We stole our own truck! The mad dash to get Clyde ready for year 3 on the road
When we come home for the holidays, we try to squeeze in all of our medical and vet appointments during the short time we're there. Same goes for our truck, Clyde. Typically, the top priority is the annual vehicle inspection. Because our truck is registered in Massachusetts, we need to get it inspected the same month every year. We purposely planned to get the inspections in December, knowing we'd be coming back for Christmas.
This is only part of the story, though, because this year, Clyde and Buggy went through the process of becoming South Dakota residents alongside Anthony. South Dakota does not require vehicle inspections - another perk of Anthony's big switch. We looked forward to having one less worry when we returned home, but we got held up in the registration process. There was a several month delay getting the paperwork sent from the bank, and then Anthony's surgery delayed his sending of the remaining documents. We're still waiting on our new license plates, which will need to be sent to Anthony's nomad mailbox. We'll then forward them to a safe and convenient place while we're on the road, likely to Anthony's parents' house in Florida when we're down there in February. So, for one final year, we needed to bring Clyde for a Massachusetts inspection.
Additionally, we had already clocked 60,000 miles on the truck and he was due for service. Service and inspection aren't a big deal under normal circumstances, but we were delayed in getting anything done on the truck, thanks to the ignition issues that took 3 months to accurately diagnose. No maintenance or inspection was going to happen if the truck wouldn't even start! We're happy to report that Clyde has now been starting with no issue, and with that problem solved, it was time to get cracking on the next orders of business.
Clyde put in a lot of good miles this year, traveling across the country twice, with a lot of zig-zagging along the way. We traveled down the east coast with its sandy, salty air. We drove through Louisiana floods and New Mexico dust storms. We parked under giant pine trees dropping sap on the roof. We drove through the Rocky Mountain region and must ask, does anyone know what that yellowish goop is that seems to fall from the sky and splatter all over the windshield?! And then, when we were halfway home, this happened:
And then an hour later, this:
That's just the exterior. When we spend as many hours in the truck as we do, traveling for hours at a time and exploring the rugged outdoors - with pets - the truck indeed gets very lived in. We desperately needed to call in the professionals to give this baby a deep cleaning, inside and out.
Our Blitz East also drove the point home that we really need to do something about the back windows. Tanner sits in the backseat on the passenger side, and when we're traveling east on a sunny day, the sun beats right in on Tanner from the south. The sun is not an Eskimo's friend and we felt guilty seeing how uncomfortable he would get. We wanted to get Tanner a Christmas present that would provide some shade and relief from the heat. We debated just getting a screen to hang on the window, like the ones people use for children, but we had also discussed tinting the windows to our truck cap. Back when we were in Nevada, we came up with a temporary solution to stealthify our truck bed. We created makeshift curtains and hung them, so that when we drove into Las Vegas, we wouldn't be flaunting all the belongings we have in the back. As expected, those curtains didn't last long, and after throwing some ideas back and forth, tinting the windows seemed to be worthwhile.
So, if we were already thinking about tinting the cap windows, perhaps we could tint the rear windows, too. Tanner would get his shade, and on the other side, the harps would have protection from extreme temperatures coming through the glass - something that's very important for maintaining the integrity of the instruments.
And with that, we had our line-up for Clyde: 60,000mi service, inspection, detailing, and tinted windows. Time to make some appointments.
One thing we love about coming back to the Boston area is the number of well-rated, family-owned service businesses. Most of these places have generations of lifelong, loyal customers. Then we come in like fish out of water, with some lingering essence of Boston attitude, but still obviously not truly belonging. It's immediately intriguing to people. Then we tell the tale of our nomadism, and just like that, we're welcomed in, for good. It doesn't matter that we leave for months at a time. Whenever we return, we're greeted by these people like we're old friends. We've already sung the praises of our pump-out guys, and we also have to give five stars to Williams Energy, who have always taken such good care of us and our winter propane needs, even going so far as to lend us extra tanks whenever we spend winter months at our home-base.
The companies that handled our truck detailing and window tinting were no different; they were personable, knowledgeable, and ready to assist in our travel lifestyle. Window tinting came first, and we went to Northeast Auto Spa. We got the truck cap windows tinted to only let in 5% light. Then we got the rear truck windows tinted to let in 35% light. The tinted windows look great but also serve the functions we need; the items in our truck bed are more concealed, and Tanner and the harps will have much needed shade on travel days.
We originally made our detailing appointment at a well-rated place in town, but Northeast Auto Spa recommended a different place, and so we took their recommendation and rescheduled our appointment at Bottoms Up. We'd drop it off at the end of the day on a Monday, they'd do the work Tuesday, and we'd get it back by end-of-day Tuesday. Our 60,000mi service appointment was also that Monday, scheduled for first thing in the morning. The plan was perfect: We'd get the truck serviced in the morning, which should take a few hours, pick it up in the afternoon, and then immediately drop it off to the detailing shop.
Except on that Monday, a major storm rolled in. We had tons of rain and wind gusts over 60mph. We spent most of our time inside the house, not trusting the trees around our RV. Branches kept falling on our roof and in the driveway. Inside the house, we were bracing for a power outage. The lights kept flickering and thousands of homes in the area were already without electricity.
The day wore on, and by afternoon, we still hadn't heard anything from GMC. We tried calling them but there was no answer. We feared that they lost power and didn't have a way to call their customers. If we couldn't get our truck back, we wouldn't be able to drop it off to get detailed. And so we set out to assess the situation in person.
We knew the storm was wreaking havoc, but we were not prepared for what we saw. Downed trees closed nearby streets, forcing us to detour. Miles upon miles of streets were in darkness. And sure enough, we arrived to find a dark, closed GMC.
We were running out of time to get Clyde all of his appointments. This Monday was a week before Christmas, and we'd be back on the road by the end of Christmas week. We had already called Bottoms Up to make sure they had electricity and were still expecting our arrival. We found Clyde parked on the northern side of the GMC parking lot, where he usually sits when he's not being worked on. We had no idea where he was in the process of getting serviced. Had they started yet? Had they finished and just didn't have time to call us? Either way, we couldn't risk losing the detailing appointment, and so we took our remaining set of keys and drove Clyde out of the lot.
Of course, we tried to text and email GMC to let them know we were stealing our own truck, but we had no way of knowing whether or not they'd get the messages. The whole situation felt surreal. The sun was setting and the storm was still overhead. Cars were trying to navigate busy intersections without traffic lights. Police were closing down roads left and right, with others patrolling busy retail areas to prevent looting. Now driving separately, we decided to run a few holiday-related errands on our way to Bottoms Up. Easier said than done, when half the businesses were closed and the other half had dozens of obstacles in the way of getting there. We did, however, make our way to Target, which was an experience in itself. Every surrounding building and the parking lot were in complete darkness, and Target was running on limited generator power. We said that it was the second creepiest trip to Target we've ever had.
Villa Anderson hung onto its power by a wire and somehow came out of the storm unscathed. So did our RV. 600,000 homes in New England lost power that day, and some areas, particularly in New Hampshire and Maine, had extreme flooding. We were fortunate that we had already sealed around our tank vents before all this rain came in, or else we would have been looking for an emergency pump-out again, but this time, the guys might not have been able to make it, due to all the closed roads and power outages.
We warned the guys at Bottoms Up that our truck had been through some stuff, but they had to see it to believe it. Now, we're not those proud truck owners who try to keep Clyde in pristine condition. We wash it occasionally, and sometimes do a little vacuuming, dusting, or window washing. We drive by self-serve wash bays and commend those owners on their diligence. We will never be those people. With all the outdoor activities we do, it would always be an uphill battle; the second we got the truck cleaned, he'd get dirty again. It just makes more sense for us to wait until we're between seasons of travel, throw some money at the problem, and let the pros do the job right.
These pros had their work cut out for them and let us know that we'd be getting our truck back on Wednesday, not Tuesday. Exactly one of the reasons we needed to steal our truck and get the other appointments done pronto. But, when we got Clyde back, he was looking cleaner than he had in years. This also gave us an opportunity to reorganize the truck bed, something that desperately needed to be done before getting back on the road.
Meanwhile, GMC got their power restored, but evidently had no way of getting messages that were left during the power outage. They actually sent one of the workers out with our keys to find Clyde, and he couldn't, for obvious reasons. We continued calling them consistently until we finally got a hold of someone. They thanked us for letting them know that we stole our truck back, or else that would have been a long and stressful day for them! They hadn't gotten to service our truck yet, and now they'd be swamped trying to catch up on two days' worth of work, and so we rescheduled our 60,000mi for the following Tuesday, the week we'd be leaving.
As we waited for Tuesday to roll around, we got our inspection. With everything else we were battling in these final weeks, the inspection could have been a real nuisance, but there are plenty of places to quickly get one in MA, and at least now we don't have the pressure of needing the SD plates right away.
If you keep track of our blog calendar, typically we're a few weeks behind, but we tend to catch up during our stationary time around the holidays. So yes, the Tuesday before we launch back out, is indeed the Tuesday this blog post is getting released. So, as we write this post, the 60,000mi service has yet to be completed. We can hope that everything runs smoothly, so Clyde will be ready to roll by Friday. He's been through a lot, and it's never lost on us what an important part our truck plays in the RV life. Clyde keeps us traveling, safe, and comfortable, and also serves as extra storage for our belongings. We don't know where we'd be without him, but it certainly wouldn't be on these incredible travel adventures.