2015-11-22

Car Wars Episode 8–The Tension Mounts

My oldest nephew got married a month or so ago.

The wedding was late Saturday afternoon down in Peoria; about a 4 hour drive.  The Daughter had a lot going on at college, so she wasn't going to come with us.

So, Cora and I got our act together, and got ready to leave a little after 9:00 am on Saturday.  Car loaded, I turned the engine over and …

THUNK!

Cora and I looked at each other, and I said, "I'm going to pretend I didn't hear that."  But backing out of the garage, I could tell that I had no power steering, so I pulled back in and shut it down.

Now what?

We're making the wedding that's not in question, but how?  We unpack the laptops, and found that the Enterprise car rental is only open for 3 hours on Saturday, but it is the 3 hours we need.  And it is only a block away.  We call them up, reserve a car, and walk there in 5 minutes.

We get a VW Jetta (no a diesel), and I make sure that I know where the outlet is for our GPS (aka "Croc" since he has an Australian accent).  I can get us to Peoria fine, but I really don't know my way around, or where, exactly, our hotel or the wedding location are, and the base model Jetta doesn't have a nav. system.

We circled around, transferred our stuff from one car to the other, ran a couple of errands that we had to knock off, and hit the road.  Later than we wanted, but still with plenty of time to make Peoria.  But since we were running late, had the GPS on so that I could track ETA.

And so, it was with no surprise that we weren't out of the metro area when Croc gave me a low battery warning.  It was plugged in, but neither power outlet was working.  Must have blown a fuse.

Thanks Enterprise!

We roared down I-55 to I-74 and when we got in range, Google maps on the phone did the trick.

The wedding was probably beautiful.  It was difficult to see because it was an outdoor wedding and we were looking directly into the setting sun.

But the reception and hotel were nice.