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...My Life as 'Drive away' driver
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.. the trip continues from HERE 2024 10 30 MN-WI 1 tool truck to Burlington WI spending the night at DeForest WI I got up at 6:30, BB had been up for over an hour. This place is being remodeled and only had two kinds of cold cereal, a couple of kinds of bread, a couple of kinds of fruit and cups of OJ. No yogurt, no hot food. Not much for a $100+ hotel. We pull out at 7:30, I didn't realize it would still be dark. Should have from yesterday, but today I need to inspect a truck in a half hour. BB had thought it was going to be cold, cold this AM and that I was going out to start the car and warm it up before I picked her up. Timing on that didn't work. It was in the low 40's here, not the mid-60's like at home. It is daylight by the time we get to the truck. They guy already has it running and was in it, not sure what he was doing other than waiting for me. He's retiring. He also had another tool truck like it but that one is not going back. I'm guessing it was an older one and not something the drop can re-build. No issues, I do remember to ask the questions I had. Hopefully I asked all of them. I'll find out when I try to start the truck in in the AM. He only left me an 1/8th of a tank of fuel and the low fuel light came on before I got to the edge of his property. But I still had enough to make it to the first truck stop, the one in Rothsay. At Rothsay, I put in enough fuel to get to Alexandria where fuel is quite a bit cheaper. Small station, I can pay at the pump with my personal credit card. Trucks running good so BB will head for home where she will eat and get her jacket, cap and gloves. I have a check engine light come on for a few seconds twice but no issues. No issues other than flies. By the end of the day I have killed a few dozen and stunned 100 or more and they are still many in the truck. 2nd stop is the Pilot in Alexandria, again. Truck says it is getting 8.7 mpg and I am able to put in 40 gallons. Pretty sure that will not be enough. And I do need to leave it with more than I picked it up with. I had thought my next stop was going to be the Kwik Trip in Menomonie, but then my DEF gauge dropped to one bar and I decided I should stop sooner. Just before Baldwin I remembered that I have wanted to stop at the re-built truckstop for a while. Today I am alone so no one will stop me. And, it is a small enough station that I can likely pay at the pump. When I get there, it says no left turn into the pumps? I never did ask the why on that, there is no other way to get to the pumps. It's a dead end street. After I fuel and park I go inside for my receipt. After I found someone, I found out that they have to go to the 'fuel desk' to get my receipt. Not sure why they have them in a different area than the store. This place has Indian food, warmer style. Plus GodFathers Pizza, Blue Taco's and Champs Chicken. Not sure how they get enough business for that many, or maybe they don't. They've been open for a couple of years now but other times we are too close to home to stop here, either coming or going. I'd heard of Champs before and looked up locations all over the US but it never worked out to stop before. As good as any. I just had three chicken sticks and dip. Plus I saw they had Mango Lassi. I had to ask what it was, and with their broken English that took a bit. It was good. But I'm thinking that is why I am not hungry at 8 PM tonight. It was like eating a large yogurt besides three large pieces of chicken. It was not a 'water' drink. I had texted BB when I got here and she stopped and waited for me. I'm doing 70 mph so we are pacing each other. This truck has over a 100 thousand miles on it so it is well broke in. I may have gotten better mileage at 65 mph but I still gained from 8.7 mpg to 9.0 mpg even at 70 mph. Just before Mauson on I90/94, I caught up to a semi and let three cars pass before passing the truck. The last of the three cars pulls back in front of the semi we are passing and then I see their left front tire kind of bump and some sparks ... ... then their left front tires rolls across mile lane into the left ditch and they are throwing sparks riding on their axle. Not sure if they didn't, or couldn't steer to the shoulder but it took a while for them to get completely on the right shoulder. But they did. I didn't think of stopping and neither did the semi, car was upright. Hopefully all is good. I did stop at the rest area near Lydon Station to look at our load board for work. Nothing. BB is ready to shut down early so we made reservations from Baldwin. Final stop of the day is the Comfort Inn in DeForest. Math said it would be after dark if we kept going to Janesville. And even later to get closer to the drop. From here we are less than two hours from the drop. Now I am at the fuel level I should be at the drop so I need to add another 10 gallons or so of fuel tomorrow AM. Paperwork says to call for appointment. I've been there before and it has not been an issue. I did call and had to leave a message, said we would be there between 9-10 AM. There had been a truck in IN coming back to Forest Lake MN but that was gone before 8 AM our time. There still is one at the same location coming back to Brooklyn Park, but we are not sure we want to drive past Chicago twice to get work. But looking at the weather, we'd kind of like to let this maybe snow storm pass before we head back. Right now there is nothing in WI that works for us but that can change. I did see a few transporters today. A wrapped RV, trucks, buses. People are moving stuff. I am still so full at the end of the day I do not eat again. The fact that it is going to be raining for the next few hours didn't make it any more fun to go get something. Load board US - 168' IA - 0 MN - 6 WI - 2 2024 10 31 MN-WI 1 tool truck to Burlington WI (delivered) spending the night at home Eggs look more like a egg bake than scrabbled, and they had sausage. But I went with yogurt. It was room temp, but so far I haven't gotten sick. Sometimes I wonder if they unplug the fridge when it's not breakfast time, or it is tied into the light switches. One headlight is not working when I go to do my inspection. 1st stop is a few miles down the road for a little more fuel. 10 gallons should get me to the drop, 12 will leave a little extra. As I am fueling and doing the math, it seems that the total will come to about $50. Then I snap back to the here and now and I am already over both 12 gallons and the $50 so I'm done. At the truckstop, I realize that even if I shut my headlights off, my running lights are still on so I am still running with only one light on. So the rest of the way I run with my high beams on. It is now daylight and no one flashes their headlights at me. This AM I had looked to make sure of one road number, everything else I was doing from memory. And I got there. One of the last turns did not look right but I was already past town so it had to be right and was. As I park, I meet a pickup pulling out of the driveway. Quick glance and it looks like my contact that I have seen only once or twice before. Then he backs up to where I parked. It is my contact and he will send someone out to sign off. By the time I moved the truck to where he wanted it, someone was walking out the door to sign. No real inspection, their truck, they are going to completely re-build it for the next salesman. I'm good to go. Besides the box truck to MN, there is now also an RV in IN to MN. But we do the math and it is a lot of driving for an extra few dollars. I even called local dispatch to see if they had anything heading back to MN, they didn't. So we head in the direction of home. By the time we are back to the freeway, there are rental trucks on the load board. So we stop in Elkhorn at Loves for gas and to call. I call, I send a text. And call again, and again but no one picks up. Then there are trucks in IA to IA that come and go and still no one answers. We get back on the road, stop one more time and call and then they are all gone. The one we were looking at was also a 4 hour dead head to the shipper, same as IN, but we would not have to go past Chicago. And this one would also drop within an hour of our house. But ... this is why I have only done one trip for this dispatcher this year. The trips come and go before he calls back. While we were stopped at Loves, BB bought her lunch. One of their salads and a couple of hard boiled eggs. Next stop with the car is Poynette rest area. Then Mauston at the Log Cabin Deli. Sign says lasagna. I order three helpings. And a cup of cheese-bacon-potato soup. From here BB drives until I am done eating. Guess she'd rather not have me eating fork food and driving at the same time. One more stop at the Black River Falls rest area and here we switch drivers again. Somewhere before Eau Claire it starts to snow. A few trucks have snow hanging on them but not many. BB had wanted to stop for food but once it started snowing she just wanted to get off the road. Final stop was home. No work lined up but BB has an appointment on Monday so we aren't going anywhere now over the weekend. This afternoon, the RV shipper started putting out trips. There were a pair to FL that would have worked if we hadn't had to be in town. We've even looked at the weather across WY but it is still too far out. After close of day, there is another trash truck going to Grand Forks. MAYBE if it had been there earlier and we could have picked it up today ... but now we know they go 55 mph and it is more than a one day trip and still do not know what time they close. Back to yesterday ... Leaving the motel and getting on the freeway, part way down the entrance ramp I realize there will be a truck next to me so I tap my breaks ... the guy behind me starts flashing his lights at me. Where does he think I was going to go? Under the truck? Then later in the day, after I had my truck, I was nearing a rest area ... the truck behind me started flashing it's lights. No one else around so it must have been for me. He later passed me and exited to a truck stop. I did not follow him. And way back on Tuesday when we took the back roads to the shipper, we saw people building what looked like an apartment complex. By stacking large pre-fab sections together. Later up by Saint Cloud, I saw what looked like where they were building the pre-fab sections. I've looked online but there is nothing on the areal photos of the area. Load board US - 180 IA - 3/2 MN - 7 WI - 0 So if we don't find work tomorrow, I'll be watching the board on Monday while BB is at her appointments. |
