Drive to Boston and Flight Home

Aug 24th

We have a long way to go today, so we woke early and were on the road by 6:30am. I have a flight to catch in Boston at 5pm today. As we were driving on interstate 90, I noticed a strange scraping noise. When I looked back at our trailer, I saw something sticking out from between the tires. Kathy found a place to pull over, and I discovered that the sheet metal above the trailer tires had come off and was hanging down between the tires and rubbing them. I pulled off the plastic beauty cover over the tires and had to cut the metal plate in half. Once I had done that we got back on the road. We stopped for breakfast, and I put Oreo inside the trailer while we ate. I didn’t want him to cut himself on the sharp metal or screws from the beauty cover, so I put those on the back of the truck. After breakfast, we started heading toward Boston again. That’s when we realized we left all the parts on the back of the truck. We took the first exit we came to, and had to drive into Springfield, MA. For a couple of miles before we had enough room to pull over and look for the parts. The beauty cover was gone. Its somewhere on interstate 90 in Massachusetts. Now we were lost in Springfield. Our GPS unit, which is programmed for the height and length of our rig, told us to turn left at the next intersection. When we turned, we were facing an overhead train crossing that was marked as 11’9”. Our trailer is 12’9”. I immediately yelled for Kathy to stop. There was a driveway to our left with a little mechanic shop in it, and we turned in there. We barely eked through the parking lot. We were not happy with our Garmin GPS. It was turned off and we used Google Maps to get us back on the highway. The traffic started getting very heavy as we approached Boston. We are staying a Wompatuk State Park, which is about 17 miles south of Boston. Once we set up, I had a shower and packed a bag for my trip back home. As we were heading toward the airport, Mia asked if I had my ID with me. It was one of those days, because I did not have my ID. Luckily, we were only a couple of miles from the campground. THANK YOU, Mia! That could have been a disaster. The 17 miles to Logan airport, took an hour. My flight was pretty good. I had heard horror stories about Jetblue, but I have no complaints I had an entire row to myself, and I had plenty of leg room. The flight path took us over up-state NY. I was able to see Niagara Falls from 30,000 feet. It was almost more impressive from that vantage point, because you could see how big it really was. Bridget picked me up at SFO. It was so good to see her.

Aug 25th and 26th

Bridget and I spent the last two days gathering and packing for our trip back. I met with Mia’s teacher and got her books. We had dinner with my parents one night, and then Margot and Silvia the next.

Aug 27th

Bridget and I got up at 2am to catch our 6am flight out of SFO back to Boston. Neither of us slept very well last night. My parents drove us to the airport. We were both very tired and Delta airlines does not make it any easier, because they are awful. They charged us to pick our seats. WTH??? Our flight from SFO to SLC, was on an older plane that was filthy and my knees were jammed into the back of the seat in front of me. The second flight wasn’t any better. It was on a large Airbus, but the seats were still all crammed together. Very uncomfortable. The crew members were all nice, but I won’t be flying with them again. Kathy, Mia and Oreo picked us up at Logan. We drove into Boston, and ordered a pizza from a small pizzeria. Bridget and I hadn’t eaten since breakfast in SFO. It might have been the hunger, but it was one of the best pizzas we had ever tasted. Once we had unloaded our stuff at the trailer, we went to bed. It had been a long day.