The Good, The Bad and The Ugly (Tuesday)

As you can tell, I am once again running behind on the blog. I'll try to catch up this morning but I make no promises. Simply not enough time.

Monday night we learned of a NAPA store about 30 miles down the road where the manager is a REAL car guy and might be able to help us find a new cap for Don's radiator. We pull in and park next to a 1959 Corvette - this seems to be a good omen. Sure enough, after a bit of head scratching, he comes up with a GAS cap that fits. Don's car looks very sport with a chome cap on the radiator. Then we are again on the backroads and headed toward Yankton. Clearly we are in farm country. Miles and miles of cornfields and open country. We arrive in Yankton just in time for lunch. This town is very close to the farm that Arlene was born on. Don & Arlene remember fine dining at the Library restaurant -- maybe this is our lunch stop. We ask at the gas station and are told that the Library has been closed for YEARS. We stop for lunch at Yesterday's Diner. Fun spot with old cars -- though not as old as ours.

Gail was off searching farmers' fields in Winner for old tractors at our time of departure so he has been trailing behind this morning. Gail & Joyce catch up just as we are finishing lunch. We now head off in a pack of four Cords. We head south out of town across the NEW bridge and follow lonely highway 12 through northeast Nebraska before joining with highway 20 and beginning the trek across Iowa. We need to make some time to cover 250 miles before we stop for the night. My original thought was to stop in Iowa Falls but as cell phone coverage permits, I check availability. Yikes, only smoking rooms are left. I start searching a little farther down the road for lodging and find four non-smoking rooms at the Country Inn in Cedar Falls. I grab the rooms and let everyone know our plans. The group has now split into two groups. We are traveling with Don & Arlene in our rear view mirror. We are beginning to hear noises coming from the front of the car. We stop for gas in Webster and Barrie looks at the car but decides we'll get to our final destination before he digs into the problem. We just have 75 miles to go.

Now, this is where it gets ugly. Barrie gets on his knees to look under the car and SWEARS. He immediately gets to works taking off Don's beautiful wheel (driver's side front) to see what is happening. It is not good. I'm not good at the technical stuff so I'll get Barrie or Don to blog what actually happened but suffice to say we are not driving the car another inch without some major work. Don pulls out his cell phone and places a call to Bill Richardson -- who answers immediately. We certainly travel under a lucky star. Bill says that if we can get him a list of what we need, he will get it in the Fed-Ex tomorrow.

Cedar Falls is a beautiful town but we don't really want to be left behind to wait for a package and we don't want to hold up our traveling companions from reaching Auburn. I get on the computer to see if we can get a truck and trailer to haul the car the remaining distance to Auburn. This way Bill can send the parts ahead and we can do the work in Auburn. Barrie is determined to drive the car home from Auburn. Another stroke of luck. A truck and trailer is available just 5 miles down the road in Waterloo - and we might be able to have it as early as 9 am. At this point we decide the only logical thing to do is to button-up the car and drink! We head back into the hotel for a glass of wine. After a glass (or two) we are feeling up to finding a place for dinner. We head toward the lobby with Don & Arlene and find the rest of our group checking in. They had stopped for ice cream and coffee along the way.

We quickly decide to order in Chinese. We take over the lobby and enjoy each other's company and another glass of wine while waiting for the Chinese food delivery. The manager offers us the use of the breakfast for our dinner party. We celebrate our friends and the fact that nothing really bad happened. Another stroke of luck. We all head off to bed a little humbled and very grateful.

Tomorrow we'll rent a truck and keep on going.