Racing the Storm in Arizona

We had a load to Indiana which we delivered last Tuesday. It's been a while since we had a load on that side of the country, unless we were trying to get home to Tennessee.

After delivering we had a wait till the next load came in, but it didn't take too long. Just long enough to give us time to eat and take a nap, which was appreciated after driving all night.

Wednesday morning found us even closer to home, as we delivered in Guntersville, AL, about 90 miles from the house. It was hard to turn west instead of east, but it was too early to go home for Christmas break. So we headed to Flagstaff, AZ with a load of chicken meal for a pet food place.

Three things of concern with that load. The delivery appointment wasn't till Friday evening, which would leave us sitting in Flagstaff for the weekend with no load. Also, we'd be arriving on Thursday afternoon, and sitting for a day with nothing to do till we could deliver.
And finally, Flagstaff was supposed to be getting a snowstorm Thursday night.

Normally that particular place is difficult to get an appointment changed, but luckily this time they worked with our broker and allowed us to deliver on Thursday at noon, which meant some hard driving to get there. We didn't exactly get good fuel mileage, but we did make it on time. And we dumped that stuff out and high tailed it north to get ahead of the storm.

The scenery was absolutely gorgeous going north towards Utah. Highway 89 scoots just east of the Grand Canyon, and you get to enjoy a taste of what it might be like if you were to go on over to the park, which I will do one day! It was late afternoon, with an amazingly blue sky, the perfect light for photography, and the way it was hitting the red rock cliffs....well, it was just perfect!

We've been on this road before, almost always going south, and almost always in the dark. So it was a real pleasure to drive through here in the daylight and see what all we've been missing.
We'd been missing out on a lot!

I've known for some time that I want to come back to this area as a tourist one day. I think that's going to have to happen pretty soon.

It was almost all straight roads, until we came to a sharp turn and then started climbing into the sky.

And we didn't feel like we'd climbed that far, but a look back at the valley floor make it clear we'd come up quite a ways.

Once we crossed the hill the land leveled out and we were on a plain of sorts. There was hardly any indication that there had ever been any canyon walls or stone spires.

We drove till dark and a little after, crossing over into Utah. We were tired. It'd been a long hard drive to get to Flagstaff in time, and since it was 53 degrees and we felt like we'd gotten far enough north that we shouldn't have problems with the snow coming in, we parked and went to bed.

When woke up at 6:00 the next morning, we discovered that we'd made a mistake. We hadn't gone quite far enough north. There was about 2 inches of snow on the road, which normally wouldn't be that big a deal, but we had some hilly country to go through, and, an even bigger issue, our trailer was empty. That's about like pulling around a big sled that has a mind of it's own. The load is what helps give us traction on slick roads and without it, things can get interesting. We were spinning tires and sliding around a bit, but we made it over the mountain and onto I-15 where we found nearly dry roads for the remainder of the trip.
We weren't completely problem free at that point. We'd picked up about 1000 pounds of snow and ice that was stuck all to the trailer and the frame of the truck. Malcolm and I got out and beat on it with a hammer and scraped with a hoe, trying to dump the weight off. We were on our way to load and carrying around 1000 pounds of snow meant we'd get loaded shy a 1000 pounds of product and get paid less. Fortunately it was just hovering at freezing and so a lot of our snow fell off be the time we got to the shipper.

We're leaving the shipper in Utah now and will be delivering in North Carolina in a few days and then going home for the holidays. By the time you read this, I'll be a home visiting family and playing with the horses and sitting in my favorite chair in front of our fire. I decided to do a few posts in advance and schedule them to post next week, since I don't have internet at home.

So this will probably be the last you hear from me till we go back to work after the turn of the New Year. I hope you all have a wonderful Christmas surrounded by your closest loved ones and dear friends.

In case I don't manage to get back on here:
Merry Christmas! And may God bless you all in the year to come!

The Southern parts of the Southwest

During a winter as mild as this one is turning out to be, it's interesting that we finally end up running into snow and yucky roads in south Texas! But that's exactly what happened Monday night south of Abiline, TX. The roads had about 3 inches of thick wet slush all the way to south of Odessa and it was coming down hard in big, fat, wet flakes. I'd say the ground off the road had to have had at least 5-6 inches of snow and it was still piling up, even though it never went under 33 degrees.

I quit while it was still snowing and let Malcolm take over. It's kind of tiring driving through that mess, especially in a part of the country where people aren't as used to it, and therefor do foolish things. I was glad to let Malcolm take control of the wheel, and I went to bed and slept surprisingly well considering it was in a moving truck, something I still struggle with even after all these years.

Malcolm woke me up at 6:00am in New Mexico. He was tired and so I took back over. We were traveling on I-10 through the southern parts of the southwest.

We stopped in Tucson, AZ to shower and eat. There is a truck stop there called the Triple T. If you ever are through Tucson, it's a good place to stop and eat. It's been in operation, by the same family, for about 45 years. There aren't a whole lot of the old family run truck stops left. So many of them have closed up, many put out of business by the big chain truck stops. So we like to give our business to the ones that are left when we can.

After breakfast, it was two more hours or so of driving, passing into the area of the state where the famous saguaro cactus grow...

...and then into Phoenix where we delivered in the afternoon.

It took till late evening to get unloaded because technically we weren't scheduled to deliver till this morning at 10:30. But they worked us in, thankfully. So often our loads are scheduled to deliver according to the time it would take a solo driver to get the job done. But since both of us drive, we get there in half the time. Usually places are pretty good about working with us, but occasionally we have to sit and wait till they have room for the product. That doesn't happen that often though.

Since we were unloaded on Tuesday, we were able to drive back east towards our reload and get that done this morning. We parked for the night in Casa Grande, AZ, and finished the trip to Willcox this morning. Malcolm got up to drive and I stayed in bed a couple more hours. But I woke up just in time to enjoy a spectacular sunset over Arizona's rocky hillsides.

We just finished loading up unshelled pecans here in Willcox. This is the first load of pecans we've ever hauled. I asked Malcolm if he knew he was hauling gold, since pecans have gotten so expensive. We'll be pulling out here shortly and on our way to a central Texas delivery for morning.

On the home front in Tennessee, today is the big day! Ava Grace apparently gained another pound last week, so my sister's doctor decided they'd just go ahead and get the job done before she grows any more. They induced this morning at 5:30 central and I'm waiting to hear the announcement that she's here! Happy Birthday Ava Grace!

On the Texas Coast

Tuesday morning we delivered another load of pearlite, this time at La Porte, TX. La Port is just a little east Houston.

Our reload was in Freeport, TX, about 75 miles south of La Porte. We took highway 146 south almost all the way to Galveston. I'd like to see Galveston one day. There were quite a few stoplights, but it provided glimpses of the gulf here and there and some pretty waterfront scenes.

 By the time we turned off 146, I was ready for a beach trip, even though I'm generally not a beach person! Overall it was a pretty developed and industrial, but once we were on FM2004 it was more open, not to mention flat.

We stopped on the shoulder of the road to close the tarp on our trailer because there were rain showers ahead, and while Malcolm was taking care of that, I watched the scenery, and the random pedestrian taking a stroll down the side road.

We did run through a few little showers, but nothing significant.

 It was dry and hot in Freeport and we sat there on the port for more than 7 hours waiting our turn to load. Not a very pleasant way to spend the day. Eventually we were loaded though and around 8:00 that evening we were headed back through Houston making our way to a little town called Mineola, 300 miles from Freeport.
We delivered in Mineola Wednesday morning, a load of rice hulls to Cargill. And then reloaded 50 miles north in Mount Pleasant.

We pulled out of there around noon yesterday, suffered through Dallas traffic and heat, (The truck said it was 108, but I'm not sure its exactly accurate) and kept trucking on through the night.

This morning shortly after sunrise, I drove through Tuscan, AZ and down the road a ways passed by Picacho Peak. I thought it was just a neat looking rock, but it turns out to have some history, including being near the sight of the westernmost American Civil War battle! I had no idea there was fighting as far west as Arizona!

As I finish this post, we are parked in Yuma, AZ which is near the California line. We pulled off to get a Subway sandwich, before finishing the last 60 miles. We'll deliver in El Centro, CA this afternoon and then head north. We have a 560 miles empty bounce to reload in Oakland, CA in the morning.

Sunday Stills: Potluck

My mom, over at A Garden of Thoughts, was asking me about the weekly photography posts I used to do, and wanted to start participating. She also wanted me to pick it back up so we could do it together. I was thrilled!

I can't say what prompted my letting Sunday Stills fall to the wayside. I think it was round about the time I was in my blogging slump. But listening to Mom talk about it and seeing her post last week, I realized I kind of missed playing with the Sunday Stills crowd. And it will be fun to do it together with Mom. So I'm joining back in, if you all will have me back.  Sometimes a person just need a break to regain their inspiration and motivation I guess.

This weeks challenge was "Potluck" meaning you could bring anything to the table as long as it wasn't from your archives. My goal is to never use archives because the whole idea for me is to stretch my imagination and improve my photography skills.

I don't have anything really impressive or exciting this week. The non-specific challenges have always been more challenging for me, which seems backwards from how it should be, but that's just how it is. I spend most of the week trying to figure out what to photograph, and by last night, I still didn't have anything specific in mind and time was up.

So, I decided to post some pictures I took this week that proved to be a challenge for me. I was trying to photograph smoke from a forest fire near Flagstaff, AZ. I was frustrated because I was trying to capture the intensity of the smoke, the emotions I was feeling as I watched the column of smoke climb into the air and obscure the mountains nearby. But I just couldn't get the pictures to have the right feeling. Photographing smoke is not easy, as it turns out. I kept ending up with pictures that looked like clouds, which wasn't at all what I was going for. I wasn't satisfied with the outcome, but I'll post the best ones anyway.

When we first spotted the smoke, we were still quite a ways from Flagstaff.

Getting closer in towards Flagstafff, it was clear that this was a forest fire and not a range fire as I originally suspected.

Past Flagstaff and going back downhill, around a curve and suddenly we were in the smoke. In a picture it looks more like a cloudy day. What I wanted to capture was the brown/orange tint of the smoke in the sky, but it didn't come through "on film."

And a few moments later we were back under blue skies, leaving the smoke behind and heading on to California.

Carlie Jean wanted me to share this one, since its one of the best pictures I have gotten of her. It really portrays her "what are you looking at" attitude. She didn't really care about the smoke. She was just enjoying lounging in her man's arms with the sunshining in on her.

What am I looking at? Your face my dear! Its time for a shave! Past time!

That's all I have to bring to the table this week. A weak start for my re-entry into the world of Sunday Stills. We'll try for better next week. To see more, and better, Sunday Stills contributions, visit this link and click on any name in the comments section to view their pictures.

And for any of you Sunday Still-ers visiting here, do you have suggestions or tips on photographing smoke? Any camera settings or ideas on the topic?

More Onions...and more...and more

I've been meaning to post since Wednesday, but just haven't been in the mood when I had the time, and when I was in the mood to blog, I was busy driving or trying to sleep. For the record, I compose amazing blog posts in my mind as I'm trying to fall asleep, or when I'm driving, but they never seem to make it to the keyboard when I'm on the computer.

When I left you we were waiting to unload onions in Oregon. The days that followed that post have been somewhat repetitive of the days preceding that post. We unloaded on Monday morning and reloaded with corn just west of the delivery. We got a last glimpse of the Columbia River before turning south to head off through Oregon's mountains on US97.

the bridge at Wasco, OR with Washington on the other side

We delivered the corn in Modesto, CA on Tuesday morning, and then reloaded fertilizer in Lathrop, CA. The load of fertilizer went to Casa Grande, AZ which is just south of Phoenix. We were there by Wednesday morning.
After unloading the fertilizer in a hurry, we put the petal to the metal and headed west for a 250 mile empty bounce, most of it through the picturesque Arizona desert.

A few hours later, we were sitting in the onion patch again. We loaded another load of onions in Brawley, CA. Loading onions is a little different from loading things like fertilizer and grain. Those type products are loaded by our pulling under a chute and the product is poured into the top of the trailer while we're parked on a scale or near one so we can weigh and know how much to put on.

Onions are loaded as they are harvested. We weigh in at the public scale in town and then drive out to the onion fields, which ever field they are harvesting that day. Loading involves our driving across the bumpy onion field alongside the tractor as it picks up the onions. We have to use our air gauges to estimate how much weight is on each axle. Its not entirely accurate, but it usually gets us close to where we want to be.

A lot of guys don't have these air gauges and its purely guess work, but Malcolm put them on our truck, and they frequently save our bacon! The one of the left is telling us that we have about 12,700 pounds on our steer axle, where we're allowed to have 14,000 lbs. The center gauge is telling us we have 33, 100 pounds on our drives, where we're allowed to have 34,000. And the gauge on the right says we have 34, 200 pounds on the trailer axles, where we're allowed to carry 34,000. We're a little over on that axle, but I took this while we were driving down the road so its not an accurate reading, and also we can get away with being a little over because of the line of work we're in.

So, we loaded in the field off our air gauges and then drove back to town to weigh out. The field we loaded in on Wednesday was 10 miles from town. So we hoped we were close enough on our weight that we didn't have to go back to the field. Unfortunately, at the scale we discovered we were 4,300 pounds over weight! So we had to go back to the onion field to dump some off.

Another ten miles back to the field, and then its guess work as to how much to dump. If you dump too much then you end up with a light load, which means less $$. If you don't dump enough, then you have to drive the ten miles back to the field again, to dump more! Malcolm stood looking at the other piles that other drivers had dumped trying to estimate how big a pile to unload from our trailer.

By the time we had returned to the onion field to dump off some, the crew had quit for the day and were pulling out to go home. So we were alone in the onion field and it was up to us to figure out how much to unload. Thankfully, Malcolm is really good at what he does, and we unloaded pretty near the perfect amount. Back to town to weigh out and get our weight ticket, and then we headed north, back to Oregon!

It was an uneventful trip through Nevada's most remote areas. Malcolm drove through some snow in the middle of the night and on one hill it was pretty slick. The truck in front of him was having trouble getting up the hill and there were a few intense moments I guess. I slept through it all.

In Oregon, most of the flooding we'd seen the weekend before had dried up, but it appeared it had all drained into the town of Burns, OR. The town was surrounded on the east side by a lake that used to be pasture and hay fields. There was more than one house sitting in a shallow lake, barns standing in water, and the main road was closed. I heard later it had washed out, but don't know if that was accurate. We had to take a small detour to get north and on our way.

We got to the delivery early in the evening and parked in line. We were the 4th truck. The previous Monday we were the first truck in line, but when we got up to unload on Monday morning, at least 15 trucks were lined up behind us with more coming in every minute. So we knew to make sure we were early every time we deliver there. It takes about half an hour per truck to unload, if things go well.



After unloading the cycle started over again. We jumped over to Palouse, WA and loaded pearled barley.

I had trouble getting a good picture of eastern Washington. "Tiss the season" for bugs on the windshield, and I'm not complaining because that means its warm! But it also makes it hard to get a good clear picture! My camera likes to auto focus on the bug splatter and who wants to see that? But take my word for it, eastern Washington is beautiful, and if you want to see more picture of it, I have a few posts labeled "Washington" and you can see more of it in those.

The picture above was take just outside Palouse. The town is in a lovely setting. We loaded the barley on Friday and its bound for San Francisco. Its been a leisurely weekend because we can't deliver till Monday morning and we'll not be going any where NEAR San Francisco till up to the very last minute! Once in town, there is no where for us to go or park, so we wait till delivery time to show up.  Tomorrow morning's mission will be to get in, get empty, and get OUT as fast as possible, and hopefully avoid most of the nightmare they call morning rush hour. We'll see if it works.

After that, we don't know for sure yet, but we do know we're working our way back to the onion field. So you can pretty much figure this week will be very similar to the last two. 

In the mean time, we're relaxing in the warm-ish Oregon mountains, taking in the fresh air and soaking up some sunshine! We're happy that warmer weather is finally here to stay (we hope)!

Springtime? Really?

The first day of Spring! So many of us have longed for this day, looking for its coming with great anticipation!

 We woke to springtime in Kingman, AZ. It was overcast, cool, and breezy. Not the typical Kingman weather.
Did I say breezy? Maybe I meant quite windy.

 For the past number of years, US93 over Hoover Dam has been closed to trucks for security reasons. And the whole time I kept wondering, isn't a car just as capable of hauling explosives for a terrorist? But apparently trucks are more threatening, so we were required to take the long way around. Until a few months ago, when they finally finished the new bridge and reopened the route for trucks! We had never been on this section of US93, as it was closed before I started trucking. So I was eager to hit the road and see new terrain.

 The skies stayed overcast and it was actually quite hazy. A disappointment since the air is usually rather clear. I was hoping for some exceptional photographs of the geography, but as it was, most of the landscape is hard to appreciate in the pictures I got.

 Still, you get the idea. Dirt, desert plants, and lots of big rocks. Not exactly the kind of place I would want to live, but it is enjoyable to drive through it and sight see.

 Finally, after about 60 miles or so, we approached an area of deep canyons cut through the ground and caught glimpses of the Colorado River. It appears the the camera enhances the haziness. Unfortunately, because even with the haze in the air, it was still quite beautiful. However, the pictures do not really produce the same sensation.

 The river was not the only thing peaking at us around the rocks. The road was also disappearing and then re-emerging across the dips and swells of the landscape.

 This is one of the newer attempts being made in certain areas of the country to protect wildlife from traffic. There were several of these "overpasses" along this stretch of US93. It is not a road. High fences line the roadway in both directions, guiding animals wishing to cross the road to this overpass. They are able to cross safely without risk of injury to animal or motorist. Expensive, but brilliant...and its about time something like this was done. I hate it when I hit a deer or other critter!

 Not for animals, but for motorists. When a bridge appeared, we knew we were fast approaching the highlight of the trail.

 And there it is. In the anticipation of seeing Hoover Dam for the first time, I completely forgot to change back to my short range lens, and by the time I realized my mistake it was too late. As suspected, no facilities are provided for truck driving tourists like us, so I had to click the camera button fast and see what I could as Malcolm drove across the bridge as slowly as he dared.

 And on the other side of the bridge we entered the great state of Nevada.

 Once we got past the hills there behind the sign, we were able to look back and see Lake Mead.

 And shortly after that we crossed the intersection where the old detour re-connects with US93 and we were back on old turf. I had never before realized just how close Hoover Dam is to Las Vegas. They are not far apart at all.

 And also we took a chance and stayed on US95 through Las Vegas instead of taking the 215 around the south side. US95 has been under construction where it reconnects to I-15 and its was a mess. We've avoided it for over a year now. But, to our delight, it was worth the risk. The project was finished and we were able to breeze right through without any hangups. We were staying on US95 all the way north to I-80.

This is a pretty drive through the Nevada back country. It kind of meanders along, running somewhat parallel to the CA/NV border, passing through a handful of old mining towns that are hanging on to life by a thread. Though the haziness had lifted, the weather was far from Spring-like.

 And it wasn't long before I ran into this...

 Know, you don't need eye drops. That, my dear friends, is a brief but rather intense snow storm, with high winds to boot. I found myself laughing (not the "haha" kind but the "near mental breakdown" type). I had  planned a beautiful drive through sunny Nevada, stopping along the way to let the girls out to play. Instead it was 33 degrees and falling, with thick heavy wet snow plastering my truck.


The snow lasted about 25 miles. After that the temperature shot up to about 42 and the sky almost cleared. My hope was renewed. But then...

 ...the wind hadn't let up any at all, and since it hadn't snowed here, the dirt was flying!

 For about 150 miles!


Needless to say, Malcolm, the girls, and I spent the first day of Spring tucked into the truck, with the windows up and the air circulator turned on in an attempt to keep the dirt out. Even with these measures taken, I still felt gritty. Probably in my head, but still unpleasant.


Last night, as we neared our destination we passed some truck stops with GOBS of trucks parked all over the place. Our initial reactions was "what on earth!!!" And then Malcolm had a thought, called 511 and sure enough...I-80 was closed over Donner's Pass due to snow. Good grief! Fortunately we weren't going that far. We got to stop near Reno and deliver. While we were dumping the product out, which took about an hour and a half, it started to snow again, though it didn't have the nerve to stick to the ground.

We finished unloading and traveled back east about 15 miles and went to bed.

This morning...

 Sometime during the night, the sky had the nerve to dump about 4 inches of very wet heavy snow on the ground. I was offended, though it did make for some pretty pictures of Nevada's mountains. It seems mostly its just truckers and crows who have the gumption to get out and about today.

It did not make for pretty driving, for about 50 miles. But then things cleaned up. We're sitting here in Winnemucca now waiting to load. Its 37 degrees and spitting snow. So far the second day of Spring has been about as disappointing as the first, weather wise.

We're heading to Dodge City, Kansas. I have high hopes that Kansas won't let me down!


PS: By the way, I guess its obvious by now that we got out of the shop in Dallas. It was something with the radiator. They replaced a part, taking till Friday morning to finish. And it cost more than they said of course, about $3000. But we made it back on the road in time to grab a weekend load. Strangely, this morning when we turned the truck on to warm up, the low antifreeze alarm went off again. Hmm....