I'm off....and I'm leaving

[Samuknow]

I will be off to MN for the weekend tonight...Leaving about 7:00 eastern time..Sorry Chris, not sure what that is in Romanian time...

Have to pick up a living room set...(long story).

I will be back late Sun night.

I will be pulling a trailer behind my van round trip..

I just hope I miss the storms on the way back..Wish me luck...

[Strongwolf]

Good Luck Sam

[Daniel ~]

Keep the rubber side down and know that THEY are out to kill you! Drive as one who respects that simple fact!

Then it's OK if you want to enjoy the ride! LOL

Monday will be a good day.

[Favu]

Have a good journey dude!

All the best

[Samuknow]

Thanks guys...

I will be careful and still try to enjoy the time with my wife...no kids....

Peaceful journey...

[raphael2040]

=O

Have fun with the missus! =D

[chrisbard]

Me too Sam...me too !

Bye

[Samuknow]

And don't worry Chris...

I will still be folding.....

[Got EpOx]

See ya later Sam

[robbie]

Safe travel my friend!!

[Samuknow]

Well I'm back...

Barely I must add. I have a great adventure to share with you all. I will type it up and post it later today...

[cloasters]

Glad you made it!

[Favu]

Nice to have you back

[Got EpOx]

I like adventures, nice to see you back safe and sound Sam

[Exile69]

I shipped the router to ya, forgot you were leaving. Hope it doesn't come til you get back.

[Samuknow]

I'm back now...Get ya paid here in a bit...

Thanks

[Samuknow]

Here is our story.....

Well it all starts Friday afternoon. I do a quick once over on the van that we are taking and pulling the trailer with. This van has made this trip many times before. It has also gone to MS several times in the past without fail. Now I say quick because we are running a little behind.

SO we are off….oh and we left too.

All is going well. It is about 11:45PM eastern. We stop for the usual breaks as we enter IL. We are fast approaching our half way point, where we planned to stop for the night. We had been traveling for a little over 4 hours and it is getting late. As we are getting closer to our scheduled stop, I am pushing the van harder. I kept it under 65 MPH for the entire trip. I am now pushing 70 and the hills are getting more frequent. After a bit my wife says to me, “What is that smell?” I tell her it smells like oil or transmission fluid. Now it is pitch black out so I cannot see anything behind us. Right then the overdrive light on the transmission starts to blink and we are losing speed. An 18 wheeler is coming up behind us and all I can see are the lights showing through a huge cloud of smoke. At this point I am freaking out just a lot. We are 250 miles from home, in the middle of nowhere. I see an exit and a light that I think we can roll to. We make it to a lighted parking lot. My wife was quick enough to read the exit number off of the interstate. Now here we sit. Transmission fluid everywhere, almost midnight, and I have no idea where we are. We decide to call 911 (emergency services) to see if we can get help. They tell us they will send a wrecker and to wait inside the van. Now again, I cannot even begin to explain the emotions that we are feeling at this point. My van that I use for work may be toast. I have a friend’s trailer. We have no idea where we are. I am about exhausted. And I have my wife with me.

We see the wrecker go by. Great, where is he going? We wait for some time and then I decide to call 911 again. After a while I see the wrecker on the exit ramp just sitting. I start to flash my lights thinking he will see us. At that point a motor cycle is passing and turns around thinking that I am signaling him. I tell him what is going on and he said he will go get the wrecker for us. Thank God. He speeds away and returns promptly with the wrecker behind him. I thank him many times and he is off. Now the driver hooks up our van with trailer in tow and asks, where to? He then tells us of small town just East 12 miles where there is a Ford dealership and a hotel. I am thinking at this point this is going to cost a bundle just to get there.

So we head off to the town. This was the nicest old man I think I have ever met. He asked several times if the temp was ok in the truck and tried to reassure us that it would be ok. We drive for quite a while and end up in the small town of Streator IL. He brings us to the dealership and drops our van there. I ask him what the damage is and he tells me 85 Dollars. I am amazed. I was figuring 200 or more. He told me that he does not take advantage of people that are in need. He then brings us to the hotel, which is right next door. He walks into the lobby with us and explains what has happened to the clerk. He tells him to cut us a break. We got a great room for 50 dollars.

We are now trying to figure out what to do. We are exhausted and pretty frazzled by now. I tell my wife that we should get some sleep. Yea right. She finally goes to sleep. I am trying to go to sleep, but I keep waking up with this on my mind.

I wake up early with a few ideas. First, I saw an Auto Zone just down the road. I figure I will go and get some transmission fluid and see if anything happens. I figure that it is fried but it is worth a try. I also saw a U-Haul truck rental a mile or so down the road. My thought is get the van to make it to the U-Haul dealer, and leave the van until the way back.

My wife is up now, so we walk to Auto Zone and pick up some fluid. She goes into the room to eat breakfast while I go attend to the van. I put in 2 quarts and fire it up. Quick prayer and put it into gear. It moves. I drive it over to the hotel parking lot. I run in and tell my wife the good news. We go to check out and it is just pouring rain. I go ahead and check the fluid and there is none on the stick. So I add another qt. We now head to the U-Haul dealer. The van is working but it is shifting very strange. I see a Napa and run in to get more fluid. I ask for quick directions to the U-Haul dealer. A man that is about to leave told us to follow him and he will lead us right to it. Now if you haven’t noticed yet, everyone that we came into to contact with was very kind to us. This went on all day.

We make it to the U-Haul dealer and explain what has happened and what we need. He then tells me that he has nothing available. This is a big blow to my plan. Still raining, I check the fluid again, nothing on the stick. I add another qt. Check again and still nada. I add another qt. This makes 6 quarts. So we decide to drive back to the Ford dealer and use the phone to see if there is anything in driving distance to rent a truck. The people were incredibly nice and helpful. Unfortunately, we came up with nothing. We walked out side and I told my wife that I feel confident that the van is fine and that we should cut our loses and head home. I did not want to chance driving the other 300 miles to MN, pick up the furniture, and then head the full 600 miles back with a heavy load in the rain.

We decided to take some back roads home as we could keep the speed down and get a feel for how the van was doing. I checked the fluid at the gas station and added another ½ quart. It finally seems to be getting full. We picked up a map, plotted our course and off we go. We drive for a while never reaching 50 MPH. All seems well at this point. We come to a tiny town and I notice the temp gauge is climbing. As soon as I see this I also see a Napa store. I stop and run in to grab some coolant. The over flow bottle was empty. Filled it and checked the radiator and it was also low. We grabbed some lunch and went at it again. This time all was great. We drove for about an hour ½ on the back road. The van did fine. As we approached the interstate, we decided to give it a try. So we got on the interstate and I kept it at 60 MPH. Well to finally end this, we made it back. The van did fine and seems great. I am having the transmission serviced and inspected this week.

The bad thing is I still have to go back to get the furniture. I am going back this weekend with a friend. We will be pulling a “road warrior” trip. We will be going straight up and back switching driving every few hours. Plus, we are taking a truck this time.