Moving this weekend

[TimandJoyce 1]

Quite the novel!!! I'm looking forward to chapter two!!

I hope the rest of your journey goes well, and that you're out of the snow soon!!

[Kathryn41 3,205]

Wow, what an adventure! Sure hope the weather and vehicle issues are behind you soon and the rest of the way is smooth sailing.

[minnew 4]

We are finally moving!!! We planned to leave on Friday morning (Feb. 20th) that ended up postponed to Saturday because of some issues with health insurance etc. And this has been such a hilarious series of unfortunate events I had to share…

We finally get the van loaded (after the guys had to pull everything out of the van to find Hayley’s Birth Certificate that we needed for the border)… We meet my mom for Lunch and head out…. Approx. 1:30.. 20 minutes out of Meadow Lake I realize I forgot my Camera – John races back for it while I continue with the kids…

About 10 minutes out of Saskatoon I notice John’s Van catch a pothole in the road… He pulls over a couple minutes later he is having low tire pressure warnings in his van. We go to Canadian tire they fix it – by the time he drives over to where the kids and I are – it’s low again so he takes it back. Guess what – his rim is bent and they don’t have one that will fit his Van. They seal it and hope it makes the journey. Off we go again…

We get to Regina that night and the “pet friendly” hotel charges a $15 per night per pet fee… so they $100 room cost us $150. We get up and hit the road about 8:30. Three of us all sick with colds! We drive until I phone John and tell him I need to stop at the next town for Gas….. about two minutes later my engine light comes on…. We pull in at the gas station… fill up – restart the van….. now the engine light is on and there is a distinct noise…. I can’t even explain the noise it was so weird! John runs back in to the station and gets some numbers of mechanics to call. He gets one to come out to look at it.. he tells us he thinks it’s the transmission but he can’t work on it for two days…. Tells us to “limp it” to Estevan. We drive about 3 minutes down the road and John stops gets out and says – we aren’t going anywhere – it started slipping 3 & 4th gear. It’s only -44 in the wind so what the heck… lets stand outside and tinker on the van right! John takes it to Canadian tire (with the kids) and I go looking for a hotel. I find one and come back and take the kids to Tim Horton’s.. We waited for 45 minutes. John calls – It’s definitely the transmission (they used their computers) and they can’t fix it. So we go back to the hotel….. The next morning John takes the Van to the local Dodge dealership (at 8:00 am) at 8:20 he calls and tells me they have it in the bay and they are looking at it. Unsure of the cause (the transmission fluid is black). They decide to drain the fluid and flush it. They drain it and find filings….. it’s shot. So they had to rebuild it. Turns out the Torque converter failed and forced Engine oil into the transmission fluid.. blah blah blah This cost about $2500.00 and took until 9:00 Wednesday to fix. So we spent my Birthday in Weyburn… By the way Meadow Lake Restaurants could battle Weyburns in worlds worst places to eat! Even Dairy Queen managed to forget our ice cream on our banana splits!

We finally get on the road yesterday and manage to cross the boarder in 1 hour or so! North Portal had no idea what to do but they did what they thought they needed to do pretty quickly. It was amazing! We drove until Kenmare, ND and had lunch. Then we drove until Carrington and got some gas (I filled my van from empty for $32.00) Amazing huh! We then drove to Jamestown and had dinner (I’m in America and I am not suppose to say Supper!) and after dinner we left and drove to Fargo… The hotel we wanted decided 2 days ago to no longer accept pets so we had to change to another hotel. OMG – Sleeze motel move over! We walk in the room and it smells like Urine! The dogs go nuts running all over sniffing and sniffing.. I didn’t want them to sleep on the floor! It was 10:00 pm and we wanted an early start so we stayed.. at least the sheets were clean!!!

This morning we get on the road… The roads were horrible. Blowing snow and drifts. I kept thinking where the heck are the plows! Well about 10 miles out of Fargo I see this sign saying Christine to S. Dakota travel not advised… Well Little did I know that Christine was the town we came to about 2 minutes later looking for a place to have breakfast – but the café on the GPS didn’t even exist! (6 miles off the highway on very poor roads!) We managed to drive another 45 minutes before we finally give up (the visability was horrible and the drifts were terrible! Turns out they pulled the plows off the road because it had gotten to zero visibility). We pull off at a small town (Mooreton). The Café owner was great – she even let Lily use her grandchildren’s walker. She helped us find a hotel in Wahpeton (about 12 miles away). We drive here slowly and get to the hotel when John’s Engine light comes on in his van! At this point I’m ready to just go jump on the next bus! We checked in and they kindly let us have the room early. John found a mechanic to look at his van and he left. We went shopping at Walmart because we are running out of clothes (we packed for a 5 day journey, not a 7 – 8 day adventure). We meet back at the hotel both John and I got stuck at the same intersection….. we both got out and luckily his warning light is just an issue with ice build up on a sensor or a wire. All fixed!

Now we sit and wait – hopefully the storm ends soon, the hotel has finally cleaned the parking lot but we have a 2 ft high pile of snow behind our vehicles…. So lets all hope we can get out tomorrow! This has been one of the weirdest trips ever, at the rate we are going we drive 1 day – rest 3! Ha, ha, ha! For once the border services / immigration were the easy part!!!!

Hugs to all!

Gail

Oh my gosh! Just think you will be in Texas soon!! Good to hear about Portal as that will be my POE as well, hopefully I get someone who knows what they are doing!! I'm in Regina right now and the windchill tonight is -43!!! Brrrr!!! My fiance was teasing me telling me that where he is in Omaha metro the highs will be in the 30-40's F....I told him you are lucky I am 1000 miles away!!! I know the route you are taking all too well! Bismarck, ND-Fargo ND along I-94....3 hours of nothing......ahh the northern plains!!! Fargo to Sioux Falls....even worse! LOL....gotta make sure you gas up before you leave Fargo! Anyways, good luck for the rest of your trip!!

[Carlawarla 1]

Oh Gail, what an adventure! Hope things go more smoothly further along the way! Let us know how you're making out, and thanks so much for the intriguing update!

[Jasman0717 9]

Damn I never heard of anyone abusing Murphy's law before. I can hardly wait for the next update.

[trailmix 77]

I too am hoping for smooth travels for you here on out - what a drive!

It will be so funny when you start getting further south and it just gets warmer and warmer

[MrsCat 6]

lawg - you stepped into some kind of vortex on your way out the door. That is the worst luck I have ever heard of.

Safe travels. Hope you make it out of the Dakotas without anymore troubles.

[saskswan 1]

Well we made it just past Des Moines today! We went this way because John's (Adult) kids live there. Now we finish our Journey tomorrow or Sunday (depending on how tired we get). Only issues we had were a bit of blowing snow and John having a faulty rim on his van - we had to stop twice to get it resealed. Stupid how there are no KIA dealers around when you need them!

Things are looking up finally! At this point all we can do is laugh when things go wrong!!!

Edited February 28, 2009 by lawg

[Reba 2]

Damn I never heard of anyone abusing Murphy's law before. I can hardly wait for the next update.

[saskswan 1]

Just wait for the second installment! Pretty soon they'll be changing the name of Murphy's law to reflect my trip! I'll post more tomorrow! Today we have to get home!!!!!!! Finally!!!!!!!

[Jasman0717 9]

Just wait for the second installment! Pretty soon they'll be changing the name of Murphy's law to reflect my trip! I'll post more tomorrow! Today we have to get home!!!!!!! Finally!!!!!!!

Hopefully the rest of the trip will be calm, you definitely have used all your "Murphy's Law" vouchers

[AddyG 0]

Can't wait to hear the rest!

[saskswan 1]

Well here it goes!

We left ND finally Thursday morning and drove for a few hours then stopped for lunch. My husband gets out of his van and says "my tire is going flat again" so he went to a local garage to get it fixed. We enjoyed our lunch and left again.... he started out driving fairly quickly then kept dropping his speed. He calls me and says - there's something wrong with the wheel balance on my van. He decided he didn't trust the guy who fixed it so we would keep going until we got to another larger center.

We couldn't find a tireshop but they had a Walmart so we went there. The kids and I went shopping while John went to get his tire fixed. He came in to find us and said - they think it will be about an hour. So we shopped.. picked up a few odd's & end's and spent way too much money again! Finally they finish and we get loaded up and leave again.

By the time we reached Souix City it was snowing again.... and we keep going, the closer we get to Des Moines (where John's kids are) the harder it was snowing. It was dark, the traffic was thick and we kept driving. Finally we get to Des Moines. Spent some time with his kids (so they could get to know Lily (our 8 month old). Two of his kids weren't talking to each other so it made Dinner really interesting. The younger two ask us to go shopping in Walmart again. John agree's. So off we go again. It was about 10:00 at night so we only drove about 1 hour before we pulled over for the night.

The next morning we wake up to about 4 inches of snow. We go for Breakfast and get on the road. Hard to believe in this day and age that they don't plow immediately after the snow is done but apparently in Missouri they don't in all counties. We watched car after truck after car go in the ditch. At one point some genius was passing John and lost control and went in the ditch.... does that stop my husband from driving - nope..... we keep going. We get to Kansas city about lunch time. The roads have been sanded and aren't that bad but still there are these idiots that think they are invincible drivers. We are delayed waiting for them to pull a few cars piled up off the road. We get on the road heading towards Wichata. A black truck gets between John and I.... at this point John decides the road is good enough to do the speed limit, he pulls ahead. The idiot in the black truck must have decided that he can't let a minivan go faster than him so he hits the gas and some ice........

The next thing I know this black truck is slamming into the lefthand barrier and bouncing off and flying across the road....... missed us by inches!!! Hit the righthand barrier and was flying back across the road at us...... We managed to avoid getting hit barely! The entire time this happened (felt like hours!) John just kept driving - didn't see any of it. I get stopped... luckily the people behind me and the idiot in the black truck managed to stop. At this point I realize John is just continuing to drive.... so I get going again. I'm barely able to hold myself together - the kids are crying and Hayley (my 10 year old) is freaking out... begging me to stop driving and to get a hotel. I finally catch up to John (at this point he realized I wasn't right behind him and slowed down). He pulls off into a Wendy's. I just fell apart.... I come from a town with ONE traffic light and here I am in a city with a bunch of idiots that can't drive in snow or ice. I have a husband that can't realize that I'm not behind him because someone just tried to kill us... We pulled over for a few hours and got some road condition reports - decided to change our route to go straight to Wichata because the storm didn't go through there.

I was okay until we started driving through Wichata, I was just too nervous to drive at night.... we drove a bit longer but finally we pulled over when I called John and said I just can't drive anymore.

The next morning we managed to get an early start and had a relatively sane drive until we got to Dallas..... The traffic was horrendous!!! I mean bumper to bumper... even when we got I-45 from Dallas to Houston - there were just insane amounts of vehicles. We drove and drove and then we stopped.... litterally on the road. There was a traffic jam by Huntsville, TX. We sat on the road between Huntsville and Houston for over two hours. We moved a little bit but not much above 10 mph. Lily was screaming at this point. We are trying like hell to just get to the house. Finally we make it to Houston... Little did I know but John decided to take us on the biggest roads he could find in the city... I-45, Beltway 8, I-10!!! I have drove in cities like Edmonton, Saskatoon, Calgary but never in traffic like this..... I was totally nerve wracked! But we made it to the house without a scratch.. Thank God!

So the way I look at it now.... something was trying like hell to keep us away from here..... so we must be meant to be here. This is our home.

That was my journey in a nut shell...... I'm here - I refuse to drive for a while. And the kids/dogs/cat are so happy to be in a house - the culture shock really hasn't set in yet. lol

[Holliday 4]

WOW! I don't even know what to say to all that, other than congratulations on finally making it home!

[minnew 4]

WOW!! Congratulations on finally making it home!! That is quite the adventure! I hate people who drive like its summer! Hahaha where my fiance used to be stationed in ND it was count the airmen in the ditch every time there was a snow! They have no clue how to drive in snow and ice if you are not from the northern plains!