. While here I called the drop. They are off for lunch from 11:30 to 1 and we planned on getting there at noon. Hmmm A full two hours to our next stop. The Maverick in Winnemucca. Their posted price for fuel is less than our discounted price at the major truckstops. And no usage fee. From here I call the bus dispatcher and get voicemail and BB makes our hotel reservation. A few miles down the road the dispatcher calls back but I have to let it go go voicemail and call him back from the next exit. 'Very, very slow ... but you can try to call me on Wednesday.' (Tomorrow is Tuesday) We did have two transporter RV's pass us today. That was it, no school buses, mixers, trash trucks, etc. Final stop is just at sunset again. Fernley NV at the Comfort Inn. BB didn't want to drive into Reno after dark. Our first ever trip this way, we came into Reno right at sunset and she was trying to figure out where to be in traffic as the sun was right at eye level. It was less than a mile away, but the Mexican place we got food from tonight was on the other side of the railroad tracks and other side of the road. No stop signs or crosswalks or sidewalks. So we drove. Great food. The place is inside a casino with no signage on the building, just a street sign. We each have enough fuel to get to our drop ... plus a range of 10-20 miles. Not enough with mountain passes to cross, but we will wait until we are closer to the drop to add more fuel. Last time I did a trip with this style RV I had to add 2 gallons ... but I my last fuel was 50 miles back from where we fueled today. BB did the math, we are still making one on the fuel when making way below the mpg. Load board US - 254 IA - 57/56 MN - 3, WI - 3 Not sure our plan for the AM yet. IF we are up and ready to go ... we will try to get to the drop before 11:30. Otherwise we will take our time getting going. ... the trip continues HERE |
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