Hi Volks,
We got home late and lots of "stuff" has been keeping me away from the
trip report writing, but if you're reading this now then I guess I have
it done.
EB2005 was a great trip. If there was another one on next weekend I'd
already be packing. As it stands right now our next trip will be
BusFusion, as there are some bills to pay and some Sunroof Bus
restoration to be done in the meanwhile. So without any further ado;
let's get to the trip report.
TUESDAY:
"Reluctantly crouched at the starting line, engines pumping and
thumping in time" (Cake; "The Distance")
Tuesday I had to work, but we were determined to get out of town asap
after rush hour. The bus was mostly packed already, so when I finally
got home from work all that needed to be done was a bit of last-minute
stuff: pack the coolers, get a few movies and games for the kids, take
time out for dinner and hook up the westrailer. We got that done by
about 8:20 and hit the road. By that time the traffic was light and the
miles flew by as we listened to the tunelist I had brewed up for the
MP3 player. Driving through St. Catharines we were singing along and
having a great time; it was a very good omen for a family vacation.
Through St. Kits and out the other side, we rolled on to Fort Erie and
the Duty Free just before the border. As usual we encountered an
easy-going border crossing with no rubber gloves and no teardown. Just
a couple questions about where we were from and where we were going and
they waved us through. So I cranked the tunes back up and we rolled on
through Buffalo and on to Lake Erie State Park.
It was closed.
Apparently I misread the ReserveAmerica website and had somehow got the
idea in my head that the park was open to drive-in business. Apparently
that was incorrect... The park doesn't open officially until April
29th. In any case, there was no getting around the big ROAD CLOSED
barricade, and without an electric site it was a bit too nippy out to
camp in the Westfakia. So we headed west on Rt 5. It was tempting to
think about crashing out at Vanagon List member Michael Vickey's place
but Colleen rightly insisted that it was way too late by then to arrive
unannounced, so we passed by there and targeted the Best Western at
Erie PA where another 4 Canadian buses had already landed for the
night... as it turned out they had arrived only a half-hour earlier. So
we found our room, installed the kids and headed down the hall with our
Duty Free purchases to say "hello". It was a very high-spirited group,
but as it approached 2AM people realized that we had stuff to do the
next day and everyone headed back to their own rooms for some
much-needed shut-eye.
"He's racing, and pacing and plotting the course, he's fighting, and
biting, and riding on his horse. He's going the Distance, he's going
for Speed. He's going the distance."
WEDNESDAY:
"There's no simple explanation
and no central Destination" (Cake, "Long line of Cars)
We awoke around 8AM and everyone headed downstairs for the free buffet
breakfast included in the cost of the room. It was pretty decent, and
made the room a real bargain at $59US for a family of five. I used the
hotel's computer to check my email and then went outside to re-organize
the westfakia and get things ready to roll at 10AM.
We didn't quite get on the road at 10, but it was closer than I had
expected. The day was clear and bright and warmer than usual, and
heading south on I-79 the miles went by pretty easily. At our first
rest stop I adjusted the throttle cable on "Gaspants", the 1972 westy
from Forest ON, and after only a couple minutes back on the road Max
was reporting problems. As it turned out the problem was unrelated...
the ground wire on the electric fuel pump was not too well connected
and the carbs were intermittently starving for fuel and the bus was
losing power.
At the next roadside stop we had a driver's meeting to review the route
choices. The "slow pokes" were headed down i-79 to i-77 to US-19 to
i-77, whereas I had plans to campout overnight at Jeff Stewart's in
Round Hill VA. It turned out that the slow pokes all wanted to "make
hay while the sun shines" and get as far as possible on a beautiful
travel day, so we parted company at the next fuel stop about 15 miles
north of the Penna Turnpike. With the bus fully fuelled up I was able
to drive the Penna non-stop, so by the time we exited the Penna at
Breezewood it was time for a rest stop. According to the map posted in
the foyer we had now covered 310 miles since leaving Toronto. Or
something like that.
Pulling onto i-70 southbound from the rest stop I checked the rear-veiw
mirror and what should I see but a beautiful orange westy approaching.
I looked it over carefully but it didn't seem familiar. A little while
later the road widened and when the westy pulled alongside we
discovered that they too were headed to EveryBus. Stopping for gas
about an hour later in Maryland I learned that the westy was owned by
Justin Baughman, who had sent me an email about the route to everybus
about 10 days earlier. 
We
suggested that he could join us at Jeff's if he wanted but they had
only been on the road for a short time so far, and wanted to press on a
bit farther to Luray Caverns where they already had a reservation.
Ambling along into Winchester and Round Hill was a pleasant trip with
no worries. Afternoon rush hour traffic intensified slightly but wasn't
a concern; we'd get there when we got there. More tunes on the MP3 deck
and the window down, it wasn't a bad way to travel at all. By about
6:30 PM we rolled into Jeff's driveway and shook hands with Round Hill
VA's most renowned bus host. Jeff even had a Canadian flag posted at
his driveway to welcome us!
The rest of the evening was spent catching up with Jeff and Anne
Stewart... We hadn't seen Anne since the trip home from EB2003 and the
last time we had seen Jeff was at John Brown's buses. Their daughter
Clarice and my daughter Lisa are very good friends and quickly
disappeared... Lisa briefly resurfaced when the pizza showed up, but
after that she wasn't seen again until dinner time. Jamie Auch showed
up later in the evening to borrow a tube of JB weld, and he left us
with directions on the best route to meet him at his school the next
day on the way to Everybus.
"And this long line of cars
keeps coming around the bend".( Cake, "Long line of Cars)
THURSDAY:
"It's a long line of cars, and
they're trying to get through" (Cake, "Long Line of Cars").
Thursday morning came bright and shiny and not quite as brisk as the
day before had been up in Erie. Coffee and donuts with the Stewart's
for breakfast was followed by a vigorous reloading of the westfakia to
get back on the road. We weren't in too much of a hurry since we
wouldn't need to be in Paris VA until after 11 PM, but there's always
that one little thing you always need to take care of, like ice for the
cooler and topping off the fuel tanks. We pulled out of Round Hill just
a little after 10:00 AM and set out on what was definitely the
prettiest drive of the week. Springtime in VA is stunning, and the
route Jamie had drawn out for us bordered some beautiful civil-war era
farmland with rolling hills and narrow roads lined with neat fieldstone
fences.
Somewhere along the way we missed a turn, and while that meant that we
got to see even more of the beautiful countryside, it also put us a bit
behind schedule meeting up with Jamie. But eventually we found the
school and just as we were pulling in Jamie was pulling out. I guess he
saw us turning into the driveway. Before we left the school we took a
moment to adjust the fan belt on his 1904cc T1 engine, as the fan was
making a bit of a ruckus.... It turned out that the alternator was
loose on its stand. Jamie quickly bolted it back in place and we were
on our way to Everybus... Now we were down to only one child in our bus
as Lisa was riding with Jeff and Frances was riding with her Best
Friend Casey Auch in Jamie's bus. Matthew didn't complain, that just
meant he had more space to stretch out for a nap, and less competition
for a turn at the PlayStation.
It was a mostly quiet ride until I smelled smoke. At first I didn't
quite know where it was coming from, but pretty soon it was obvious
that it was coming from a tire on Jamie's tent trailer. I told Jamie
about it on the CB radio but by the time he had pulled over the tire
was already ruined. He had wanted to change it earlier but his spare
wouldn't fit inside the wheel well. My spare fit, but as we were
installing it we somehow broke the filler stem, and it wouldn't hold
air. With no other alternative, I decided to have another try at
Jamie's spare, and figured out that if I supported the trailer with my
jack it was possible to use Jamie's scissor jack to push the axle away
from the trailer box far enough to slip the tire on. Once that was
taken care of we were back under way and things were again running
smoothly. We cruised on through Opal, Charlestown, then onto
Lynchburg...
Some Canadians refer to Lynchburg as the "Bermuda Triangle" of
carabuses. It seems that every time a group of buses goes through
Lynchburg on the way to EveryBus, *something* is bound to go wrong. So
it was a very good sign when we made it through Lynchburg with the
whole group intact and the buses rolling smoothly. As we cleared the
city limits at 6PM I mentioned to Colleen that it would be nice to
arrive at Hagan-Stone park while it was still light out.
And then Jeff Stewart informed me that smoke was coming off of one of
MY trailer wheels.
Sigh.
I quickly pulled over and headed back to check out the situation. As it
turned out, the passenger side wheel bearing on the trailer had
completely disintegrated. The dust cap was gone and the wheel was
sitting slightly crooked on the axle. I pulled out some tools from the
back of the bus and we got the wheel off, then I pulled the bearings
off and wrapped them in paper towel. Jeff Stewart drove me back into
Lynchburg and we checked out the local Walmart, but they didn't have
ANY bearings in stock, so we had to go a bit further into town to check
out Advance Auto.
"Can I help You?" they ask.
"I need a wheel bearing" I tell them.
"What make, model and year?"
"It's a generic utility trailer" I tell them..."No make and model... I
bought it in a kit from Walmart".
"have you got a part number?" they ask.
"No. It came off a utility trailer. It's a wheel bearing. Walmart
usually sells them, but not the store here.".
"Well, without a part number or a make and model, I can't tell you if I
have one or not. You could try the RV place down the street, but they
won't be open until tomorrow morning."
About now I'm losing it. With all the shelves in the store there HAS to
be a wheel bearing to fit my trailer; it's just that they only know how
to reference part numbers, they don't really know much about auto parts
at all. So I try another angle...
"I really need to find a bearing. My
family is back at the side of the road, and we can't leave the trailer
behind. We have to get to the campsite *tonight*."
That seemed to do the trick. He opened a drawer and pulled out a
caliper, then asked for my bearing. He then took a couple of
measurements and headed into the aisles behind the counter.
"Let me go see what we have, I may be
able to find something that will fit".
The other guy at the counter told me to go ahead and join him back
there, so I did. Within a couple of minutes we had the bearing I
needed, and a tub of wheel bearing grease to go with it. I paid the
bill, and climbed back into Jeff's bus for the trip back to the camper.
Back at the camper it was starting to get dark. I put the bearing on,
and then made a not-so-good discovery: I needed TWO bearings!!
And then I heard the familiar sound of a flat-4 engine, and looked up
to see Tom Hughes, another bus pilot well schooled in the risky route
through Lynchburg. Tom's 71 bus had broken a steering arm in lynchburg
back in 2001, earning him the "Rusty Bus" award for that year.
Back in Jeff's bus, we travelled up to Advance Auto and picked up
another bearing (ordered by part number this time) and a tub of orange
hand cleaner. When we got back to the bus and were halfway through the
repair we were joined by another bus, this one was a factory VW
high-top splitty, still in original paint. When we had the repair
completed we followed the high-top as far as Danville, then he pulled
off for gas and dinner and we sped onwards to EveryBus.
IIRC we reached everybus just slightly after 11PM. The first order of
business was to raise the "White Sky" and get some light on the
campsite, after which we set up the beds for the kids and broke out a
large bottle of Red Cup Ale to share with our friends around the
campsite. When I explained what held us up Jamie Rivers took a look at
the trailer and mentioned that I still had a problem. The bearings had
failed again!
It was a chilly night, but the Red Cups and friendly neighbours kept
the chill off for a couple more hours as we watched the buses roll in.
About 1 AM I remembered that I had to cook the pancake breakfast the
next morning, so I turned out the lights on the White Sky and headed
off to bed.
"It's a long line of cars, and it's
all because of me." (Cake; "Long Line of Cars")
FRIDAY
"I want a girl who gets up
early. I want a girl that stays up late" (Cake; "Short Skirt, Long
Jacket")
When I awoke on Friday there were already a few people up, and it was
about time to get the Canadian Pancake Breakfast running. I started
hauling stoves and other gear over to the main pavilion, and before
long we had lots of bacon on the go and pancakes flipping all over the
place. The smell of fresh Canadian bacon cooking soon brought lots of
hungry campers to us, and we dished out fresh flapjacks from about
8:30AM until about 10:00. Chris Slaymaker lent a hand with the pancake
flipping... perhaps he is working on "honorary Canadian" status?
Once the breakfast was done I wandered back
over to the Canadian Pavilion to have a look at the Westrailer's wheel
bearings. The bearings I replaced in Lynchburg had failed, because the
hub was damaged in the initial bearing failure. I decided to see if the
wheel from the other side would work on the axle, and discovered that
the bearings on the other side were also messed up. So Jamie and Chris
Rivers and Steve Cope helped pulled the wheel and figure out what would
need to be done. It seemed like all I needed was one new hub and two
sets of bearings. John Steinkamp gave me directions to the local
"Northern Tool" store and I sat back to await the arrival of my parents
in their newly acquired 1985 westy. They had picked up the westy on
Wednesday and taken it to Salem Imports for Mark Dearing and his crew
to give it the once over before EveryBus. While I waited for the
Salem crew to arrive I cooked up some Pogo's on the BBQ and made sure
that Chris didn't starve himself to death working the registration
desk. 
Mom and Dad arrived with the Salem crew at
about 4PM, and I quickly commandeered the Vanagon for a trip to get the
trailer parts.
The Auto tranny vanagon handled quite smoothly. Power was "appliance"
smooth in delivery, and torque was enough to get the job done. Just
enough to get out of its own way, but not enough that you have to be
careful with it. The power steering was a nice touch, and the interior
was in very good condition. A very nice ride, in other words.
Northern Tool was quite similar to the "Tractor Supply Co" stores here
at home, with an excellent selection of trailer parts. Wheel hubs,
bearings.... they had it all. $60 later I was out the door with a new
hub that included bearings, two sets of spare bearings, and a set of
"Bearing Buddies" to keep the bearings lubricated. We hit a little bit
of traffic on the interstate on the way back to camp, but I still
managed to get the bearings installed before dinner.
After dinner was a typical Friday night at camp. More Red Cup Ale, more
conversations with friends from far and wide. I got a chance to thank
Mark Dearing for helping my parents out on their way home from Florida,
and I got to greet Steve Dolan and Marcus Schaper as they arrived at
the campground. Steve was actually driving the same 67 bus that he had
driven to Everybus in 2001, but you certainly wouldn't have recognized
it as such if you didn't know... It looks brand new! And there
was lots more going on... it was the usual distributed mayhem that you
get when a herd of bus-owning cats congregates on a campground.
Sometime close to 1AM I once again dumped the lights and hit the hay.
"She's touring the facility,
and picking up slack" (Cake; "Short Skirt, Long Jacket")
SATURDAY
"We are building a religion,
we are building it bigger, we are widening the corridors and adding
more lanes" (Cake; "Comfort Eagle)
"unofficial"
EveryBus Burrito Breakfast. Even though Teddy couldn't make it to EB
this year, the unofficial FMBC Burrito Breakfast went on! I was going
to say that "you can't keep a good breakfast down", but that doesn't
make all that much sense, does it?. By the time I rolled my lazy butt
out of bed, there were already a few people loitering in the pavilion.
No-one was cooking anything yet, but I could sense an aura of
expectation in the air that called out to me: "Let's get it ON!!!". I
headed back to the Canadian Pavilion and Jamie Rivers helped me drag
some stoves and griddles over to the main pavilion. Pretty soon we had
Crazy Aunt Sherry and Jamie Rivers scrambling about 20 dozen eggs,
Richard Sanchez cooking up an excellent pile of charizo sausage, Ian
Janes working the veggies and Frank Condelli scrambling pound
after pound of bacon. There were also many other helpers chopping and
serving and the cooperative mayhem was a true work of gastronomic
grandeur. And the food was pretty tasty, too.
While the breakfast was cooking the moonbounce was being set up for the
kids. It was every bit as popular as it had been last year, keeping the
kids coming back time and again for many hours. After breakfast was
done I went for a stroll around the campground checking out the items
for sale and trying to build interest in the "Camping Competition".
After I had made my "rounds" I headed back to the Canadian Pavilion for
lunch, and made up some forms to keep score with.
At 1PM we had the driver's meeting for the Camping Competition. I
explained what was required and made sure everyone got a chance to
review the rules sheet. Then I went back to my usual wandering routine
until the crowd started to build up at the registration desk at 2PM.
The Camping Competition turned out to be a lot of fun. Some people took
it seriously, others had a bit more fun with it. Team Spatula stopped
to sing happy birthday and present a cake to one of their clan, and
Cory Petrie and Rob Laffoon showed good form and humour in their turn.
My parents took me completely off guard with their performance...
bickering non-stop for the entire 05:20 of their turn. When they shut
the sliding door and started rocking the bus I just had to look away.
The competitors seemed to enjoy themselves and the crowd had a good
time, so I'd call it a success.
The rest of the afternoon went by pretty
quickly, and all of a sudden it was time to judge the chili. With a
couple of Yuengling in my pockets to help reset my taste buds I did my
best to give a fair and balanced evaluation of the various offerings
brought to be judged. With about 25 different varieties submitted it
was tough work, but somehow I was able to struggle through and the
group agreed on the winner. Frank Biffath was unable to attend EB this
year, so the competition was a little tighter than usual... Once I
finished my chili responsibilities I had a run at the desserts and side
dishes and then went back to the Canadian Pavilion to tabulate the
scores for the Camping Competition before the awards presentation. With
that taken care of I went out for a photo-reconnaissance mission that
was cut short by a friendly couple of Vanagon owners that invited me in
to sit and chat a while. When 7:00PM rolled around I had to excuse
myself and went to find a seat at the awards presentation.
The awards were as fun as ever. Chris started off by thanking his
family for their support, then put me on the spot for my help with the
event. Heck... All I did was show up and find stuff that needed
doing... "Tweren't nothin', really." He proclaimed me "Prime Minister"
of the Canadian Contingent, which might be a mixed blessing if you are
familiar with the way that Canadians typically despise their current
leader. Since the title also included the award of an adorable National
Anthem -playing hampster I accepted gratefully and sat down politely as
a good Canadian should.
The door prizes were handed out, the Camping competition prizes were
awarded, and then Mad Uncle Dave stepped up to hand out the prizes for
the Chili Competition. He started off with a quick verse of song
accompanied on acoustic guitar, then shocked and amazed the crowd as he
smashed the guitar to smithereens at the end of the first verse. 
He then read the rest of his speech from a
roll of toilet paper and proclaimed the winners. The final
official act of the evening's festivities was the Koni Shock raffle
funded by Trow Wiccal in support of type2.com, which raised a goodly
whack of cash to help support the listserv. Thanks Troy!!! (even though
I didn't win).
After the awards we retired to the Canadian Pavilion to plan out the
final act of the Canadian Invasion... There were 10 liters of Red Cup
Ale that needed to be drunk. And since there was no shortage of
Americans that were also willing to be drunk it was our duty as
representatives from the CMoABD ( Canadian Ministry of Alcoholic
Beverage Distribution ) to ensure that the RCA was distributed in an
equal and orderly fashion to the appropriate candidates. It took
several trips through the loop to complete our mission, but we eventually
infiltrated our beverage through the kidneys of the Tidewater Type 2's,
Tennessee Mechanized, the FMBC, Team Spatula, and to a few other
thirsty strangers we encountered in our wandering.
With
the supplies of RCA depleted, I resorted to bottled beer and settled
down at the Canadian Campfire, which was doing its best to burn its way
through a huge pile of firewood. We talked about various topics,
including my involvement in the migration of the AIRS list to a
MySQL/PHP database format. (It's under way, but it'll be a while). At
1AM I once again decided to call it a night, and found my way back to
the westfakia.
"Now his hat is on backwards,
he can show you his tattoos. He is in the music business, he is calling
you Dude" (Cake; "Comfort Eagle)
SUNDAY:
"The fans get up, and they get out
of town" (Cake, from "The Distance")
Around 8AM I tossed my tired butt out of bed and started getting the
campsite organized for packdown. I put a huge pot of coffee on to perc,
and boiled some water for oatmeal. It's not elegant, but it fills you
up and it's an easy meal to get done when you're packing up to break
camp. We packed the trailer, dropped the top on the westfakia and then
dismantled the "White Sky" and packed away the poles, lights, tarp and
knuckles. Then the eternal wandering and goodbyes began; the hardest
part of any campout. Adam found a final lost and forlorn stray bottle
of Red Cup Ale and he and I presented it to Chris as a going away
present. 
Adam
changed his travel plans at the last minute and decided to follow Cory
and I up to Harper's ferry, which made three Canadians in a carabus.
Unfortunately we weren't able to break camp quick enough to carabus
with Jeff Stewart up 29/15, and Jamie Auch was tied up with some
business to conduct with a realtor in Winston-Salem. I figured that
since I had travelled up there a few times in the past I should be able
to get us where we needed to go.
Mostly I was able to figure things out, and we stopped for lunch at the
Walmart in the south end of Lynchburg. We got clear of there and were
doing fine until somehow I missed the turn to the bypass and we wound
up heading into the business district. I turned the carabus around and
backtracked along the route, but apparently I didn't go back quite far
enough and I wasn't able to figure it out. Instead I elected to take
the scenic route, and we followed 29/15 through downtown lynchburg. It
was a lot slower than the bypass, but we did got to see a lot of
civil-war era downtown architecture that you just can't see from the
interstate. The view of the town from across the river from the North
side was quite impressive, and worth the extra effort in m opinion.
Back on 29/15 northbound we soon spotted a familiar westy at the side
of the road... Steve Dolan and Marcus Schaper had been stopped with
electrical gremlins. By the time we pulled up they had sorted things
out and were only a few minutes from being ready to roll, since we were
in need of a gas stop I told them that they would be able to catch up
with us safely at our next fuel stop. Unfortunately it didn't work out
that way, but it was nice to catch up with Steve that one more time
anyways. At the fuel stop I idled the engine for a couple minutes
waiting for my compadres to finish fueling and suddenly the bus lost
power, stumbled and died... We checked it out and after wiggling some
wires the problem went away, so we got back on the road and pointed the
buses north.
Further up the road and the miles flew by... Charlottesville, Opal, and
then we veered left onto Rt 17 towards Winchester, VA. I had figured
out a suitable route (pronounced "root" in Canadianese) to get us to
Harper's Ferry which turned out to be very pretty. Two more small civil
war era towns went by, with lots of narrow roads and stone fences,
almost made me want to get a green card and move South. But then I'd
have to repaint the bus...
Around 8PM we finally rolled into Harper's Ferry and camped out on
Jamie Auch's front lawn... and not two minutes after we shut down the
engine I could hear Jamie's bus coming down the street. We set up the
tent trailer for the kids and then put the girls to bed; then had a
beer with Jamie while Cory helped Adam work on his distributor. Adam
had been having problems with the vacuum advance earlier in the day,
and Cory was able to help him out with the correct vacuum line and even
helped replace the vacuum can. They then set up the carb and reset the
timing and by the time Cory was done it purred like a kitten. We
finished up our beers and headed off to bed.
"No Trophy, no flowers, no
flashbulbs, no line. He's haunted by something he cannot define."
(Cake, from "The Distance")
MONDAY:
"They deftly maneuver, and
muscle for rank, fuel burning fast on an empty tank" (Cake, from
"The Distance")
Colleen woke early and had a coffee with
Christina Auch... I awoke at 7AM just as Jamie and the girls were
heading out to school. I popped open the rear hatch and called out a
"Good Morning" to Jamie, and he came over and he shook my hand before
heading off to work. Pretty soon after that I got up and went inside to
borrow Jamie's computer, hitting up Mapquest to check out how far it
would be to take I-81 up to Ontario instead of the usual Penna
Turnpike/i-79/i-90 trip that I have used before. Mister Mapquest told
me it would be about 90 miles extra and take about two hours more time
on the road. As it turned out that was rather optimistic, but at the
time it seemed like a pretty reasonable idea and the bonus was that we
would be able to keep company with Cory and Christine all the way to
Gananoque. And I'd get to drive through Scranton, the town named in the
Harry Chapin song about 30,000
pounds of bananas.
Adam and Heather agreed with the route selection so we took off and
headed up the interstate.
I-81 is an interesting drive. For the first few hours there were very
few hills, but a LOT of trucks and huge RV's towing cars behind them.
Did I say there were a LOT of trucks? I mean hundreds... everywhere.
But the road was in better shape than the Penna and the miles slid by
easily without raising the CHT gauge.
And then we hit passed Allentown and the
highway headed into the sky. The mountains around Scranton and
Wilkes-Barre are tremendous. About the same time the last bits of green
disappeared from the roadside and we re-entered the gray and rocky land
which we had left behind only five days previously. Sigh. In a month or
so we'll be pulling dandelions here, but in the meanwhile it seems like
forever. I guess that's just one more reason we love EveryBus. I had to
shift down to third gear a few times and watch the CHT a little closer
in this area, and keeping up with Cory's freeway flyer equipped splitty
was more or less impossible. In the two occasions where he did get away
from Adam and I we soon found him awaiting us at the next rest stop.
In Cicero NY we stopped for our final
fill-up with American gasoline. An hour after that we crossed the
border, with me first in line, then Cory, then Adam. We put Cory
in the middle because he ALWAYS has problems at border crossings...
they pull apart his bus and ask him a million questions. This time he
managed to get through in about 20 seconds, and Adam was quickly passed
through as well. 
We
then continued on up to Highway 401 and split company, Cory heading
east to Cornwall and Adam and I heading west towards Toronto. But first
we needed to find a Swiss Chalet in Kingston for a civilized sit-down
Family meal.
After Dinner I decided to relinquish the steering wheel to Colleen,
because suddenly I could no longer keep my eyes open. She finished the
drive to Toronto, filling up with fuel near trenton at 11:15PM and
arriving in the driveway at home around 1:00 AM. We were stiff, sore,
and VERY pleased with ourselves having had such a great time away for
the week.
"As soon as you're born you start
dying, so you might as well have a good time" (Cake; "Sheep go to
Heaven")
SUMMARY:
1843 Miles. One liter of oil. 110 gallons of fuel. That works out to
about 16 MPG. Apparently I need to pack lighter and drive a little
slower. The good news is that thanks to the exchange rate the gas was
actually cheaper than last year if you are paying in $CDN.
I've said it before, and I'll repeat it here:
THANKS to Chris and His Family for Hosting EveryBus.
THANKS to Jeff, Ann, and Clarice Stewart for their hospitality in Round
Hill.
THANKS to Jamie, Christina, Casey and Emma Auch for their hospitality
in Harper's Ferry
THANKS to the staff at Hagan-Stone Park for the good work that we never
notice.
THANKS to the Canadians (and others) who helped with the pancake
breakfast.
THANKS to the staff at the Advance Auto in Lynchburg VA.
THANKS to Jamie and Chris Rivers and Steve Cope for help with the
Westrailer bearings.
THANKS to my family for putting up with (and sharing) my obsession.
I can't hardly wait for EB2006. But in the meanwhile I will make do by
planning for Buses
of the Corn.
Happy trails,
Greg Potts
Toronto, Ontario, Canada
1973/74/79 Westfakia Conversion **Bob the Tomato** LY3H
1977 Sunroof Automatic L63H/L90D
1988 Vanagon GL 8-passenger Automatic
http://www.pottsfamily.ca/westfakia
http://www.busesofthecorn.com
PS: Did you read all the way
down? Thanks, I hope you enjoyed it. As a bonus, I'll let you
look at the rest of the pics I took here.
We
suggested that he could join us at Jeff's if he wanted but they had
only been on the road for a short time so far, and wanted to press on a
bit farther to Luray Caverns where they already had a reservation.
Once the breakfast was done I wandered back
over to the Canadian Pavilion to have a look at the Westrailer's wheel
bearings. The bearings I replaced in Lynchburg had failed, because the
hub was damaged in the initial bearing failure. I decided to see if the
wheel from the other side would work on the axle, and discovered that
the bearings on the other side were also messed up. So Jamie and Chris
Rivers and Steve Cope helped pulled the wheel and figure out what would
need to be done. It seemed like all I needed was one new hub and two
sets of bearings. John Steinkamp gave me directions to the local
"Northern Tool" store and I sat back to await the arrival of my parents
in their newly acquired 1985 westy. They had picked up the westy on
Wednesday and taken it to Salem Imports for Mark Dearing and his crew
to give it the once over before EveryBus. While I waited for the
Salem crew to arrive I cooked up some Pogo's on the BBQ and made sure
that Chris didn't starve himself to death working the registration
desk. 
Mom and Dad arrived with the Salem crew at
about 4PM, and I quickly commandeered the Vanagon for a trip to get the
trailer parts.
"unofficial"
EveryBus Burrito Breakfast. Even though Teddy couldn't make it to EB
this year, the unofficial FMBC Burrito Breakfast went on! I was going
to say that "you can't keep a good breakfast down", but that doesn't
make all that much sense, does it?. By the time I rolled my lazy butt
out of bed, there were already a few people loitering in the pavilion.
No-one was cooking anything yet, but I could sense an aura of
expectation in the air that called out to me: "Let's get it ON!!!". I
headed back to the Canadian Pavilion and Jamie Rivers helped me drag
some stoves and griddles over to the main pavilion. Pretty soon we had
Crazy Aunt Sherry and Jamie Rivers scrambling about 20 dozen eggs,
Richard Sanchez cooking up an excellent pile of charizo sausage, Ian
Janes working the veggies and Frank Condelli scrambling pound
after pound of bacon. There were also many other helpers chopping and
serving and the cooperative mayhem was a true work of gastronomic
grandeur. And the food was pretty tasty, too.
The rest of the afternoon went by pretty
quickly, and all of a sudden it was time to judge the chili. With a
couple of Yuengling in my pockets to help reset my taste buds I did my
best to give a fair and balanced evaluation of the various offerings
brought to be judged. With about 25 different varieties submitted it
was tough work, but somehow I was able to struggle through and the
group agreed on the winner. Frank Biffath was unable to attend EB this
year, so the competition was a little tighter than usual... Once I
finished my chili responsibilities I had a run at the desserts and side
dishes and then went back to the Canadian Pavilion to tabulate the
scores for the Camping Competition before the awards presentation. With
that taken care of I went out for a photo-reconnaissance mission that
was cut short by a friendly couple of Vanagon owners that invited me in
to sit and chat a while. When 7:00PM rolled around I had to excuse
myself and went to find a seat at the awards presentation.
He then read the rest of his speech from a
roll of toilet paper and proclaimed the winners. The final
official act of the evening's festivities was the Koni Shock raffle
funded by Trow Wiccal in support of type2.com, which raised a goodly
whack of cash to help support the listserv. Thanks Troy!!! (even though
I didn't win).
With
the supplies of RCA depleted, I resorted to bottled beer and settled
down at the Canadian Campfire, which was doing its best to burn its way
through a huge pile of firewood. We talked about various topics,
including my involvement in the migration of the AIRS list to a
MySQL/PHP database format. (It's under way, but it'll be a while). At
1AM I once again decided to call it a night, and found my way back to
the westfakia. 
Adam
changed his travel plans at the last minute and decided to follow Cory
and I up to Harper's ferry, which made three Canadians in a carabus.
Unfortunately we weren't able to break camp quick enough to carabus
with Jeff Stewart up 29/15, and Jamie Auch was tied up with some
business to conduct with a realtor in Winston-Salem. I figured that
since I had travelled up there a few times in the past I should be able
to get us where we needed to go. 
Colleen woke early and had a coffee with
Christina Auch... I awoke at 7AM just as Jamie and the girls were
heading out to school. I popped open the rear hatch and called out a
"Good Morning" to Jamie, and he came over and he shook my hand before
heading off to work. Pretty soon after that I got up and went inside to
borrow Jamie's computer, hitting up Mapquest to check out how far it
would be to take I-81 up to Ontario instead of the usual Penna
Turnpike/i-79/i-90 trip that I have used before. Mister Mapquest told
me it would be about 90 miles extra and take about two hours more time
on the road. As it turned out that was rather optimistic, but at the
time it seemed like a pretty reasonable idea and the bonus was that we
would be able to keep company with Cory and Christine all the way to
Gananoque. And I'd get to drive through Scranton, the town named in the
Harry Chapin song about 30,000
pounds of bananas. 
And then we hit passed Allentown and the
highway headed into the sky. The mountains around Scranton and
Wilkes-Barre are tremendous. About the same time the last bits of green
disappeared from the roadside and we re-entered the gray and rocky land
which we had left behind only five days previously. Sigh. In a month or
so we'll be pulling dandelions here, but in the meanwhile it seems like
forever. I guess that's just one more reason we love EveryBus. I had to
shift down to third gear a few times and watch the CHT a little closer
in this area, and keeping up with Cory's freeway flyer equipped splitty
was more or less impossible. In the two occasions where he did get away
from Adam and I we soon found him awaiting us at the next rest stop.
In Cicero NY we stopped for our final
fill-up with American gasoline. An hour after that we crossed the
border, with me first in line, then Cory, then Adam. We put Cory
in the middle because he ALWAYS has problems at border crossings...
they pull apart his bus and ask him a million questions. This time he
managed to get through in about 20 seconds, and Adam was quickly passed
through as well. 
We
then continued on up to Highway 401 and split company, Cory heading
east to Cornwall and Adam and I heading west towards Toronto. But first
we needed to find a Swiss Chalet in Kingston for a civilized sit-down
Family meal.