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View Full Version : Scot & Jefe’s Big Adventure – Tucson AZ.



Team Jefe
11-07-2003, 10:25 AM
Call me a gluten for punishment, but I just can’t say No to a friend in need. A little background. My buddy Roger Rood needed a favor. He has an old friend, Carolyn, who is down on her luck, jobless, broke and needing to move back to Houston from Tucson. So he asked me if I’d make a road trip with him out to load up her stuff and truck it back to H-town. Sure, absolutely, count me in. However, I thought it better to volunteer my PSD for the ride than Roger’s ’93 Chevy 1500. We thought we were going to be bringing back another car from AZ, so we went searching for some more drivers. We each scored one more. Roger got Byron Williams, and old friend and partner in crime on other adventures. I got the Harbor Master himself.

Friday at 1400 was the ETD. We were supposed to make the run empty and pull a trailer back. Well, Carolyn could only find a 12-foot U-Haul in Tucson, so Roger went looking and found a 16-foot trailer to take with us. When we picked it up, I asked about a spare (I’ve already been down that road), but no spare was to be had. Now we are trailering out there AND back…..whose idea was this anyway. We finally got hooked up, everyone aboard and on the road at 1530. This weekend was opening of deer hunting season in Texas and we were headed west…with every Bubba Redneck hunter in the entire world. It was VERY slow going to about Sealy (45 miles out of Houston) and lots of traffic all the way to San Antonio. There the traffic started to thin out as several hunters headed south. We pushed on through SA and out to Kerrville to make our first pit stop at 1930. Fueled up and loaded with McDonald’s we were back on the road. About 5 miles later Byron realizes he left his drink on my toolbox…and its still there. So he pulls a mission impossible move, rolls down the window, sticks out of the truck and reaches back for the coke. Snags it like a pro stunt man before I hardly had time to slow down. Gees buddy we’ve got drinks in a cooler in the front seat, but hey what’s a road trip without some excitement.

As we push on into West Texas, Scot & I call the SE Texas Donzi crew who are at CaptWK’s for a Halloween party (we were supposed to be there too). Cell coverage sucks out there, but we finally got through to JimG. The party was hoppin’ and ALL the women had on costumes that allowed for major cleavage……………….Roger you owe me BIG TIME. But, no sense dwelling on it, we were on a humanitarian mission…and happy to be there. Scot pulls out his portable DVD player and we pop in “The Score” for our in-flight movie……I love modern technology.

We pushed on to Fort Stockton for our next stop at about 1130. 4 hours was working out to about half-a-tank of diesel and the limit of our bladders. I’m guessing drinking Red Bull, Mountain Dew, and lots of Coffee affected that timeframe. At Fort Stockton I called AJ who was headed out to the bars in Boston for Halloween (have I mentioned how much I miss that girl…anyway I digress). Might as well mention that I called her at every stop and many time in between. Scot’s going to go on and on about it anyway. Hey, give me a break already.

I gave up the helm at Ft. Stockton and Roger took over, with Byron as co-pilot. They had been napping in the back from Kerrville. HM and I take up residence back there where I implement a plan that had been forming for a few hours……easy you perverts, I just noticed that there was enough room in the floor for me to lay down, thereby give Scot room to lay down in the seat (almost like bunk beds). It sure beat the prop you head against the door with a pillow technique that Rog & B were using. Needless to say, they were not happy at this scenario, sorry fellas.

The next few hours slipped by while I slept like a baby. I woke up in El Paso, just in time for our next stop. Fuel, Head break, Junk Food, Coffee, Hot chocolate for me, and back on the road. We got through New Mexico without fanfare and finally took a pit stop at a rest area a couple of hours out of Tucson.

We pushed on a little further and stopped for breakfast in Benson AZ at a Denny’s around 0700. Our waiter was Arnold Swartzenagger’s little brother from West Berlin. Grand Slam Breakfasts and Steak & biscuits, gravy, eggs, grits, pancakes, OJ…we hit it pretty hard to fuel up for the “loading party”.

We had about 45 miles to Tucson after breakfast, and made it to Carolyn’s house about 0830. The load out went easier than I expected. She was not as ready as I would have been, but there wasn’t that much stuff to load anyway. The hardest things were there SOLID Wood bedroom furniture that looked like it was rough cut oat and weighed about 10,000 lbs., but the four of us plus Carolyn and one of here friends hit it hard and got everything loaded by 1130. We said our goodbyes and got right back on the road. One of these days I’d like to go visit Tucson, I hear it’s a nice town.

I drive us out of town an hour or so and stop for lunch at Who-Knows-Where, AZ. We actually go into a restaurant (Truck stop) and eat like civilized people. After lunch Byron gets his first shot a driving. HM & I are in the rear seat bunk beds and we head east. A couple hours down the road, I am awakened by the telltale vibration of a trailer tire blowing out……..and we have NO Spare. Now I’m mad ‘cause I KNEW better than to leave the house without a spare…well nothing else to do but deal with it. We get the tire off and limp on east looking for a place that has tires. Within a couple of miles we spot a big sign TIRE STORE, we exit and see another sign, “We are always open, just go to the trailer behind the shop”. We are in the middle of nowhere in Arizona, so B & Rog go to the trailer to get some service, but NO the tire man is not there, he went to get some more tires and won’t be back until…..tomorrow….So much for ALWAYS being open. Back on the road, limping east, we go about another 30 miles and see another TIRE STORE sign. This time we were in luck, they were open, but had no tires the size we needed. Screw it, get two in the next size up, mount them and let’s go. This process took about an hour where we hit the store next door, explored the desert, on foot and by ATV and were told stories of the area, Mexico (The border was in site), and local medical remedies from the Ancient Hispanic Senior who ran the shop. Actually, he was a really cool cat and helped the time pass quickly. Finally after a couple of hours delay, and Byron barred from any more driving, we were back on the road at 1730.

The rest of the trip was pretty routine. We’d stop about every 4 hours for fuel, food and bathrooms. Scot got on the wrong road once and had to do some fancy driving to recover (Just like he did on the way home from PK), but for the most part we made it back to Houston in one piece. We unloaded at Roger’s house and I was on my way home at 0835. 2200 miles in 41 hours Door to Door. Not bad, when I got home, I showered and crashed for a few hours.

Cool trip, good traveling mates and I got to see a part of the country I hadn’t seen yet….albeit at 70 mph.

Scot took lots of photos, but we’ve both been very busy this week so ask nice and he may get some time to post them.

Until the Next Adventure;
JEFE