Drove to Florida… almost 3K miles… again

I’m trying to post more often, but in that, I end up posting less often. I don’t know how that happens, but anyway, this time I do have a reason. I was gone for a week. I’d done the journey in about 4 days before, but this time, well, things went a bit differently.

I was driving a fully loaded ’85 Cadillac Seville. Yep, that was 135 horses of purebread slowness, following a motorhome towing a trailer–which could smoke me on accelleration! Oh yeah, I was feelin’ sassy in my Cad-O-Lack that had been sitting for about ten years and probably should have been towed, but what the heck, I only live once.

And when Bobby Ore asks if you’d drive for him, the only answer is yes. So I did.

But the car kept breaking down. No surprises there, huh?

30 minutes in, radiator blew.

3 or 4 hours from there, the smog pump belt broke–and it was brand new!

Another 3 or 4 hours from there, we limped into a shop.

…Who among other things didn’t tighten down one of the radiator hoses.

Another 5 hours from there, that radiator hose came loose and sprayed the brakes plus the windshield. Nice.

Limping into another shop got everything patched up, but I think we were both still wary.

The rest of the trip went off without incident. Which was refreshing, I might add!

Somewhere during the first bit, we pulled off to glue the rearview mirror back on. But given that I’ve unsuccessfully done 4 and have a propensity for having them come off in my hand when I adjust them, I let Bobby do the glueing and then I decided to wait a few hours to let the glue dry.

Well, hours turned into days because I completely forgot!!!!! This pic was taken during the last 200 or so miles of the trip:

One of the reasons I forgot about the rearview was because I was concerned with the sideview mirror. The passenger side one was good as gold, but the driver side one… Well, I dunno what was going on with it other than it wasn’t really connected to the guts behind it. Over the course of the first thousand miles or so, I finally set up this sophisticated method of getting it to stay properly aligned. It was quite an engineering feat considering I had nothing but a couple napkins to work with…

All in all, even though it was hellish, the trip was worth making. I mean, if nothing else, it can serve as a memory of times much worse. I survived just fine. A little worse for wear, but the car made it to Florida in one piece after those first three days.

I forgot to take a picture of the car itself…Duh…I know, I know… But here was my view from Los Angeles to Central Florida:

Maybe I’m a glutton for punishment, but I’d do it all again in a heartbeat.

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