We'll miss you DVDV

The day we knew would come has in fact arrived. We begin our final journey as proud owners of our Desert Violet 1998 Ford Explorer, lovingly known as DVDV.  Valley’s family needs a reliable heavy duty car and DVDV got the nod.  I have spent the day getting her ready for the run to North Port, Florida: washing, vacuuming, polishing, gassing her up and getting an oil change service, just to make sure all is well on the trip.  We’ll not be setting any records, having decided to take our time and make it as relaxing as possible, so we’ll be spending three nights in hotels and we’ll only average about six hours of driving a day.

Smart folks would have timed this to begin in November when the weather would be much cooler, but hey, 90 degrees and frequent thunderstorms, as predicted, add a certain amount of adventure to the transfer.  As we were getting things organized for the trip, we began to discover things about the car that we either didn’t know before or forgot.  For instance, the sun visor on both the driver and passenger side has two visors so that if you move the big one to the side window, you still have a smaller backup for the front window.  Ingenious!  I’m betting that there is no one out there that has a car that has a built-in cassette player as well as a CD player and an option to connect your phone so that you can play whatever is on your playlist. Oh, and today I found out where you add the fluid for the rearview window washer, not that it matters since that wiper hasn’t worked in years.

We are all packed and the car is filled with things that the Florida kids want, which is a joy since we really would like to unload lots of our stuff. We’ve got a cold six pack of Evian, a bag of peanuts, a bag of almonds and a jug of Vecchia Romana, an Italian brandy for beddy-bye sipping. We’ll keep you posted!

We had a crack of dawn start today, that is if we lived in Hawaii!  It was to be a six hour trip Rock Hill SC but with rain, trucks and tons of traffic outside Charlotte, it turned into a 8.5 hour ordeal. No biggie, we arrived safe and sound.  Since Cindy isn’t running, she packs lighter than normal and the receptionist gave a that look like, I know what you’re here for!  We had a lovely dinner and unwound from the day’s drive and got to bed much earlier that normal.  Tomorrow to Jacksonville!!