Trip report #1, "Here goes"
Those familiar with my usual reports will probably notice that this one gets a little light on details in some areas. In the beginning, and again at the end, I was able to jot notes down in my notebook as things were happening. But there in the middle? Oh no... That was easily that toughest run we've done yet. Delays, car accidents, weather.... You name it and it was stacked against us. There was no time for anything but gas and go (and "go" we did).
But enough of that, let's get this party started!
Shortly after going radio silent, we were still SMACK DAB in the middle of hauling gifts. You might remember that my mother and grandmother flew to town to watch the kids while we were gone. Well, they also took it upon themselves to wrap EVERY present, which meant they were literally spending 10-hours a day shopping with us and then wrapping. We thought we just about had things finished with one day to spare (for packing, etc) and my mom noticed that 9 more names were added to the list.
Much frantic shopping followed. My grandmother stayed behind in the hotel, and my mom and I split our efforts and went in separate directions. We had all the new gifts bought in about 3 hours. Which only left one kid left on the list. "Yaroslav".
"Yaroslav" is a 13-year-old boy who was asking for a VR headset. It's not your typical set, but more of a sort of headgear that you put your phone in, and a lens magnifies the image until it looks like surround sound for your vision. By this point we had exhausted every option available to us (basically 2-video game stores about 45 minutes away), and every online vendor reported the same thing "we couldn't possibly post it to you soon enough. The system is just too slow this time of year".
But Vikki was already hard at work on it. She reached back and was able to get a follow-up option for the kiddo. A soldering iron, and accessory set...
I was immediately in heaven. Did I mention I was an electrical engineer? Not only do I know exactly what this kid needs to get started, but I know exactly where to find it in town (I may have spent a bit more than normal on this one, but I really wanted this kiddo to have all the basics he would need to get started).
Once everything was in-hand we got back to the hotel room and the family went back to work wrapping. We didn't get the truck loaded that day, but we were sitting at a nice round number of 50-children and we had just bought every item on thier wish list. Things were looking good.
The next day, it took us two trip's in Mrs. Hungary's Saab kombi to get all the remaining gifts to our house for packing in the truck. When we did, this is how it looked:
I was now beginning to get a bit concerned with space in the truck...
Speaking of the truck, I did mention that it had just returned from Africa. Well, we had been so busy that we really haven't had a chance to clean the poor thing! The entire interior was covered in red-dust, and a leak in the sunroof (one of the drains got plugged) meant that water intrusion had turned it all to mud!!!
My mom got to work cleaning, while I got to work getting it running and ready for the trip:
(light bar got ripped off on the Africa run, almost none of the connectors survived but the dang lights did!)
Anyhoo, I mentioned "getting it running" well I noticed that when I got back from Africa the battery in the Toyota was spilling out of its vents. If that wasn't bad enough, it didn't have any charge left either. Initially I put it on the battery charger, but thinking better I eventually just pulled the Optima Red-Top out of the Mazda. I figured if the battery was spilling out the vents, then some of the cells must have gotten damaged during the rallye and I did not want to run a road-trip with that risk.
Next up was the packing! it started off simple enough:
The idea was simple: Put presents in trash bags to protect them from the leaking sun-roof and from any remaining red-dirt (that stuff was impossible to completely get rid of!), and stuff them in the back Tetris style!
(Hey, Santa may have a magic red bag to put his toys in, but here in 4-Runner land we have to use what few trash-bags we got)
Except we instantly realized we were going to run out of room (it wasn't even close). We briefly considered bringing a second vehicle, but decided to pull out the 4-Runner's secret weapon instead (I've been hoping I could do this for like 3-runs now )
Ladies and gentlemen, I present to you the "First Gen 4-Runner's party piece":
ooooooh yeah. The sky was the limit, and we were DETERMINED to get there. And if you thought Vikki was shocked the last time she saw this thing loaded up, you should have seen her when we pulled up to the curb this time! But I digress. First things first:
Inside the truck, the driver's seat was still VERY WET. I had no idea the roof was leaking, and I haven't had a chance to even open a DOOR on this poor truck for weeks now. Instead of worrying about it, I just decided to line the driver's seat with trash bags as well.
I gotta head to work shortly after this, but ultimately we were able to get everything in the trunk. We even added candy bags for each kid and a box of christmas candy for each mom. Going back over the list, we also purchased more diapers (we figured about 2-packs for each child) and some baby formula (we bought 3 boxes each for the two children who needed them).
Unfortunately my appropriately sized tarp is being used at a house we currently have under construction, so I had to use our GIGANTIC sized tarp to cover everything (this involved several tricky folds to get it to fit within the truck's footprint):
Um, quick note: What you see there on the back of the truck was directed at the two team members who decided to hop in the truck with me and drive down the west coast of Africa, despite the three of us having never met each other (Stranger Danger!). It was a running joke, and I didn't have time to scrape stickers
Anyhoo:
That's that. We're loaded up and ready to go. I work till 11pm, and the alarm is set for 3:30. By 4-o'clock tomorrow, we're Eastbound and down!
Wish us luck, y'all