Cluckers Clucks America - Day 1

~Morning~

My eyes forced themselves open. Ouch, rough night. I checked my watch: 11am. Oh, crap.

Pulling myself together, Robbie and I finished loading the Jeep, stuffed so tight with my belongings that not only could we not see out the back, but also the rear speakers were completely muted, the rear wheel-wells nearly sat on the tires, and the doors and trunk would fling themselves open as if propelled by a spring if given the chance. After grabbing a bagel in hopes of calming our stomachs (queasy stomachs would actually be a theme of the trip), we departed. It was 12:30pm. We were leaving a solid 7 hours later than planned.

With a fresh layer of tape anchoring Cluckers to the hood, we pulled away from the Montwood one last time. It seemed only fitting that we would start our trip in Santa Monica. Coast to coast on Route 10. We snapped a few pictures from Ocean Avenue, prepared ourselves for what lay ahead. The idea was to drive until we dropped. We could both catch a nap during the afternoon and if we were feeling good once we got to Phoenix, we'd keep rolling all the way to Las Cruces, New Mexico.

After a bit of traffic slowed us down out by San Bernardino, Route 10 opened up before us. We parted ways with Route 15/40 (the crowd heading for Vegas), cleared ourselves from Palm Springs, and hit the open road. El Burro Volando was cruising, Cluckers forged ahead, and with the help of gallons of Gatorade, our headaches were dissipating.

We grabbed a mid-afternoon lunch in Blythe, California, a few miles from the Arizona border. So far, we hadn't seen much. A windfarm a couple hours earlier and a lot of desert. A different desert than the Mojave: less sand and more scrub brush. Shortly after leaving Blythe, we passed through a poverty stricken trailer park straddling either side of the highway. We believed it was an Indian Reservation, though we weren't entirely sure. That was eye-opening, indeed: hundreds of trailers sprawled out in the middle of the desert, thirty miles in every direction from other signs of life. A far cry from the affluent regions of the country we'd both lived in our entire lives.

Brian had described this portion of our journey, which turned out to be the first three days, as "a whole lot of nothing." He couldn't have been more spot on.

~Afternoon~

The real excitement of Day 1 came around dusk, about 50 miles from Phoenix. Caught in a patch of traffic (ie. four cars), I smelled burning metal. It was unpleasant. I glanced at Robbie, asked, "You smell that?" He nodded, made a face. "Maybe it's the car in front of us." I checked my gauges, all seemed well. Sped around the other cars, leading the way. The smell persisted. We spotted a gas station/towing service coming up at the next exit. "Should we stop there?"

Now, common sense said pulling into the gas station was the right move. But male pride told us otherwise. We looked at each other, agreed to "Wait till the next exit." As soon as we passed, we realized we shouldn't have. The smell persisted and although no smoke was coming from beneath the hood, we both suspected something not so good was going on. We pulled off Route 10 at the next exit, which just so happened to be out in the middle of nowhere. "It's ok," Rob offered, pointing out a sign off the exit ramp, "we're near a nuclear power plant."

As soon as we eased the Jeep onto the gravel shoulder, it started making a pretty nasty sound. I turned it off and jumped out, fearing the worst. Opened the hood and was greeted by a face full of smoke coming off the serpentine belt which turned the radiator fan, AC adaptor, etc. Uh oh.

After pointing vaguely at parts of the engine and trying to both sound knowledgeable, we decided we'd try to turn on the Jeep. Maybe it had just needed some rest. To cool off. I turned the key and that didn't go so well. The Jeep howled in protest, a violent grating sound. Robbie guessed that one of the pulleys had seized up on us. We decided it was time for our first lifeline.

Here's where I gained appreciation for doing this trip in 2009. Robbie pulled out his Iphone and used the GPS to triangulate exactly where we were. He then punched in "towing services" near our location and was able to find out the name and phone number of the place we'd passed a few miles before. He got them on the phone, explained what had happened. The guy suggested that before we call a tow truck, we try contacting a "mobile mechanic" named Carter who worked in the area. Evidently, this guy Carter would come to us and might be able to fix the Jeep at our location. If he was able to figure out what was wrong with the Jeep, and had access to the parts, he'd be able to save us the towing fee. Plus, it was already getting late and garages wouldn't be open to fix the Jeep until tomorrow afternoon, if not later.

Robbie called Carter and he said he was about thirty miles away fixing another vehicle. He'd come to us next. That done, we hunkered down and waited. Did I mention that the temperature had dropped from 75 to 45 in about fifteen minutes? I lifted the trunk and my overnight bag self-ejected into my arms. A little less than an hour later, Carter arrived.

~Night~

It took Carter about five minutes to deduce what was wrong with El Burro Volando. Shrugging a small flashlight against his neck, he ripped the guts out of my engine and explained that the mechanic in LA had tightened the new belts too tight when I'd taken the car in to be serviced. That, combined with age, had fried the bearings on the AC Adaptor and had caused the pulley to lock up. It probably didn't help that we'd been using the AC that afternoon for more or less the first time in six months or so. Anyhow, Carter looked at us, said he needed to head into town to grab the parts. Did one of us want to go with him? I looked at Robbie, hoping he'd offer. He didn't. So I hopped into Carter's van and left Robbie out in the desert with no hope of escape when the power plant failed.

As we roared towards Phoenix in Carter's van (which had over 450,000 miles on it - the sign of a good mechanic), I reflected on Day 1 of the trip. So far, nothing had gone according to plan. At this rate, it was going to take us weeks to get across country. But I couldn't deny that everything was pretty awesome so far. Other than the fairly legitimate concern that this mechanic guy was going to kill me and feed me to the locals, I was pretty content.

Going into town turned out to be a 60 mile round trip. Plenty of time to get to know Carter's family history. He and I talked real estate, politics, and foreign policy. I learned he didn't think too much of Mr. Obama, he didn't like Mexicans, and the government was trying to steal his damn land. He'd been living out near Buckeye his whole life - his brothers, his father and grandfather all had - and they were all mechanics. He'd driven down to Mexico to the grocery store and seen maggots on the meats, and someone had recently tried to pay him in drugs for fixing their car.

We got back to the Jeep, replaced the AC Adaptor, and El Burro Volando roared back to life. Reborn. Unbelievable. Carter followed me to the next exit, a truck stop a few miles down, and we concluded our business. I asked him how much we owed him for his services. He pursed his lips, looked at the starry sky, and said, "I don't know. How does $200 sound?" He didn't take credit cards and my checkbook was buried in a mountain of junk in the Jeep. All I had on me cash was $120. He shrugged, looked at me: "That's fine. You can just mail me the rest when you get back."

Robbie and I got back in the Jeep and looked up to find a trucker in a sleeveless denim shirt, tattooed from shoulder to wrist, grilling the hell out of us, a 9MM on his hip. On that note, I hit the gas and got out of there, back on the road. Nothing like a couple California fairies to serve as target practice before the big Mexican shoot.

It was 9pm and we still hadn't reached Phoenix. Robbie had a family friend who lived in Scottsdale whom we had originally planned to have lunch, er dinner, with. We called Brooke and she offered to let us crash at her place for the night. We stopped at an In-N-Out for dinner, scarfed down the most delicious double-doubles ever, then took the 101 loop around Phoenix, past the Cardinals stadium and through Glendale, eventually pulling to a stop at Brooke's pad out in the suburbs. A bunch of enormous cacti in the front yard. We crashed at about 11:30 or so. Las Cruces could wait another day.

Lesson of Day 1: Learn to Slow Down