1 tree truck to Olathe KS
... spending the night at Lexington KY
Opps
Alarm goes off at 6 AM local. Breakfast at 7. Nuke a sandwich, plus yogurt or fruit.
Right as I am shutting down the computer, BB asks how many hours I can drive today ... so I check.
Opps
(And now when I am writing this, Opps again)
The 7:30 AM Opps. I only have 8-1/2 hours I can run today. Most of the 500 miles today are hills and curves. This truck will not maintain 65 mph.
As we go past the airport in Winston-Salem we see 6-8 airplanes parked on the runway. They were there last week too. But they are too far away to see what airline / company they are for.
1st stop is in Lambsburg at the Loves for fuel. And BB bought a seat cushion.
2nd stop is the travel plaza in Beckley for food and break. Quiznos is still closed so we eat at Sbarro's. We eat outside at tables, so I also buy water rather than walking back to the truck to get some of ours. Food is baked Ziti.
This trip we are paying cash for tolls. The I-Pass does not work well under the big steel grid.
Last trip we had stopped in Nitro at the Pilot for fuel. As we were getting close today we jokingly said we should do that again. As we went past that exit, we saw that traffic was backed up the freeway exit, down the street and into the Pilot lot. If we had gotten off and needed to stay in line, it could have easily been a half hour before we got to the Pilot lot.
No more. If we need fuel we will stop an exit back and fuel at the Sheetz. No discount, but we could get us enough fuel to get to our next stop.
3rd stop again is for fuel. This time at Catlettsburg at the Flying J.
By now we know we are not going to make it the 500 miles today, we are going to make just over 400.
We have to cross a few scales today but didn't have to visit the inside of the scale house. At the last scale, the truck ahead of us had to exit to the scale, but got the bypass lane past the scale house. THEN he got flagged over. So he turns right enough to clear our lane, but is completely blocking the weigh lane. And he parks there. Parking is a marked area in a different place by the scale house. That will be an interesting conversation.
4th and final stop is the Comfort Inn in Lexington. We walk next door to Cracker Barrel for food. It is only 4 PM and we are out of hours. Tomorrow will be a long day to make up for the hours we didn't drive tonight.
2nd OPPS. I use a log software to check my log every night. Now as I was writing this up, I looked at a different screen of the log software ... and Opps. Manually, I had mis-calculated. I had three more hours we could have drove tonight. :(
... now we still have a long day tomorrow and no reason for it.
Load board
US - 404
IA - 177
MN - 2
WI - 19
We / BB watched the load board as we traveled. There have been more good runs out of NC. Not great, but good. Pairs of trips going to VA and MO. Also trucks going to IL and IN.
But nothing out of KS or MO.
So the plan is, we will stay on schedule and pick up our rental car at the airport at 8 AM, drop the truck at 9 AM. Then eight hours home, so we should be home shortly after dark. Spend the night at home.
Then head out on a similar trip again on Friday and back the following Friday. And then stay home for ...
Checking the I-80 weather. Chains required at Donners Pass by Reno and closed to high profile vehicles in WY.
Covid - some are predicting that cases will start spiking in April again. So we still are not wanting to spend any time vacationing.