Tribulations

Well we’ve been driving around the country for the last several years and other then a few minor instances we’ve never had any trouble. I guess we were due. Pat broke down in Cloverdale Indiana on his way back from Kansas City. We crossed our fingers hoping it was a minor mechanical issue but no such luck. The transmission and possibly the transfer case on Charlie’s 1999 Chevy Silverado is shot. Pat was stranded! After a call for help on the BBQ Forum I found someplace safe in Indiana to bring my trailer so Charlie and I hit the road in my pickup truck at 4:00am Tuesday morning with the intention of towing his truck home. We arrived in Cloverdale around 7:30 pm and picked up the trailer and delivered it to Old Dave. Thank you very much Dave for helping out. It’s people like you that make BBQ great.

After dropping the trailer we were off to meet up with Pat who had been stranded in a motel for the last couple of days. The plan was to get some shuteye and pick up the truck in the morning. We picked up a car dolly early in the AM right across the parking lot from our Motel. When we got to the truck and tried to get it on the dolly we found out it wasn’t big enough. Major bummer! There was no way we were going to be able to tow the truck home. Luckily we were able to return the dolly for no charge. The shop where the truck had been towed originally quoted Charlie a price of $5000 to $7000 to repair the truck. I think they really didn’t want to deal with it so they quoted a high price. After meeting with us face to face they said they could install a Transmission for way less than that. We decided to leave the truck and have them repair it. We finally got back on the road around noon time.

We drove about 500 miles in pouring rain that night and decided it would be wise to stop and get a room. On the news we saw reports of Tornadoes and Snow all along the path we had driven. When we drove out to Indiana we took a westerly route directly through Buffalo New York. Luckily for us we decided on a more easterly route on the way home. Buffalo had almost 2 feet of snow. We finally made it back to NH around 2:30 pm on Thursday. That’s three vacation days I really didn’t want to use but sometimes we don’t have a choice.

Now we have to figure out how we’re going to get Charlie the truck and the trailer to Tennessee for the Jack Daniels contest at the end of October. We’ll work it out.