1 bus to Grand Junction CO

... spending the night at Grand Junction CO

We have a bus so we need to take two trips to get our luggage back to the bus. If we remember, we do the first trip when we go down for breakfast. Breakfast ... they had a stack of wrapped burritos in the warmer for breakfast. That and two cups of packaged juice was it for me today. I still had soup from last night and BB had lots of potatoes left.

I'll use the excuse of parking so far from the room as to why we didn't get going on time. That plus warming up our leftovers plus getting breakfast. But I think the main issue was that we started talking about what trips we might do after we drop the bus tomorrow.

When I come back to the bus after checking out, BB is talking to someone ... someone who's car is backing out because the driver is ready to leave ... now.

We pull out at 7:30 AM local. On time, but this is way after first light and is 9:30 home time.

Beautiful ... the sights today are beautiful. The first is coming through the Virgin River gorge.

What? I am getting pulled in at the UT scale / port of entry. So I gather my things and go in. The officer asks for my 'registration.' I tell him I am a transporter and don't have a registration and hand him by Bill of Lading (which is what we run on, per the DOT) He looks at it and says that he still needs my registration. Then his co-worker who overhears us, tell him ... (the same thing I did) ... he's a transporter, he doesn't have a registration.

Then one of the says they had not seen my IFTA (tax) sticker when I went past, but see it now. I'm good to go.

They did not ask about my permit, proof of IFTA or anything else.

Next stop is for CNG fuel in Cedar City. This one is at a truckstop so there are restrooms. When I pull in, I do not see any of the smaller nozzles I like to use so I hook up to one of the big ones. I get about halfway full and the pump shuts off. And then a few seconds later, I hear the compressor kicking in. That should have happened before the pump shut off. So I restart the pump and get a complete fill. And in under 10 minutes.

When we go through Beaver, we can see that the CNG station we used to fuel at is being torn down. These things are very pricy, I'm surprised they take then down as soon as they do. I did see one at a Flying J, but could tell if that one was still working or not.

Beautiful ... This may have been before Cedar City. The red rocks in the foreground and the snow covered mountains in the background as the sun is still coming up.

Lunch is at Ross's today. Sort of like a Pizza Hut/Pizza Ranch buffet. Pizza, salad bar and pasta. Good food. They dish up the pasta and gave me 4x what I would have taken, so I did not eat it all. Plus I had a couple of pieces of pizza and a small salad.

Before we left, I asked one of the staff (turned out to be the owner) how long they had been in business. They are right across the street from the Flying J ... so I've been in this area a few times. Turns out this place had been a Steakhouse/Event center. When they had that, they required a staff of 40 people. Once covid hit, they could not find 40 people to fill there staff. So they shut down a few months until they came up with this idea.

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From here I called the drop. I said I would be there between 9-11. But the person who will check me in is not on-site so they need a specific time. 9:30? No, we can't get the rental car until 9 AM and then I still need to wash the bus. As in me go to a self service building and wash the bus. So I said 10:30. I'd rather wait for him than him wait for me. Getting done later means we can't do some of the trips out of here, but those are gone by the end of the day anyway.

Again, beautiful ... Devil's Canyon, Eagle Canyon, Ghost Rock. There was supposed to be a 'rest area' at a specific mile marker. There was not, but a few miles later there was an overlook with a pit toilet. Spotted Wolf. This is why we don't stop often on our travels. I had to climb to the highest point and video a 360.

... and tomorrow we will be going through Glenwood Canyon.

Final stop is the hotel. I wasn't watching the signage. There were two lanes coming off the freeway and two lanes come from under the freeway so I was expecting a two lane roundabout. Nope. So I ended up heading away from the hotel. Finally did a u-turn in the Days Inn parking lot. It worked.

BB decided to get a room at the Clarion instead of the Comfort Inn because they still had king beds available. And they were cheaper. (They also have an airport shuttle but she prefers being chauffeur)

Food. The inhouse restaurant left a few months ago and the Village Inn closed down before that. So we walked across the street to Wendy's and both got chili. There is lots of food on the other side of the freeway, but we would have had to cross two busy round-a-bouts.

Work. Late in the day, RV dispatch put more trips out. Including some FL. Those are the longest ones and work for us. But talking later, we do not make much money on those because we have to deadhead a day out of FL. Kind of wanted to get down there this week, last year we went to their strawberry festival and was hoping to get back this year.

But we haven't been doing great on picking trips this year and now will be deadheading back 1,000+ miles this weekend. Everything that was a maybe out here is gone.

Load board

US - 262

IA - 88

MN - 4

WI - 4

Tomorrow. Drop BB at the airport at 9 AM, wash bus, drop bus, head out of town in a rental car. We hope to get far enough tomorrow to be able to get home on Saturday night. But we have driven into the night the prior two nights so maybe not. We have the car for three days ... so we do not have to have it back Saturday night.

Oh, before I drop BB, we will be on the phone at 7 AM local securing work for Sunday.