Hello from North Platte Nebraska

Hello from North Platte Nebraska

Thursday morning   May 17, 2012   (First travelogue of this trip).

We are at our “normal” stop on our way to visit the relatives in Iowa – the Wal Mart parking lot in North Platte (map).  We left Evergreen a bit after noon yesterday and got here about 7:00 local time.  That probably seems like a slow trip for some of you (about 300 miles).  However, I decided to drive a bit slower (set cruise on 66 MPH) – partly to save fuel and partly because I was not all that confident about the tow dolly tire situation (more on that later).  We also stopped several times to check on the tow dolly.  Lastly we had to slow down quite a bit during some huge dust storms and high winds that we encountered in eastern Colorado.

We need to step back and apologize to our readers for not posting in the past few months.  As we have said many times, our intent for this blog is to document our travels, focusing on our bus travels.  As a side note, these blogs have been a wonderful “diary” that allows us to relive some of our wonderful experiences.

During our absence from posting, we have had a kind of tough few months.  Each of our daughters have had some pretty significant health issues, Judy has documented the fact that the are in foreclosure on their house, and we have closed the RV Safety Systems business.  In addition, Pat had to have cataract surgery last month.  We can only hope that our extended family has better days ahead of us.

Closing the business has been quite traumatic.  As some of you recall, the business was based on a fire detection system that I developed.  That product was well received and has proven very reliable.  We developed a second system for a marketing partner and that product passed every test that the customer devised including some actual vehicle fires.  The second project has languished and will probably not become a reality.  Our original product had reasonable sales, but the profit did not cover the debt incurred for development and marketing costs.

Part of the huge marketing costs involved trade shows.  That said, those shows were a great experience and involved a lot of amazing travels in our bus. 

Now that we are no longer traveling for business, we will be posting less frequently.  We hope that you will check in occasionally, or opt for the email notification of posts.

Now, what about this tow dolly situation?  Tow dollies are  not at the top of my list for bringing our own transportation.  We have always towed “four down” using a tow bar.  We have towed our Commando, Durango and the Service Truck over the years and consider that to be the best option.  My plan was to finish the Durango engine rebuild and bring it on this trip.  I got the engine running and it runs well, but my diagnostic software is showing intermittent sensor problems that keep me from getting my emissions test and license plates.

So, our only alternative was to bring the PT Cruiser.  It can't be towed with all four wheels on the ground because to the automatic transmission.  I would have to install a special pump to circulate the transmission fluid and I really don't like that approach.  So the only alternative is a tow dolly.  I found a great used unit made by the Acme Tow Dolly company.  I will try to post a picture of the bus/car combination next time.

That is all for now.