 |
|
|
|
|
...My Life as 'Drive away' driver
|
.. the trip continues from HERE 2024 02 23 IA-CA 2 RV's to Davis CA ... spending the night at Elko NV Spent last night in Rawlins at the Comfort Inn We don't want to get going too early this AM because of our NV permit. Breakfast was egg patties and sausage. Inspecting at 7:30 local. Sun is up and on my windshield but not on BB's. Frost this AM. Pretty quiet day. Saw one other Ekko at the Flying J in Rawlins. Don't remember any other driveaway coming or going. 1st stop is in Rock Springs at Cruel Jack's. We used to stop here for fuel before the Loves in Green River opened. They had a fire a few years ago and it burnt down the attached A&W. They started rebuilding the A&W, it is still on the highway sign, but then changed it too a GodFathers Express. And they completely re-did the whole store. Nice new restrooms, new layout. It used to be an old 'hole in the wall' place. 2nd stop was in Fort Bridger for fuel and Burger King for food. My low fuel light came on before we got there but it is coming on now when I still have about a 100 miles range. I did try the new candied bacon but they put too much pepper on it. And it wasn't a Whopper Jr so it was a lot of food for me. When we are done inside, we have to make phone calls. First call is to RV dispatch, my RV has a warning light on. They suggested I drive it a couple of more days to see if it goes off. I'm good with that. Then I'll get paid all my miles. Next call is for permits. We had talked about what time to get the permits for last night, and again just before I called. But as soon as I hung up, BB thought I got them for the wrong time, that we would be sitting at the border for an hour waiting to go in. But, they are now ordered, we have to adjust. Then I call the drop. Today they are making appointments. Don't remember that happening ever before and we have been delivering to this customer for the last almost nine years and this is their third location. So we need to now be there at 9 AM for one and 9:30 for the other. Not sure how my warning light issue plays into that ... And last I call the bus dispatcher to let them know I was on my way. Monday doesn't look good now ... so we will talk Monday about Tuesday. I'm good with that. We'll end up with two days off, just a couple of hours work in the middle. Still bucking a headwind. Forgot to look at my mpg today. Likely closer to 14 than 19. When we left Fort Bridger I had a range of 318 (vs 440 yesterday.) 130 miles later when we stopped in Tooele I had a range of 320. All down hill, almost. 4th stop was the Flying J in Tooele for a break. 5th stop was at the Wendover rest area for a break and to wait until our permits were good ... :) Our permits were good 20 minutes ago. BB's math was bad at noon. If it hadn't taken us a full hour, slow service, at Burger King, we would have been to the border within a couple of minutes of our permit. Just before the rest area, there is a 'tree' with a few large balls on it and a cracked one on the ground. My guess is it is a disguised cell tower. Anyway, today was the first time I had seen people parked at the tree. I assumed people did because of the things they would leave, but today someone was actually stopped. Water was a little higher that the last few times. Before people were driving off the rest area onto the flats. Today a few kids were wading in the water. From here I tried to call one of the west coast dispatchers. Their number on the website is disconnected. So BB found another one, someone finally answered but they would have to have someone call me back. That doesn't work. I'm driving. I was going to ask about their CA trips. They have 12 ranging from 47 to 470 miles. Most starting close to where we drop. But that will have to wait now until Monday. 5th stop is the Comfort Inn in Elko. It's been a while since we have been here. With the buses we stay at the Holiday Inn. The Comfort has tight turns and tree overhang to get to their lot. Not worth it. As soon as we are checked in, we call the Pizza Barn next door. Food is ready in 30 minutes this time. Once when we were there, by the time we finally got our food, they were telling new orders that there was a ... two hour wait. Load board US - 161 IA - 41/40 MN - 1 WI - 1 Tomorrow ... rolling early to get out of the state before the permit expires. We both 'might' make it to the next cheap fuel, but we will put in a couple of gallons here in town before we leave. Then the next stop will be our final fill, we hope. We might have to add more or might leave 10 gallons depending on the winds. 2nd stop will be food, 3rd will be the rest area at Donners Pass and then the Rocklin hotel for the rest of the weekend. Not the cheapest but a big parking, lots of food within walking distance and seems to be a safe area. Just wish there was hiking trails less than a mile away. A mile is still our hike, so we'd only get halfway there. 2024 02 24 IA-CA 2 RV's to Davis CA ... spending the night at Rocklin CA Omelettes and sausage for breakfast. We were ready at 6:30 local but not in a big rush, ended up starting at 6:45. Frost on the windows again. Temps the last two days have been below freezing to highs around 50 degrees. 1st stop today is just across the freeway at a Sinclair gas station. We each put in about three gallons of fuel so we have excess range. We each had enough to get to the next fuel, IF there was no loss in range. Here in Elko there was a Holiday Inn Express hotel. It had closed and at sometime a Wyndam sign went up. Then it was covid. As far as I saw, the Wyndam never opened. Most of the last four years, there has been a fence around the property. My guess is that various people had tried to re-open it. Now today, it has an 'Elk Motel' sign up but it is still not open. But closer than I have seen for years. Officer in the median in about the same place as usual. Usually he has a transporter pulled over. But we haven't seen any/many transporters this trip so maybe neither has he. He sits just west of the west Elko exit. 2nd stop is less than an hour down the road at the Maverick in Battle Mountain. We took a little detour to get there because there is a new Comfort Inn in town. It still has a temp sign where the prior one had been and the parking sign was still for the old hotel. And there is food next door ... just in case we ever make it this far. I top off the fuel tank well. 3rd stop is the Port-o-Sub in Lovelock. We had seen on a prior trip that the station was leveling a non-paved part of the parking lot. Today we see they have made it into a travel trailer parking area. No signs saying it is open yet. We are there at 10:30, but this location opens at 8 AM so not an issue. We have stopped somewhere that didn't open until later. When we are done eating, I call the truck/van dealer that is a couple of blocks from our hotel. Yes they can work on them, but the appointment would be for 'sometime later in the week.' Good to know. Going through Sparks/Reno. Someone was between the dumpster and the freeway fence with their pants at their ankles. They did have baggy underwear on, and a shirt around their middle ... Strange. Just into CA, there was a cop without his lights on ... and not fully out of the travel lane. Because of thick traffic and no lights, I did not see him until it was too late to get over. So I slow to a crawl and continue past his car ... and he decides to walk between me and his car as I am passing. He could have waited another minute and the traffic was much lighter. 4th stop is Donners Pass. Snow as high as the six foot fence. Today I was too busy watching and unpredictable car ahead of me in traffic so I did not look over at the ski resort. Plenty of snow compared to other places. From here down to the hotel, I had my dash on mph. Otherwise I get behind something and don't realize how slow I am going. Yesterday I had an average if 15.2 mpg. Forgot to look today when we were done. We did see one of our buses in transport. I forgot almost right away what name was on it. BB thinks it was some place in Kansas. But that was it. Not much for transporters out. 5th and final stop was the Comfort Inn in Rocklin. Not packed yet tonight. But it is only 2:30 local. Once we are in the room, I call a second truck dealer. This was MAY be able to look at it right away Monday morning. He knew what I was asking but was very careful not to give me a direct answer, but instead wanted my number so someone could call me back in the AM. So Monday ... 6 AM local, will be 8 AM RV dispatch time so we can call and get things started. By 7 AM the truck/van dealer is open. And we have a delivery appointment at 9 AM. We'll see how this works. ... BB MIGHT follow me to the dealer, and hopefully they can tell us how soon it can be looked at. At that point I can either wait with the RV or leave mine and get in BB's. At this point we are not sure what time or what point we will call about the next trucks to move. We did <> decide to use our local rental car from the drop to go to get an 2nd local from near the buses. Part of that reason is based on us moving the trucks, we'd be going that way anyway ... and we have time. And the cost for two locals is much less than a one-way. After we are in the hotel a bit, we decide to walk to Sourdough. One of our go-to sandwich shops on the west coast. There used to be a A&W/KFC in the building next to it but that had been closed a year or two. Today there are Wienerschnitzel signs. Opening soon. Load board US - 229 IA - 120/119 MN - 0 WI - 1 Tomorrow is an R&R day, no travel. Maybe some walking. It was in the 70's today. No jackets. 2024 02 25 IA-CA 2 RV's to Davis CA ... spending the night at Rocklin CA Today is a day off ... no alarm. But we were up in time to eat breakfast. They had two kinds of scrambled eggs (with/without meat,) sausage, potatoes. Plus I had good yogurt. Non-diet yogurt, the last few days other places it has all be diet. We didn't eat too much because we were going to go next door for lunch. BB did laundry before lunch, we haven't been gone a week yet but will likely be out for a while yet. And the laundry was just a few doors down on our level. Sometime after noon local, we went next door to Morning Toast. Timing was good, people were starting to leave and we were seated within a couple of minutes. Good food. In the afternoon, we did go for a walk. About a mile and a half so not even all the way to the park so it was all sidewalk. There is a new burger place that just opened the first of the year. It's about two blocks from the hotel on the same side of the road. Nice thing about this area, dozens of food places and no McD's, no BK, no Wendy's, No Hardee's/Carl's Jr. In the evening we were still stuffed but knew we'd be hungry overnight if we didn't eat now. So Taco Bell. I got two taco's and BB got 1. So a low key day. When we were out, we saw one company was washing two of their trucks with the hotels water. Hadn't thought about doing that. We also saw a 'Super sucker' truck in transport in the lot. We've talked about various plans for tomorrow, but they will get adjusted tomorrow. ... the trip continues HERE |
