Bouncing Around New England - In the Fall

Been a full week of bouncing to different points in New England. I may have seen as much of it as I care to, even though it was in the midst of the fall turning of the leaves. Ever since setting my sights on Choteau, MT, I've become a real big fan of wide open spaces. And wide open spaces is not something too prevalent near the turnpikes of New England, nor around the Big Dig in Boston. I did add Maine and New Hampshire to my states visited doing driveaway.

Monday, October 16, 2006

Went to Forestry Equipment to pick up a boom/chipper truck bound for Somerville, MA, which is adjacent to Boston. I expected the usual stripped down IHC 4300, but this one was a beautiful special order metallic emerald green, automatic, air brakes, the works. Really nice truck to drive. I was pleased when I saw it since it was a 700+ mile trip to Somerville.

Good time of year to be driving up through the Shenandoah Valley of VA. Passed through there fairly quickly and on up through WV, MD, and in to PA. Made it to Newburgh, PA for the evening - about 500+ miles total. I had decided that since I had the full week this time for driveaway, if needed, I would take my time and not push as hard as I sometimes do.

Tuesday, October 17, 2006

I always wake early when out on these trips, so generally get an early start. I was on the road toward Boston by about 7:00 AM. The scales were busier, for some reason, on this trip. CT has a real mess of a scale on I-84 that is part of a rest area. It winds the trucks all over the place, and backs them up pretty well as far as I could tell. The agent was outside looking at the trucks as each came by. Looked at me, and thankfully this was a new truck (more about scale agents later), he asked if I was transporting (duh, my placard had to be removed from my window in order to talk to him), he walked around back, then motioned me on. I guess he was checking my driveaway tag.

Anyway, was on up I-84, on to I-90, the CT Turnpike, and in to Boston by noon. My dispatcher had said I needed to go into Boston and pick up I-93 for the best way to Somerville. My driver's intuition was telling me to get off at exit 18, but I decided to follow her directions. She had said I-90 would bring me in above the Big Dig in Boston - wrong! Man! there are about 12 lanes it looks like going into this hole, then a bunch more merge after you are in it. I've never seen a tunnel area anywhere near as big. Wonder why they call it the Big Dig? No wonder the roof fell in after it opened. But on this day, the roof stayed up and my boom truck fit through, and I made it out the other side no worse for the wear. Didn't have much trouble finding the drop-off, even though my contact didn't know where I was when I was actually sitting right behind his building.

I dropped off, then dispatch said to get a cab to Cambridge to pick up a rental car for Portland, ME. Cool, I hadn't been to Maine, so this was interesting. The address given me off Travelocity didn't exist, and it took the cabbie a lot of driving around before he finally figured that out. After calling Budget's 800 number several times, I was finally able to get them to provide the correct address - Hotel @ MIT. Again, that was cool. I'd feel perfectly comfortable hobknobbing with a bunch of engineering professors and students. I guess I went around Harvard and MIT, but can't say I saw much. Maybe there's not much to see.

Was on the road to Portland by about 1:30 PM, a drive of around 120 miles. I was to pick up a boom truck at Southern Maine Power. I noticed on my directions for delivery in Worcester, CT, that it mentioned sales location. I've found the words "sales" and "auction" do not bode well in driveaway.

On the way to Portland I was debating with myself (a mentally challenging activity) about whether to go ahead and pick up the truck or spend the night while I still had the rental car. I finally decided that the pickup location wasn't that far from the airport, where I was to drop off the rental car, so I'd go by and take a look at the truck before I dropped off the car and got a cab to pickup. Good move on my part.

The truck was parked on a hill out back of the building. Looked old, but not all that bad. Tires worn, but still some tread. Not as many left over lunches as some, but plenty of old stuff left in it. It was obvious this was an old truck going to a sale. When I went in to talk to someone, the building was all locked. Most of the windows had signs posted saying no entry without an apointment. It was about 5:00 PM, so some of the workers were coming out to their cars. A very nice young lady offered to assist me, but she wasn't able to get back in the building either. As I waited around and continued to check out the truck, the second shift started showing up. One of them knew about the truck and took me in to get the keys. At that point, several of the mechanics took note and started commenting about how they thought it was ridiculous that they were putting anyone on the road in that truck. When it gets hot, it pushes water into the oil and doesn't run too well. Hmmmmmm...... I took the keys and went out to check it out. Upon starting it - finally - it engulfed itself in blue smoke, puttered, then stopped, I didn't try to restart. Called dispatch and told them that someone else may be willing to get on the road with this one, but I wasn't.

Dispatch was a bit reluctant, since they assured me that they had been told that this truck just came off the road and was running well. I stuck to my guns and they agreed for me to just return to Auburn, MA, where I was scheduled to pick up my next truck at Bartlett Tree Service. That also can be worrisome, since most of those used tree trucks have been killed, but I did have good luck with Bartlett on a previous trip.

So I headed back toward Auburn from Portland expecting to find a hotel on the way for the evening. Turns out you really can't find hotels when you are on the turnpike. There are few exits, and no signs for hotels, so I don't have a clue how you do that. I did have a coupon book, and even though it was raining and hard to drive, I decided to go on to Worcester, MA where I was to drop off the car and there was a Days Inn there I could stay at (and get my reward Triprewards points).

Finally got to the hotel by around 8:00 PM, and found out the long drive had been for naught - they wouldn't give the reward points at the coupon rate. I occasionally have that happen, but usually if you pay a few bucks more you can get the points. This time, the rate was going to be more than $20 more, which I didn't go for, but I did stay for the night.

Wednesday, October 18, 2006

Up early and dropped the car off at the Worcester Hotel and Conf. Center by 8:00 AM. Had a bit of a wait for a cab to Bartlett Tree in Auburn. When I got there, it was a similar situation to the one in Portland. It was an old 1997 IHC boom/chipper truck, 84k miles, with two guys throwing junk out of it. So my heart sank, because I thought I was in it for another turndown, which would totally tick dispatch off. After talking to both of the guys, they agreed the truck was total junk, but that the only real problem was the boom didn't work correctly - not a problem for me. After a lot of questioning on my part, they agreed the truck ran OK. So I checked it out as thoroughly as I could. It did start up OK and seemed to run OK. I noticed it had a full load of chips in the back, so I made the guys empty that because I'm not supposed to transport anything other than the truck, and I really didn't feel like having it pull any more than itself on the 120 or so miles to Milford, CT, where it was to go to Aerial Lift of CT.

So after checking everything as well as I could, I nervously headed out. The truck actually ran pretty well, and I made it to Milford by about noon. As I pulled in, I had quite an audience. Turns out they were having a demo day and there must have been 50 to 75 people including a bunch of salesmen standing around and/or having a lunch of assorted BBQ, veggies of your choice, and all kinds of deserts. Since I was idling in front of the whole bunch, with a hungry look and no way to get around them to park it, one of the big shots came over and told me where to park and, since my next truck was a demo and wouldn't be ready before 2:30, I could use their office and enjoy some lunch. All of which I did. The BBQ was outstanding!

In the midst of all that, my cell phone was ringing with a call from my oldest daughter asking if I'd co-sign for her on a new apartment - sure, what are dads for?

I actually had an enjoyable 3 hours at Aerial Lift. I did my paperwork, partook of a scruptuous lunch, and checked out all the stuff they were demoing - much of it being stuff I often move. One of the highlights was a presentation and Q&A by two CT State Troopers on CDL requirements, testing, etc. I cornered them after their presentation to ask some pertinent questions about what goes on at scale houses. One of my best was a question about whether a fire extinguisher AND emergency triangles are required when transporting a truck. I already knew the answer is, for whatever odd reason, only triangles are required. I've been required several times by dispatch to buy triangles if they are missing from the truck. Anyway, these two troopers get into a disagreement about whether a fire extinguisher is required, and 30 minutes later and with the DOT regs. book out, they are still arguing. That's a good example of what we can expect to deal with when we are at a scale house.

The truck I was to pick up was a nice Ford 750 Log Loader. They had it all set up with a log hooked in the tongs. Problem was, when it came time to close up shop, didn't anyone really know how to operate it. There are what appear to be hundreds of knobs and levers on this thing and it took forever to get it packed up and the boom stowed. But I finally got on the road around 3:30 PM for the 750 mile drive to Southco in Shelby, NC.

I made it to Allentown, PA where I found a Howard Johnsons for the night. Got screwed because they wouldn't take the $40 coupon rate and the best trucker rate they had was $65. Don't know if Spirit Miller will cover that or not, but they've been good about accepting it in the past even though they make a big case about keeping it under $50. That's a near impossibility in the northeast especially during leaf turning season.

Thursday, October 19, 2006

Again, up and on the road fairly early, although this time I did sort of take my time having the Belgium Waffle before I left. I decided it would be about 400 miles to get down I-81 near my home, and that I might as well plan to spend the night at home and take the truck on to Shelby on Friday. Dispatch agreed that was doable, so I set sail on down I-78 to I-81 and HOME. I actually reached home earlier than I expect, around 3:00 PM and that left me in a quandry as to what to do with the truck. My original plan was to stage it at the local TA truckstop, but I wasn't able to find a family member or friend who was available to pick me up - so much for both. I finally decided to bring the truck home, and thinking it was too big to go up my driveway and turn around, I'd just back it in and block my driveway. My wife would have to hike up the driveway when she got home. But when I got home, and started backing, after a lot of checking, I decided to go ahead and back it up to the house. My only concerns was whether I could chock it and whether the brakes would hold. I did chock it.

Friday, October 20, 2006

Well, the brakes did hold, but I did notice the chocks were lodged in there pretty tightly. Was on the road to Shelby early arriving there just before noon (I seem to be on a roll for arriving just before noon). Dispatch actually had a rental car already lined up. So a quick post-trip, turnover to Southco, a cab ride, and was on my way home. A brief drive on I-85, then on up I-77, where about 20 miles north of Charlotte it turned into a parking lot. Made me feel I was going around Washington DC. About 20 minutes later, I came to where the action had been. Both north and south lanes had very significant wrecks. The south bound lane was stopped and many people had gotten out of their cars and started enjoying the fall day. I measured about 10 miles of backup before reaching the end.

I was home about 6:00 PM. One of the biggest weeks of driveaway I've had. Drove close to 2000 miles, which should help get me conditioned for the 2300 mile drive to Choteau in November. I'll be off driveaway next week, with a little golf on Monday and bus duty on Wednesday and Friday, with plenty of home chores in between.