ET's Info-Stew

Yesterday Jenny and I, with tremendous help from Dad, Mark (my brother) and his fiance Heather, loaded up our 16 foot Penske rental moving truck for our move to Colorado. It turns out we had way more stuff than we expected and the truck ended up being fully loaded nearly top to bottom. We didn't have any appliances and didn't have much furniture (bed, TV stand, nightstand, two side tables), so the bulk was just household stuff. After lunch we finished off packing the truck and did our apartment walk through. We visited family that evening and left Livermore at 10:10pm, I in the Penske truck towing my Nissan Sentra on a tow dolly and Jenny in our Ford Explorer half filled (including a lawnmower from bro-and-sis-in-law Patti and Carl [thanks you guys!]).

We drove taking the I-80 route until the wee hours of the morning arriving at Boomtown, Nevada at about 3:00am. If anyone reading this post is considering moving like we are doing, I'd suggest not doing this drive at night; it's pretty scary. In boomtown we went to the hotel lobby and asked for a room. The person told us that they were full. I didn't really believe him, but they have a right to refuse service to anyone, and I think he knew we weren't there to gamble. So we got back into the trucks and continued on into Reno. We stayed at a Motel 6 off exit 12. It wasn't a comfortable stay, and in the end it was $73. But it got us the rest we needed to continue.

Here is another tip for the driver choosing to tow a vehicle for the first time: think ahead and plan your moves so that you NEVER have to back up. It is so difficult to maneuver correctly that it's best to avoid backing up as much as possible. Always keep an eye out for a parking lot with two entrances. So far we've only needed to back up once, and that is because I made a stupid turn into a parking lot with only one entrance/exit. It took us 30 minutes and help from a woman who drives horse trailers for a living to get us out. Having a second vehicle to drive around town with really helps here. Just park the rental truck in a spot that's easy to get into and out of, then drive around town (for errands, shopping, food, etc.) in the other car.

Anyway, we woke this morning at about 8:30am after 5 hours of sleep, had breakfast at Denny's, and restarted our treck at 10:15am. It's 410 miles through Nevada on I-80, and they seem to go on forever. The terrain is all desert, but I found that the nearby mountains at least provided for some interesting scenery. Still 410 miles at about 55 MPH is tough.

On the subject of speed, once you get into open desert, the speed limit is 75 MPH. But we were going 55-60 on average, first because the truck can get a little squirely in wind gusts, but also because it saves gas. Also, you can't go too fast uphill because the oil temp starts to get too warm. A big question people have when moving like we are is gas mileage. Our fully loaded 16 foot Penske truck towing a car on a tow dolly was getting an unexpected 12.3 miles per gallon, and that's with a 10 MPH headwind (there's wind socks along the route). I expected to get 6-8 MPG. Granted, the truck was in good shape. It has about 82,000 miles on it and runs rather well. Penske's quality trucks and good customer service are why we decided to go with them even though they were more expensive. Anyway, the Ford Explorer, which typically gets 14 MPG empty with a mix of city and highway miles, was getting over 25 MPG (with the headwind half loaded) going 55-60 on the highway. I'm sure it feels mind numbingly slow and boring for Jenny, but it really is helping save us on gas. So, if you're going to make this trip, it saves a lot of pain in the wallet to go 55-60 MPH, however tempting it might be to go faster.

Still that speed makes the trip feel very long. Google maps said the whole trip should take about 19 hours without stops. But that's based on going the speed limit. We've been on the road 17 hours, and we still have about 8 hours to go. I think the extra 6 hours on the road is worth the couple hundred dollars we are saving in gas because we aren't particularly in a time crunch. But you do have to be patient and flexible with where you bunk for the night. I'm glad I didn't make prior hotel reservations. We would have saved money there, but we would be stuck to a schedule that's too rigid.

We made it to Evanston Wyoming for tonight, which is about 90 minutes ahead of our plan. The hotels off exit 3 aren't cheap. Tonight we are paying $100, but at least it comes with free Internet and continental breakfast. Tomorrow will be a nine hour day with stops, mostly across Wyoming. We've driven right around 600 miles today in about 13.5 hours with stops. At least we have three states behind us.