The final stage

Sorry I didn't get around to posting yesterday. It was a very long day, and I ended up in Portland and had arranged a little visit with my lovely daughter and her equally delightful husband. Boy, since I last posted a lot has happened, and I took a lot of pictures, some of which I will add to this post. I think I will have to get a on line picture repository so I can just post all the pictures there and put a link here. I ended up in Missoula MT on Wed night. Very pretty place. The ride from South Dakota to there was amazing as well. Lots of high plains type landscape and then the mountains full of snow appearing on the horizon. Went past Sturgis early in the morning, and someone left the light on. It has been about 7 years since I was last there, and it has grown a lot. Had a pretty much uneventful night there in Missoula, but woke up to rain in the morning, which after about 30 min of climbing into the mountains turned to snow. It snowed for pretty much 3 hours. I do not like driving in the snow in the dark. After the initial thrill of it looking like a space warp drive trip with the stars flying past you, it gets old and distracting. The snow got so bad that at the highest point, there were snow plows out and we were down to 25 mph. I think we got through just in time and later might have had to chain up. Glad I missed that. Here are some really bad pics of the early morning snow storm. The pictures are coming out all out of order, and frankly, I am too tired to try and figure it out, so deal with it. :-) Finally managed to get out of the snow and into WA. Down through Spokane and west through the Snoqualami (sp)pass. Still lots of snow there too. More pics, but you won't know which is which. After leaving Spokane, I came up a pretty good hill, and just before dropping down, got a great view of the Columbia river. Everybody talks about the Mississippi, but I believe this river puts it to shame. What a mighty river, and a beautiful view. Finally got into Puyallup WA, which is just outside Seattle and where our terminal is. Dropped my trailer and was assigned another trailer headed for Riverside. One slight inclusion. 3 drop offs in Oregon. So, I had to deliver some sofas, recliners and chairs to some stores there. Which is not a big deal, I get paid for every drop, but I am anxious to get home. So that added pretty much another day. But got that done, and am sitting in Corning Ca as I write. Oh, just one thing I did want to mention, other than what a great time I had with my daughter and hubby. Thanks you guys for lifting my spirits and having a great dinner with me. It was so good to see you, and I am hoping for many more such nights. On the way south from Portland, I saw 5 or 6 large flocks of ducks, or geese flying in formations. There must have been a hundred or more in all of them combined. It amazes me, that they can fly so long, and so fast. They were going at least 50 mph, and as you may know, ducks and geese don't glide. They flap their wings constantly. I don't know what their limit is, but they have unbelievable stamina. I wish I had a tenth of that kind of stamina. Well, it is getting late, and I am about to fall out of my sleeper. So with that, I will say good night. I hope to see some of you tomorrow night. The rest, take care and I will begin a new adventure sometime next week. Until then, you will have to put up with my boring reports from home. LOL.

Larry

Another good day. Got up at 3AM and ran hard all day. Did 11 hrs driving with only 1.75 for breaks. Got to Missoula right at the 11 hr limit. Took a shower and had a bite to eat. Finished up the log book, and am too tired to fire up the laptop, buy an Internet connection and post. I took a lot of pictures today. Mostly of the mountains and snow. It rained most of the morning and even had some slushy rain for awhile. It was cold. The heater doesn't work real well when it is cold. I need a cove for the grill so it will warm up some. I will post pictures later. Maybe tomorrow. I am going to stop and see Brittney and Brian tomorrow for dinner. If nothing else, this job has given me the opportunity to visit loved ones I haven't seen in awhile. But after 8 days, I am ready to go home and see Becky, Roxy, and the fam. Dropping a trailer and picking up another in Seattle then hope I'm heading home. Let u know tomorrow.

Good night!!!

Back on the road

Well, had to get back on the road this morning. 4:30 AM. My cousin Don was no happier about it than I was. I left if up to him as to when we started, as long as it was after 4 AM to start my hours of service over at zero. For those that don't know, the Federal Govt. has requirements regarding how long you can drive and work a day and for 70 hrs in 7 days. Once you hit those levels, you can no longer drive until you take 34 hours off. It is complicated, so I won't try to explain it. Anyway, it was raining too, which made it even more enjoyable. I headed north from Cedar Rapids to get to I90, which will take me into Washington. Rained most of the day, hard till about 1PM then sprinkles and drizzles. It wasn't too bad, not a lot of traffic, so that was nice. Went north all the way to Minnesota and caught 90 and headed west. Stopped in Sioux Falls right over the South Dakota border and fueled up. I was a little concerned about fuel, since I have a malfunctioning fuel gauge, so I put 50 gal in at the truck stop I parked at in Iowa. Not sure it was necessary because I only took 177 gallons in Sioux Falls and I have 300 gallon capacity with about 250-275 usable. But I didn't want to end up running out again. There was not a lot going on today. The only thing that really did interest me was some birds I saw in a large pond across the hwy from me. There had to be a hundred or more, and at first I thought they were ducks, since they were mostly in the water. But as I got across from them, I noticed they had large thick bills, very much like a pelican. I find it hard to believe there are pelicans in South Dakota, but they must be some variation of them. Other than that the scenery was much as it was through Illinois, Iowa and then Minnesota, lots of farm land. South Dakota is more ranch land than farming, but still not much to see. I made it all the way to Rapid City, which is the gateway to Mount Rushmore. I am only about 50 miles from the Wyoming border. I'm hoping to get through Wyoming and Montana tomorrow, but am not sure. I will drive another 11 hours, which is the limit. I put 680 miles on today in 11 hours driving time. Not bad since the truck is governed at 65. In closing, I would just like to say how enjoyable it was to get to stop and visit my cousin (who is really much more like a brother and best friend) and his family. It was only a day, but after missing out on Easter, it was quite gratifying. Thank you Don, and Alica for making me feel at home. Love you guys.

I will post again tomorrow if possible, even if it is just a quick note from my phone. If I get to Montana and into the mountains there, should be pretty. I'll take some more crappy pics with my phone. That camera is moving higher on the shopping list every day. :-)

Good night all, till tomorrow.

Larry

Taking a layover in Iowa. I was out of hours to drive and close to Cedar Rapids, so stopped in to visit my cousin. Good being back here. Seeing some of my family. I will be back on the road tomorrow early AM.

Happy Easter everyone! I'm sure yours will be better than mine. I am still in KY this morning. I'm trapped behind a bunch of trucks that appear might have taken the weekend off. I'm having breakfast and hope I can get out after that. This day is already starting to get hard for me. I love and miss my family so much. I know everyone is going to be at my sister's house today and I won't. I never miss a holiday with family and this is tough. Something I am going to have to get used to I guess. I'm hoping to get a dedicated run to Canada, and that should put me home every week. I can only hope for the best.

Well, got my truck back and headed out at 3 ET. got through TN and a lot of KY. I am headed to Seattle WA. Ran into a vici

Finally!!!

In this day and age, it shouldn't be so hard to get internet connection. But then again, I have been in the south for 3 days. (ouch) Apologies to any of my southern friends. :-) Ok, the first day was interesting, only in that it was my first day back driving distance. I left Riverside, CA and took I15 north to I40 east, and that was my route the entire way to Morganton NC. 40 is a pretty good road all in all. Vast amounts of desert until you get to Oklahoma, and you trade desert for open plains. There were some pretty sites, and I will post some phone pics I took. I have to get a little camera I can shoot with while driving and takes good pictures. On my shopping list. But for now, my phone will have to do. Stopped in Gallup, New Mexico for the night. Slept at a T/A truck stop, right in front of a railroad track. I swear a train went by every 15 min. and was wailing on the horn. I thought it might keep me awake, but guess I was too tired for that. Can't go through Gallup without thinking about the Run For The Wall trip that Long Hair and I did. I get emotional every time I think about it. Next morning headed east again. Passed my favorite fireworks stand in Moriarity NM later that morning. Might have to stop there on my way through next time.
Some interesting things I noticed from the road. There are a heck of a lot of Fed-Ex trucks running on I40. I mean a lot!! Also, quite a few Red Bull trucks, but the little bobtail type trucks, and they almost always seem to be running in two's. Wouldn't it be cheaper to buy a bigger truck? Just saying! :-) Also interesting, was the windmill blades being transported. Now when you look at these windmills on the hills driving down the road they don't look all that impressive. But, just one blade being transported on a truck does. Wish I could have gotten a picture, but these things are at least 70' long on a special trailer. I'd say a good 8-10' in diameter. Huge!! On blade per truck and I must have seen 15 or more from NM all the way to Arkansas. I wonder if all these clean energy people think about how much it costs in fuel to get one of these windmills working? Just a thought. Ran out of fuel Tuesday afternoon. The fuel gauge on this truck is just plain messed up. It said half a tank, but going up a light grade it just quit running. Everything seemed normal, so that was the first thing I checked. Sure enough, no fuel. Made a call and got help pretty quick, but had to backtrack a little for fuel and all in all cost me about 3. 5 hours,. Outside of Amarillo TX, saw a bad accident. Well, the remains of it anyway. Only saw one car, on a trailer with the roof completely caved in. There was what was left of a big rig sideways across the west side of the road burned to the ground. Completely!! Tractor and trailer gone except for some scrap. Sobering visual. Sure hope the poor driver got out alive. No CB radio, so couldn't get the gossip. That's on my shopping list too. Stayed a little outside of Oklahoma City Wed night, drove so late I just pulled over and went to sleep. Got up early and headed into Arkansas. This is a real pretty state. At least what I saw of it. Lots of greenery and pretty flowers along the road. Was an overcast day, but nice. Weather was pretty good all the way, but woke up to rain Friday morning. Only had a 4 hour run to the terminal so not all that bad, but good rain, some fog, and the Great Smokey Mtns made for slow driving. Made it yesterday about 2PM, did some of my orientation, but it got late. They also looked at my truck and I need brakes, so they are doing that today. I hope to get out of here by this evening if they get it fixed. I will be heading for Seattle Wa. from here. Then I hope to get home for a couple of days. Take care my friends. Hopefully I will be able to post more often on this next leg.

Larry

Trouble with posting sorry

First day

New Beginnings

Well, I am sitting at home getting ready for a drive to North Carolina. I have never been there, and it should be an adventure. This will be the first day of my new life. I will be driving an 18 wheeler for a company called WorldWide Logistics. They deliver new furniture to stores and warehouses all over the US and Canada. I believe mostly I will be dropping a trailer and hooking another trailer at one of our terminals throughout the US. I hope to post to this blog every day I am on the road. I'll try to post pictures, and let you know where I am and where I am going. Just in case anyone is interested. :-)

Good night and follow me tomorrow.