We quietly rolled back into town, greeted by the heat and humidity that is typical for mid-August in Maryland. The crickets and cicadas flooded me with a cacophony of sound, interrupting my sleep the first night. I’m not sure if I became re-accustomed to the sound or if they moved on to torment other campers by the end of our brief stay.
This was not a leisure stop, but a laborious few days, sorting out the odds and ends we were unable to complete before we left in May. Each day was filled with sweaty, exhausting tasks and we were prematurely relieved to be leaving five days later. We began this journey exhausted from two eight hour days in the car.
Our first visit to storage yielded an entire truck bed’s worth of trash. During our frantic last days in our house with the dump closed and our waste management refusing to pick up additional trash, we made the executive decision to store our extra (non-stinky) trash. John took the large load to the dump and we celebrated our first accomplishment.
Jan the van
I can only imagine that Jan was upset that we abandoned her for our travels. Dennis has had all the glory this summer, so she decided to throw a royal tantrum to welcome us back.
My aunt graciously allowed us to stash Jan and our patio furniture at her house about an hour away. We left one of our scarecrows in the passenger’s seat so she would have company if she decided to take Jan out for a joyride. When we deposited our things in May, it was late, and a neighbor thought we were robbers. One night a few years ago, John sat outside my cousin’s house after dropping something at her door. He was sitting in the car on the phone, trying to help navigate my mother, Kaeli and I through the subway in NYC after we missed a bus. She panicked, calling a friend (and was about to call John!) because there was a “strange man” sitting in a dark van outside her house. I guess we have a reputation.
We made it to the house before dark and loaded the furniture easily into the truck bed. My aunt had let us know that Jan wouldn’t start several days before when she tried to move the van. We set up to jump the van. I let Dennis know that this was his moment to shine and give back a little from all we’d invested in his engine this summer. We wiped corrosion off the van battery and said a little prayer and offered encouraging words to Dennis. The funniest moment was when John pondered which of Dennis’ two batteries should be used. Dennis did his best, but after an hour, we were left to face the sad truth: Jan needed a transplant. The towing company contracted by our roadside assistance only brings batteries out to cars during business hours.
The next day, my aunt left the key for the roadside mechanic who replaced the battery. Jan still did not come back to life. They then replaced her alternator and she sputtered back to life. John went back to storage while I zoomed away with Jan, who sounded like she was purring, happy to be reunited.
Throwing out the China
During our previous cross-state move, the movers had tossed a box with fragile items on a stack (in front of me), and the items inside had broken. I vowed to avoid this by carefully pulling my fragile items aside so we could transport them ourselves. However, at the end, Jan was filled with the items that were left, not the fragile items, so we needed to switch some things out. There were also items that had not been boxed due to our rush. John had planned on taking time off work for moving, but was unable to due to delays with a deadline.
John picked up a box of our China and the bottom opened up, spilling my bread plates into the concrete floor. Even worse, a second box burst, and our wedding autograph plate shattered. I cried a few tears over the plate and kept the pieces, although I’m not sure I’ll really be able to repair it.
We chalked this evening up to “the best laid plans.” Things were not going quite as we had planned and our exhaustion was growing by the day.
We removed items from Jan to make room for the fragile items (that were left), boxed up the loose items from storage, and downsized our RV supplies. We’ve been traveling with a lot of extras, unsure of the length of our trip. We also accidentally brought some items, and thought some things would be cool that proved to be useless on the road.
The following day, we returned to storage with our last load of boxes in the truck. We also decided to pull out the tiles from the bathroom remodel we never completed since the movers informed us they charge by weight. They are now tucked safely in Dennis’ bed under a big, blue tarp. This was only one of our many follies.
It’s getting hot in here
We were an hour and fifteen minutes into our trip when Jan first started acting funny. It was as if she was in cahoots with Dennis, shifting into “limp mode” as I tried to go up a mountain. We pulled into a rest stop where we discussed our options. We decided to try to push through, stopping as needed to restart the car, getting her to a mechanic once we arrived in Indiana the following day.
Less than two minutes later on the road, the temperature warning signal began incessantly beeping and smoke was billowing out of the hood. John has some pretty fancy maneuvering skills because he was able to stop immediately both times while pulling the RV; I didn’t have time to call and warn him as I could barely steer the van to the side of the road.
We popped the hood and realized the radiator hose was disconnected. Our current theory is the mechanic accidentally knocked into it when replacing the alternator. John grabbed his wrench and reattached it, then added some water to the very empty radiator.
As soon as I accelerated, the warning signal started screaming, so we pulled over again. After a few calls to random mechanics and mechanically minded individuals, we decided to try to make it to a truck stop five miles away. A special shout out to Wilson whose sound advice saved the day.
Folks, that was a LONG five miles as I crept towards my destination, Jan screaming non-stop. When we finally made it to the truck stop, my nerves were fried. I tried to unwind, parked with the kids, at a diesel semi-truck gas pump while John took another look then headed over to chat with the on-site mechanic. There is a diesel mechanic that repairs traveling semi-trucks, so he couldn’t actually take a look at Jan, but was very helpful. He was a wealth of knowledge, instructing John on how to drain bubbles out of the radiator. Thirty minutes or so later, I could feel eyes on us as we simply sat at the gas pump (after fueling up), waiting. John finally crossed to our side of the building and announced that he “thought” Jan was working again. That’s not exactly the vote of confidence I was hoping for, but any glimmer of moving forward was much appreciated at this point.
We headed back on the highway and Jan zoomed along, happy as a clam. Apparently, air had entered the radiator when the hose was loose, and our attempt to cool the radiator had only caused the bubble issue to worsen. John can now add amateur mechanic to his resume.
Too good to be true
Soon after we resumed our trip, I saw this sign for “The Wilds;” you know, the place we were stranded at the beginning of our adventure. I said a little prayer, then relief and a big smile cane over my face at his far we’ve come.
We continued along without any other major issues, but I realized that there was a definite hiccup to the smooth purr of Jan’s engine. She continued to sputter whenever she went up large hills. If the incline was steep enough, no amount of pressure on the gas pedal could maintain her speed. A sense of deja vu after our summer with a Dennis. I swear the two of them are in cahoots, trying to make me lose my mind.