This is the conclusion of the story started in this post.

Monday morning felt much better than the previous day… we were more rested and excited about the mechanic’s return to get the bus going.  We had been told that he would get there “first thing” on Monday morning, so we quickly got presentable and ready to get going.

8:00 am came and went.

9:00 came and went….

10:00… David went to the Limo office to see if Ron was around, and what he could tell us about the situation.  Ron called the repair shop, and was told that the mechanic would be there as soon as possible.

Well, we didn’t really know what was possible, so we did our best to be patient and stay positive.

11:00…

Noon…

1:00…

I started getting rather irritable.  I started whining at David and asking him what he thought we should do.  He obviously had no control over the situation, either, but he went back over to the office to check with Ron again and see if there was any news.  I’m sure it was much more pleasant in the air conditioned office without a whiny itchy wife complaining at him.

Ron called again, and they told him someone would be over as soon as possible, definitely that afternoon.  Great.

I kept my mouth shut.  There was nothing we could accomplish by wallowing in misery or impatience or frustration, so I just read my book (thank goodness I had brought a few more books than I expected to be able to finish) and sat in front of the fan.  My bug bites had become slightly overwhelming.  Maybe the fact that I had no way to shower, or that it was so hot and I was so sweaty or that I had been scratching in my sleep were to blame.  Regardless of the reason, I felt quite miserable, and many of the bites were now scratched raw, some bleeding, some scabby, and I believed I looked ready for a part in a movie about the plague.

Around 4:00 pm, a truck pulled up, and a mechanic got out and approached us.   As David  greeted him, he informed us that he was the person who had tried unsuccessfully the previous Friday.  The master mechanic was still tied up with other work, but he had been given some more tips to try to get it going.

David tried to help him in any way possible, mainly by yelling things back and forth, turning over the engine when prompted,  and lending moral support.  I contributed by staying the heck out of the way and keeping quiet.

After a couple of hours, the mechanic determined that the fuel pump had gone bad, and he made some calls and promised us that he would be back “first thing” the next morning with a new one.

We were feeling a bit discouraged at that point, but we just tried to keep faith that all would work out, and we proceeded to walk to a local fast food place for a hot supper.  We also picked up some beer for David and a box of wine for me.  Now, I am not usually one to drink boxed wines, but that night, it really hit the spot!  Everything became much more humorous and tolerable after  a little imbibing, and we retired sometime after dark with great anticipation that we would finally get on the road on Tuesday!!!

Tuesday morning came, and happily, “first thing” arrived sometime between 8:00 and 9:00 am, and the junior mechanic brought the master mechanic along with him this time.  It turned out that the Monday appointment was delayed by “insurance jobs”… apparently, in order to get insurance claim work, the garage needed to give them priority over anything else already scheduled.  So, we got bumped.

The bad news was that they could not obtain the fuel pump. The good news was that the master mechanic was going to try to work his magic and get it going anyway.

It took about an hour, but he got it going!  YAY!!!  Never before had I felt so happy about smelling diesel exhaust from a bus!!!   After they were really sure it was good to go, and they made sure there was enough fuel in the tank for us to get to a gas station, Ron came back to see how things were going, and with a show of reluctance, agreed to take care of the mechanic’s bill.  Darn straight, Ron! 

As an act of faith, I had gotten all our belongings secured and ready for the trip, so we got on the road by about 10:00 am Tuesday morning.

Now came the fun experience of David actually driving the bus for the first time.  He had driven many other large vehicles in the past, often taking a school bus load of students to a Ski area back in his coaching days.  So, this was not out of his ability range, but it was a tiny stretch – certainly the largest vehicle he has driven to date.

The first step was to get to a gas station with a diesel pump, and enough space for the bus to fit and then get out.  The place recommended was not far, but once we got there, they actually didn’t sell diesel.  They gave us directions to a gas station that they knew for sure did sell diesel fuel, so we headed that way.  Bingo – $200 later, we had a full tank and were ready to get on I95 and head north!

If you have ever driven through downtown Jacksonville on I95, you are familiar with the curvy, lane-changy, overpass-intensive section in the center of the city.  I always loved that part of the drive, but I could see how relieved David was after we finally got though it and were on more straight and open road.  Soon we were in Georgia and he visibly relaxed.

He didn’t really want to push it, so we stayed at around 55 to 60 mph most of the way north that day, and the bus was a bit slow to accelerate, particularly uphill.  Thank goodness, the traffic was fairly light and we made great time.  Leaving FL from Jacksonville instead of more southern points also helped us feel like we were a bit further along, too – we previously left from Orlando, or Ft. Pierce, or even Miami.

At about 6 pm, we were getting near the NC/VA border, and we decided to find a Wal-Mart to pull into for the night.  We had loaded all the Wal-Mart locations on our Tom-tom, and found one within ½ mile of an exit near Petersburg, VA.  It was just starting to get dark as we pulled in, and we were happy to see that the WallyWorld was surrounded by a variety of take-out dining options, so we picked a spot, parked, and David blew up the air mattresses while I went to find food.

I’ve always been aware of the RVs in the Wal-Mart parking lots, but never paid much attention until that night.  More and more pulled in, at the far end of the lot well away from the store.  “There was long ones, tall ones, short ones, brown ones”… and as we encountered other RV occupants, we waved and chatted, like members of a tribe.  I liked it!

No electricity that night, but being the fan of battery-powered LED lights that David is, we were not left in the dark!  We turned in early, anyway, since a bus full of windows encourages waking with the sunrise.  The only down side to the Wal-Mart were the big vapor lights that burned all night.  Just had to use a T-shirt like an eye mask, and we slept fairly well.  Being so much further north, the temp was 55 or so, so no problem not having the fan running, either.  And, it was too cold for the mosquitoes!!

Wednesday morning came and we rose at about 5:30, and got going as soon as we used the Wal-Mart rest room.  I was absolutely determined that we would get home that night.  David was not so sure, since we were not quite half-way, and since he had to do all of the driving, we needed to make occasional rest breaks for his optimal functioning!

The ride was smooth, uneventful, but he was really tired.  We decided to make a change to our route that would take us from central MA into Vermont, instead of going more easterly through Massachusetts and directly into NH.  We knew that there was a Wal-Mart in Lebanon, NH, right on the VT border, so we figured that we could get at least that far if not all the way home.

You see, there were a couple of night-time running lights burnt out on the bus, and that would make it mildly unsafe and not completely legal to drive after dark.  We had hoped to get them replaced but as a specialized part, they were not readily available in any auto parts store.  So they had yet to be special-ordered, and we knew that we would need to drive only by daylight.  Given that David was the only driver, we had planned to limit ourselves this way for his sake, as well as the other obvious reasons.

The one disadvantage to driving through VT was the high number of hills we had to ascend.  Descending them was a breeze, but as they got larger and longer, the bus would loose velocity and decelerate down to 45 and even 40 mph as we climbed.  Then, David noticed that the oil gauge needle was dropping.  We had to pull over and see what was going on!

He had obtained and read through an electronic operating and maintenance manual for the bus and saved it on his laptop, so I quickly booted it and tried to find information about the oil blah-blah-blah (insert technical lingo here if you know it – I sure didn’t).  Dear reader, if you have been in a relationship that involved loving communication via bickering, you can well imagine the exchange.  David was feeling frustrated and pressured, and I had no clue.

Somehow I got the info on the screen, he had simultaneously found the requisite pipes, valves and gizmos, and he moved forward into berating himself for not thinking ahead and getting oil, and checking it thoroughly before we got on the road, and that all made him really grumpy.  There was not really anything seriously wrong, other than the bus uses a lot of oil and we didn’t have any.

Thank goodness for that extension cord in Jacksonville – we had a full charge on the laptop, and our Verizon wireless Internet card, so I was able to find the nearest auto parts stores, and we found a couple within a few miles of our location at the time.  We actually had to go to 2 different places to find the type of oil that the bus required, but we got it, David filled up the oil tank-or-whatever-you-call-it, and we proceeded to try to make it home.

And we did!  It was just a little more dusk than we would have liked, but I got ready with my most pathetic excuse-story in case we did get stopped: “Please officer, we are almost home – we have just driven all the way from VA this morning, and look at my bug bites from Florida – I need a shower, or maybe you can tell by your nose….”  Alas, this was all unnecessary, as we pulled into our driveway at about 8:00 pm that night.

The cats tried not to show how happy they were to see us.

The shower felt fantastic.

The bed felt even better.

We, and the bus, were home again. 

Extraneous Background No Comments November 4th, 2009

This is the story of picking up our bus and driving it home to NH. It may not really benefit anyone who is reading this blog for the purpose of learning how to convert a bus to a motor home, but hopefully it will be entertaining enough, and maybe even a little bit educational, too.

As discussed in my Shopping for Buses post, we won the bus on eBay, and it was located in Jacksonville, FL. We decided to buy 1-way plane tickets from Manchester, NH to JAX, and then drive it north. Since the seller of the bus (we’ll call him “Ron”) owned and operated a Limo service, he was kind enough to offer to pick us up at the airport and take us to his place of business, located in the southern part of Jacksonville, near I95 and across the St. John’s river from the Naval Air Station. It wasn’t exactly downtown, but it was certainly within the city limits, and it was not like any campground we’d ever visited before!

Our flight was scheduled for Saturday, May 15^th, and we cleared our work schedules for the next 5 days, planning to get home well before the following Thursday when normal life would resume. David’s mom would watch Stitch (our American Eskimo dog) and the cats would watch the house during our absence. We had the new, converted title to the bus (now officially a Motor Home), and we felt great about our plans.

Surprise! On Friday, May 14^th, we got a call from Ron (the seller of the bus), who had one of his employees go start up the bus to be sure it would be ready for us to drive home. Ron’s employee didn’t learn how little diesel fuel was in the tank until he ran it dry. The bus had started again just fine, but in running out of fuel, it needed an expert to clear the air out of the fuel lines and re-prime the bus to start again. Ron called a local mechanic service he used for any repairs to his Limo fleet, but the fellow they sent out didn’t have the expertise to fix the problem.

So, Ron’s call to David was a heads-up that we probably wouldn’t be able to drive the bus until the following Monday at the earliest, when a more expert mechanic would be sent out.

What to do?

We had very little flexibility in our dates and options at that point. Since taking our dog on the plane was not an option, we needed to work around Mom’s schedule, and she would not be able to take him again until 3 to 4 weeks later. Our temporary plate was already issued, with a 30-day period of validity.

We decided to go forward as planned. We figured that the extra day (Sunday) would give us a chance to do some work on the bus that needed to be done anyway, and it would be a fun adventure.

Our luggage and its contents were rather strange for the flight south. We packed our largest suitcase – the one that met all the maximum limits for most airlines – with a king-sized air mattress, sheets, pillows and 1 sleeping bag. We chose one of our coolers for allowable dimensions for checked luggage, and verified online that Southwest would accept it. David filled the cooler with all the tools and gadgets he thought he would need to use while we were down there, then sealed it tight with Duct tape. We then each packed a carry-on sized suitcase with a few changes of clothing and toiletries. David took his laptop and we were all set to go.

The flight to JAX was uneventful, and Ron met us at the airport as planned. I admit I was hoping for some miraculous spontaneous restoration of the bus fuel lines, but that was not to be. We arrived in the back parking lot of the Limo shop, and met our future Motor Home for the first time.

It was all that we had hoped for and more. The first thing we did was open all the windows to get some ventilation going – it was HOT in Jacksonville, about 95 during the afternoon, sunny and cloudless.

Ron seemed a bit surprised that we were not planning to rent a car and book a motel room for the following nights until Monday’s service appointment. We considered that a back-up option, but really felt that we had planned well enough to manage “camping” in the bus for that period. Honestly, we wanted to minimize costs. And David wanted to play with his new toy!

David had planned to immediately remove enough seats so that we could spread out the air mattress that night. For the remaining daylight he worked on it, but found that the bolts were so rusted, they wouldn’t budge without some WD-40 soaking first. Fortunately, our King mattress unzipped into 2 single-sized units, so we blew them up separately and wedged them on the floor in the aisle between the seats, one for each of us.

The Limo shop was the kind of place that had people coming and going at all hours, and Ron told us that we could help ourselves to ice from their ice machines in the unlocked area of his offices. He also ran an extension cord out to us, so we had electricity. David had brought his own selection of cords and plug adapters, so we were in great shape in that regard. The bus had a bathroom, but no running water, and we weren’t really sure we wanted to use the toilet and holding tank anyway. Upon exploration of accessible areas in the shop, we found a nasty lavatory, but it was better than nothing!

We were within walking distance of a variety of fast-food restaurants, grocery and drug stores, and there was even a Wal-Mart about a mile away. So, we moved all the tools out of the cooler, filled it with ice, and took a walk as the sun set to get some take-out for supper, bottled water and beverages for the evening.

We went to sleep feeling excited and happy about how things were going, but it was not destined to be a very good night.

The night was still, hot, humid and buggy. We had to keep the windows open to get any hint of breeze that might blow through, and as a result, the bugs found us. Or, rather the bugs found ME. The aisle space between the seats was about 18”, so we had enough space below the seat bottoms to lay flat, or lay on one side, but changing positions was very difficult. The bus had absorbed so much of the day’s heat, the the temperature near the floor had to be around 85 to 90 degrees, even if the air outside was closer to 75. I kept throwing the sheet off me, drenched in sweat, and apparently that’s when the bugs got me. During the night, I was so distracted by the heat and cramped discomfort of the tight space, I didn’t notice the bugs biting, I guess, not that I could have done anything about it at that point.

Around 3 am, we learned another fun fact about our surroundings: The brush and shrubbery bordering the back parking lot (that made the area so nice and private) hid train tracks, and some sort of loading station. Suddenly the air was filled with the grinding of tracks moving, trains getting filled up with whatever load they hauled, and generally reminded us of the ambiance of the motel in “My Cousin Vinny” – remember that movie?

We were both relieved – and wide awake – by the time sunrise rolled around. As we drank our first Pepsi (blech! I don’t usually drink that, but we knew we’d have no immediate coffee and would need some morning caffeine), we discussed how we were going to manage sleeping better the following night. The first priority was to get rid of enough seats to have more space on the floor.

While David successfully loosened the bolts that had been marinating all night, I proceeded to count my bug bites, which were beginning to itch like crazy. Hmmm, 75 on one arm, 68 on the other, 85 or so on each leg, with lots around the ankles and tops of my feet. Thank goodness I’d worn an oversized T-shirt to sleep in and protect my torso and butt, for the most part!

We washed up as best we could, and took a walk to the grocery store. We got food for breakfast and lunch, and then checked out the Walgreen’s next door. There, we found a box fan on sale, and since we had power, we grabbed it! I also got some itch-fighting spray and ointment and cleaning products so I could wash the floor where David took out seats. It was really dirty under the seats!

Sunday was another cloudless day, and by 11 am we could feel the heat rising as we walked back to the Limo lot. Fortunately, the fan worked wonders! We were able to direct it to the area we were working in and it kept us comfortable throughout the day.

Even better, that night it effectively solved 3 problems: it kept us cooler, it kept enough breeze going to prevent the mosquitoes from landing on us, and it provided white noise to help offset the 3 am train activity!

Check back soon for Part two!

Extraneous Background 2 Comments October 30th, 2009