Back from Montana

Just back from my fall trip to Choteau, MT to check up on our little house and visit some friends. The weather while I was there, for the most part, was fantastic with highs in the 60's and 70's and lows in the 40's. Choteau was dressed up in its fall colors while I was there. I got in a couple of rounds of golf using new clubs I had made (on the cheap) and sent to Choteau. Didn't help my game any, but I still enjoyed it. The fall crisp, clear, views from the golf course overlooking Choteau and the Rocky Mountain front are fantastic.

I did some work around the house, including cleaning up the leaves just in time for the Cottonwoods to drop their leaves and recover the yard. I also toured the area of the Fools Creek Fire from this summer, which was unbelievable. Also drove to Fort Benton, since I'd never been there, and found it to be a visual delight.

I had to fly in and out of Spokane, WA, a 350 mile trip since I was using some USAir vouchers and Spokane is the nearest they come to Choteau. The drive is beautiful, and I took the scenic route back using route 2. Crossing the Marias Pass on Monday morning was a bit dicey, since it was snowing heavily. But the roads were clear and I had a nice drive in the rain back to Spokane.

Spirit Miller called while I was awaiting my plane in Phoenix to see if I wanted to take a truck from Forest, VA to Lawrenceville, GA, but since I was in Phoenix I wasn't exactly available. Plus, I really haven't yet gotten in the driveaway mood again, but I guess I will shortly. More on that later.

Still Driving - Occasionally

Haven't been a good boy about keeping this blog up. I guess, like most bloggers, particularly if they have any life at all, I'm burning out at keeping this going. But anyway, back to the subject at hand - driveaway.

I did take one of the better trips last week of all my driveaway work. It began Monday, September 24, with a crane (don't like them, want to quit driving them, but unfortunately, the local Altec plant is almost exclusively turning them out lately). I actually sort of like driving the cranes. There's some real excitement controlling something that big. And making it through the weight stations is a real high. But the liability is way too much for me to be fooling with. This crane was a 10-speed Peterbuilt weighing something like 75,000 lbs. Since these things are so close to being overweight, I've gotten so I ask the folks at Altec if they can provide me their official scale receipt to have with me if/when I'm pulled in at the weigh station.



I took this crane from Daleville, VA to Blue Bell, PA, a trip of about 375 miles. Just before I got to Blue Bell, dispatch asked if I'd be interested in picking one up at Berwyn, PA for delivery to Plains, PA. Berwyn is only about 12 miles from Blue Bell, so that worked as a short deadhead, and even though that truck was only going about 100 miles, it would pay for my motel room Monday night. This truck was a nice bucket truck with automatic. Made for an easy ride to Plains once I could get out of the traffic around Berwyn, which is right next to Philadelphia.





I delivered to Plains on Tuesday morning, and they had a tree truck (bucket with chipper body) to go to Plainfield, IL (that seems like a lot of Plains), a trip of about 775 miles. No deadheading to pick this truck up, plus a nice trip for my first time out I-80 through western PA.

I stayed Tuesday night at a Howard Johnson's Express, one of the scungier places I've found, and very surprising to be a Howard Johnson's. Was dirty enough that I checked the bed thoroughly before I got it it, and if it hadn't been that I was already itching from chigger bites from a weekend hike, I'd have sworn I was eaten up with bed bugs that night.

I arrived in Plainfield on Wednesday afternoon, but dispatch didn't have anything near there to point me back toward home. They are moving a lot of stuff to a truck show coming up in Louisville, so I asked if they had anything coming out of the Altec plants in St. Joseph, MO or Duluth, MN. They did have a digger derrick truck coming from Duluth, so I decided that rather than do about 750 miles from Plainfield home, and the weather was nice, I'd deadhead about 450 miles to Duluth, pick that truck up for Louisville, then deadhead the 450 miles home from there. So I headed on up through northern Illinois into Wisconsin. It was a beautiful drive.

I stayed the night in Eau Claire, WI, which is an interesting little town that totally had me and my Tom Tom lost, but I did find the Ramada Inn which I was staying at using the CLC card, one of the best deals I've found. The hotel was much too swanky for my normal driveaway sleeping, but at $35 who could complain. I got up early on Thursday morning and arrived in Duluth about 9:00 AM.


Altec had the truck set out on one of their 4 lots, and after talking to their receptionist, I found it, even though the truck numbers didn't match exactly with my paperwork. So had to hang around a few minutes to get that squared away before heading to Louisville.




Had a beautiful trip down through WI, where I saw my first Bald Eagle in the wild. It swooped down about 200 yards in front of the truck, across the road to the left, and settled in a tree just as I was passing - an amazing sight. I stayed in Peru, IL, for the night (looked a little rough where I was) and delivered in Louisville on Friday about 2:00 PM. The trip from Duluth was about 800 miles, about 350 of which I did on Friday, so I wasn't sure I'd be able to make the whole 450 mile deadhead trip home Friday evening. But there is a real advantage to towing your car. I didn't have to wait around for a cab, get a rental, and all that stuff, but could just head on out. I got on a roll and was back home by 10:00 PM. Got some really good music on my PDA that seems to get me cranked up after dark.


That ended one of the better driveaway trips I've made, taking up a whole week, and about the only problem I faced was the bucket cover coming off on the trip to Plainfield, but I was able to fix that with little problem.

Also, since my last blog entry, I took a set of trips that should be called deadhead trips the week of September 5. Like most of my trips lately, it started with a crane to Blue Bell, PA, deadheading to Forest, VA for a truck to Shelby, NC, then deadheading back to Forest for a truck to Dunmore, PA. That's just wearing me out on driving I-81 and doing PA, plus all the deadheading didn't leave much money.













Since I've been working so hard lately, I'll be taking about 2 weeks off, beginning next week, to head back out to Montana, check up on the little blue house, and relax. Trip should be a bit of a chore since I'm using a voucher I got with USAir and they don't fly into Great Falls. I have to leave Roanoke Weds. morning at 6:00 AM, fly to Charlotte, then to Phoenix, then to Spokane, and then drive to Choteau. Tough job, but somebody's got to do it.