1 bus to Denver CO (delivered)

... spending the night at Gothenburg NE

Breakfast was in a bag. One bagel, one cup of fruit and one yogurt. (plus I added some leftover bacon to the meal)

Before we get to the freeway, there was a round-about. I wait for my turn, and then get off on the wrong street. Guess I just like going around them. Found a place to turn around and got back on the round-about.

50 miles and we are at the rental car place. I drop BB and then head into city streets. One row of cars on each side of the street, so if you aren't staying long ... you just park in the middle of the street. 1st street had a car in the center of it so I went to the next street. That had a delivery truck in it, but I figured it would be moving. I didn't realize that there was no place on the whole street when people could meet. Luckily the truck was further down the street than I thought and I turned before meeting it. It wasn't the same with the car. That was still sitting there.

1st stop was the TA in Commerce City for fuel. I decided to put in 15 gallons even though my math said I needed 12. And I was way over when I stuck the tank afterwards.

2nd stop was at the edge of the TA at the Blue Beacon truck wash. Only six trucks ahead of me and it still took an hour and a half. It only takes about five minutes to do mine.

The guy behind me in line, his truck died. It was a straight truck and after a while six people from the truck wash came out and pushed the truck far enough out of the way that other trucks could get past. Only two trucks got past before he got it started and got in line.

While we were there, BB found me and carried all of our stuff to the car so that is done before the drop.

3rd stop was the drop in Denver.

I call the phone number on my paperwork and no one answers, and no one answers when I hit '0.' I walk the lot and don't find anyone. Finally BB calls and says that she has found another of our drivers and he has someone coming over. And the come to my bus, not his. He has to drive his bus to mine.

Didn't know until last night at the motel when we checked in that today was a holiday. But everyone here knew it, and had the day off. The people who are inspecting our buses are from the office across the street. As I was walking around looking for someone I saw a lot of buses that had been brought in and still had the plastic on and/or still had the shippers paperwork in the window.

The other driver was looking for a ride to his motel 'by the airport.' We have been trying to keep our distance from others, but I guessed it was only 10 miles or so. And it would have been, IF he had given me the address. After we get near the airport he says we are heading to the wrong one. So instead of the 10 miles that it should have been, it was 25 miles ... and an extra half hour to get out of town.

Lots of stories. He had been with this company 10 years. He'd taken a leave from here to work local during Covid because there wasn't enough work. But got fired from that company because of something he said on FB.

4th stop - After we drop him we do a quick stop at Flying J for the rest room. We have stayed at the same motel as he was, must have been on one of our other company trips. We haven't done any Denver trips with this company.

... the other company. We are still on their emailing list after four years. Today we get an email that they have adjusted their driver required at to notify corp of any speed over 80 mph. Yes 80 is to fast, but I don't like being tracked.

Seems like our being the nice guy cost us an hour plus today. We aren't likely to make it to Lexington tonight. And we will have to be running until after dark to make it home in two days.

5th stop is in Brighton at Arby's. 1st we had planned on stopping at Loves because I knew where it was. Then BB looked online and we would be passing a Chic-fil-A first so we planned on stopping there. Until we saw the drive-thru line was backed up out onto the street and we were coming from the wrong direction. So we drove two doors down to Arby's. By the time we left, I'm not sure Arby's was faster.

This Arby's no longer has the Philly's. :( So now I am down to a Gyro or Rueben.

6th stop was in Crook for the rest room. Sinclair.

7th and final stop was Gothenburg at the Quality Inn for the night and the Nebraska Barn for food. Food is OK. The other close food was two pizza places and Chesters Chicken.

We ended up driving until after dark in hopes of making it home tomorrow night without another nights motel.

We have appt's on April 1 so we have about 10 days to fit in another trip. We have started doing the math. But not enough time to get to the west coast for a bus and back.

Load board

US - 265

IA - 116

MN -0-

WI - 5

IA load board had gotten down below 100 before they started adding new ones.