Trip 14 and 15 - Forest Ending in Birmingham

Trip 14 and 15 – Forest, VA to Shelby, NC to Garner (Raleigh), NC to Birmingham, AL

December 1 – Thursday

I wasn’t planning on going out this week, just after Thanksgiving. I had a school bus trip on Weds. evening and then another one scheduled for Tuesday, so didn’t feel I had enough time to get caught out. But dispatch had called to see if I could be available, and I told them I could do a short trip. This was on Weds. and as usual, they didn’t have all the info together and asked that I call back that afternoon. Since I would be on the bus trip, I told them to just go ahead and fax the info and I would get it when I returned that night.

The school bus trip was to take the William Byrd HS swim team to a meet in Blacksburg, a trip of about 50 miles one way. I found that’s a fairly long trip in the older activity bus they use, with the throttle taking about all my right leg can offer to keep it going for the full hour trip. Had a semi-close call on the way up the mountain on I-81. A car carrier came over on me as he was passing and I actually had to head toward the emergency lane and slow down in order to avoid him hitting me on the front left side. I’ve often thought those guys that drive the car carriers seem to be a bit more aggressive than the average nutty truck driver, but I thought it unusually stupid to mess with a school bus half loaded with high school kids.

After getting in that evening (Weds.), checked the fax and dispatch had me lined up to take a new International 4300 chipper/boom truck from Forest, VA to Shelby, NC. That’s starting to become a regular run for me it seems. Went to Forest early Thursday morning, pre-tripped in the dim light (perhaps a significant event to be explained later), and was on the road by 8:30 am. This was the sharpest looking truck I’d driven yet - fire engine red, drove nicely.

Had an uneventful 250 mile trip to Shelby and delivered around 2:30 pm. After turning the truck over to the guy there, he came to me and asked if I’d seen the scratches on the top corner of the chipper bin. Sure enough, there were scratches that looked like it likely had been brushed by a tree limb. Nothing real bad, but enough for them to get the bosses out, inspect, re-inspect, take pictures, etc. Since there were literally no trees for me to hit on route 29, I-85, and route 40, I just couldn’t imagine any way I hit a tree limb, but had to admit the scratch was there and I didn’t notice it in pre-trip. I let dispatch know, but at this stage, they didn’t seem to be concerned.

As always, the big mystery when delivering a truck is what dispatch is going to do with you then. They never let me know ahead of time, and I think that may be the part of the work that bothers me the most, since I’m a planner by nature – not a good trait for driveaway work. Dispatch apologetically told me I’d need to get a cab to Charlotte (about 50 miles east), take a bus to Raleigh, cab to Garner, and a truck would be staged at Carolina Power and Light (CP&L) for me to take to Birmingham. Of course, I always try to avoid the Hound and, since I wanted this to be a short trip out, at the time I wasn’t real thrilled with heading to Birmingham, but since I’d done that trip before didn’t really mind.

I had to wait about 30 minutes for the cab to get to Shelby to start the $70 trip to the Charlotte bus station. That gave time to watch the local crew sweat over the scratches on the truck, check out whether I’d hit a tree on the corner of their lot, etc. It will be interesting, I’m sure, to see how that all ends up.

The bus trip to Raleigh, and I can’t be quoted on this, was actually not too bad. The Charlotte bus station wasn’t overflowing with the usual crowd, and the bus was an express, so arrived Raleigh about 8:00 pm.

Buses and airplanes always have at least one character that dominates the trip. This bus trip, since it was after dark, was supposed to be quiet with lights out, according to the driver. For the most part it was, but that one character naturally sat opposite me and regaled his seating companion with his philosophies of family management. This went on non-stop for two hours until she said something, one of the few words she could get in edgewise other than “yes”, “no”, and “oh”, that offended him, at which time he cussed her out and dug out his cold chicken from his bag. At least he was quiet for the remainder of the trip.

The station in Raleigh also didn’t have the usual crowd and I was able to get a helpful cabbie to Garner, which luckily wasn’t more than about 5 miles away. He knew how to get me directly to CP&L and seemed to take that direct route, but we had trouble locating the truck. CP&L is a big outfit, and after checking several locked gates with no answer from the guard telephone, we were just about to give up, when I found the truck parked just off an entry road into the place. It was a used International 7400, but only had 6400 miles on it and was still in pretty good shape. It was the largest Altec boom truck I’d yet driven. I wasn’t looking forward to having to pre-trip a used truck in the dark, but this time it went much better than the last. It was parked under pretty good lighting, and everything seemed to be in good shape. I had some question about the level of water in the overflow tank, but decided to head on and I’d check it under better conditions later.

PCMiler had the recommended 550 mile trip taking me back west on I-40, picking up I-85, and heading down past Charlotte through Atlanta. Since I’d just been through that route several times, I decided it would be about the same distance, and better drive, to head east on I-40, pick up I-95, then pick up I-20 in SC and go all the way to Birmingham.

By the time I headed out, it was around 9:30 pm, but the adrenaline or Mountain Dew caffeine was flowing, so I drove several hours before bunking down at Lumberton, NC for the night.

December 2 - Friday

Slept fitfully that night and was back on the road to Birmingham by 7:45 am. The trip went smoothly except for the usual developing mystery of what will dispatch do with you once you get there, since naturally you’re not going to know ahead of time so you can plan anything. Since I was going past the Talladega speedway again, I had thought about visiting the motor sports museum there if I had time on the return trip. Dispatch had told me to call at 3:00 pm and they’d have things lined up to fax me for the return trip. The idea was that I’d be picking up another truck out of Birmingham.

Friday afternoons are particularly hectic for dispatch, and of course the return info wasn’t ready after I had pulled off at the closest place I could think of that had a fax, a Ramada Inn just east of Atlanta. But since the info wasn’t ready, I had to get back on I-20 and plan to find another faxing spot around 4:00 pm. So I drove on to AL and stopped at their welcome center, where they were willing to receive a fax for me. Naturally, the info still wasn’t ready at 4:00 pm, but after several phone calls it was decided they’d just put me in a rental car to drive back home to VA. That was OK with me, since it appears the 2-3 day trips agree with me better.

I had originally debated whether to stop just short of Birmingham for a relaxed evening and delivering the next morning, but since they had a rental car lined up and I was still feeling fit, I decided to go ahead and deliver and get a few hours back towards VA.

Delivered the truck successfully around 6:45 pm. The Altec plant in Birmingham, while in a tough area, does have a 24-hour guard, although I noticed he doesn’t carry a gun. He called a cab for me, but it took a long time for it to show up. That gave the guard plenty of time to fill me in on his evangelical calling, his six daughters, etc. I must say he was a nice fellow and could tell I wasn’t worth evangelizing, so saved his good stuff for another day. He did mention how rude a lot of the driveaway drivers treat him, and I don't doubt his frustration. Don't know why some of us would act badly with people that are in a position to occasionally help us out.

The cab finally came about 7:45 pm, got to the airport Hertz, waited forever to get serviced, and was on the way out. I’d originally figured I’d be taking I-20 back through Atlanta, but the Altec guard and I agreed it would be more fun to head up I-59 through Chattanooga, so I did.

The adrenaline and caffeine were still working well, so I drove several hours, which got me to Cleveland, TN, just northeast of Chattanooga. Naturally, of the whole trip, the drive from Birmingham to Chattanooga was the only area I had never seen, but I still haven’t since it was dark. Don’t know if I missed anything, or not, but I’d suspect I’ll get another chance in this business. I’d driven around 650 miles that day, so around 11:30 pm decided I’d better call it a day and checked in at what’s becoming my regular stopping point – Days Inn.

December 3 - Saturday

I was back on the road before 8:00 am and home by about 1:30 pm on Saturday. The drive from Birmingham, for whatever reason, really didn’t seem that long. I think listening to Kim Komando, the digital goddess, most of the way home helped pass the time quickly.

I returned the rental car to the Lynchburg airport since my personal truck was still parked at Forest. My wife went with me and we did the first of Christmas by picking up the tree on the way home.

This was a good trip, given that I had to take the Hound and several cabs, and night pick-up, but all the pieces ended up fitting together. If I didn’t desire the ability to plan out my next move, I’d have no complaints. But since I’m a complainer, I’ll complain about that this time.