T Minus One Week
Saturday 8/22. We don't usually over plan trips and this one was no exception. With one week to go there were just three small things to do before leaving...
Service the Jeep. Fix the transfer case shifter which suffered at my hands the last time it misbehaved, the fuel gauge which stopped working after a dip in a puddle and, finally, some bad drivetrain vibration which started sometime after not fitting between a rock and a tree the weekend before.
After some wrestling with rubber washers the transfer case shifter finally stayed put, with no rattling, and it even shifted. Then I replaced the chain and sprockets on my motorcycle, went rock climbing in New Hampshire and finally left for JFK airport 200 miles away in NYC where I was working all week.
Debbie wisely arranged for Bobby, our mechanic, to ready the Jeep in my stead. Its disturbing enough when you have your mechanic on speed dial but when your mechanic remembers your own phone number that's another thing entirely!
We drive a 2005 Jeep Wrangler Unlimited Rubicon Sahara. Feel free to arrange the same words in a different order if that makes more sense. For those who don't speak Jeep, this is the two door long wheelbase model with locking differentials and is named after the Sahara movie and it is our second Wrangler. The first one, a 1997 model, is still going strong despite the efforts of two learner drivers and years of New England salt. Based on that experience we fully expected that the replacement would be just as reliable.
Readers of our
2010 report from Michigan may remember that we are no stranger to mechanical issues. That trip saw the premature death of several fuel pumps before a split hose in the fuel tank between the fuel pump and the sender unit was diagnosed as the cause. More recently we've paid a couple of big bills including a replacement gearbox just a couple of months ago. (The six speed manual transmission is a Mercedes unit and after a while it doesn't like to go backwards.) On our part we do try to make sure that nothing fails because of anything we should have done.
Get maps. I've always liked maps, which I can pore over for hours while exploring in my head. I figured we'd be able to get detailed-enough paper maps en-route through mainland Canada. Not wanting to miss out on pre-trip exploring, I ordered Topo Canada on DVD and planned to spend some quality time with BaseCamp before leaving. This trip was a first for us, with an additional navigator in the form of a Garmin GPSMap 78S – our first GPS – which we hoped would settle disputes between the other two navigators. Would that be a wise decision? We shall see...
Wait out hurricane Irene. We had originally hoped to leave on Saturday but with storms approaching we decided our kids (one working, one at college) who live at home would probably disown us if we left for vacation with a tree sticking out the house! Fortunately the worst of the storm missed us and the house remained intact and the basement dry. For the most part our city neighborhood fared well although downed trees broke power lines and squashed at least one car. Fortunately nobody was hurt.
As I write this three weeks later our neighborhood is fine but the widespread devastation in Western Massachusetts, Vermont, New Hampshire and other East coast states is going to take a long time to repair. Our best wishes go out to those folks.