mood: tired
technically day 5 now, we are in new orleans made it safely here. rally is over, hung out on bourbon street some, back to the hotel room and i'm going to sleep. babe 2008 is complete. time to get rid of the van and head home.
dan0 on 05.25.08 @ 11:34 PM CST [link] [No Comments]
well its hot outside here in fort payne, alabama so i've taken a few moments to head back into the a/c and edit up some picture for y'all. plus things will be hopping outside for a bit as one of the rallygoers got into an accident right before pulling into the hotel. they were in a vw cabriolet making a left hand turn into the hotel, they were hit in the right front and pushed the frame rail into the a/c compressor and belts. they are determined along with a group of other rpeopel helping and the close the half of the other rallyers watching alongside.
babe08 pictures (descriptions added later)
dan0 on 05.24.08 @ 08:01 PM CST [link] [No Comments]
here's a quick picture of the stop off of SSR32 we had in the morning. i've kinda decided all the pictures will get uploaded and added when we get back to ct.
jim's junk
dan0 on 05.24.08 @ 04:59 PM CST [link] [No Comments]
mood: chillin' in the a/c
newport,tn - fort payne,al
no challenge today, just follow the route and end up in fort payne, al. the route which just happened to take us through some very windy and somewhat sketchy roads. the first leg was driven by jason which included SSR32 which began as dirt then was a very windy mountain road. jason let everyone by that was behind us just because we would be that slow. well we could be faster but the end of the day yesterday left our right front brake grinding, so we didn't want to push it. we stopped off the mountain at an old gas station as a few teams fixed/tweaked some things. we headed off further back in the pack on our way to right hand gap, a very nice (long!) uphill and downhill through the cherokee national forest. shortly after that a quick lunch stop, then gas then driver change. a short drive got us to the tail of the dragon at deals gap. a very popular spot with sports car enthusiasts, and we're doing it in a big van with questionable brakes. i had a blast on the road and would definitely come back with an appropriate vehicle. a short (few hours) drive to fort payne, al and we're set for the night. we even came in an hour early due to central time zone change. since some teams went through the dragon twice we were one of the first few teams in, which translates into relaxing in the a/c for a bit before other teams show up and we hang around outside for a few hours.
tomorrow poses to be the longest day with a drive of over 450 miles to New Orleans, but we'll be rested up for it now
dan0 on 05.24.08 @ 04:49 PM CST [link] [No Comments]
mood: tired
harrisonburg,va - newport,tn
day two was definitely a long day. it began with us sleeping the in the van to save a night of hotel costs, and waking up several times in the night. because sleeping in a reclined front seat and a loveseat are not the most comfortable places to sleep. today was costume day and there were all sorts of supermen (and a couple superwomen) roaming the packing lot for a few hours before we headed out. our chalenge which we received the night before had us going to three different towns off of a 3 lists of 4 towns (one from each list). we had to pose with a local in front of a municipal building with the towns name on it and our vehicle. after striking out at the court house in the first town we visited, we rolled down the hill to a post office and there struck the brilliance that we should look for post offices because they are a sure fire building to have the town name. thanks jason.
getting to our first town was an interesting story, our gps told us the way, and it took us 25 miles down a road that was about a lane and a half wide. and as we finally pull out onto a normal road, we see a fellow rally goer go past. what are the odds?
its getting late now so i'm packing it in for now, but i'll post more about swords in the waffle house, route 421, and truckers at some point.
dan0 on 05.23.08 @ 08:51 PM CST [link] [1 Comment]
This is just a quick picture of the van at the first overlook on skyline drive.
babe7
dan0 on 05.22.08 @ 07:47 PM CST [link] [1 Comment]
music: whatever is playing on sirus radio in the van next to us in the parking lot
staten island,ny to harrisonburg, va
so day one has been wrapped up for a few hours now, we got into harrisonburg around 6:30 tonight. our first challenge this morning was getting the van to start. jason said, as some of the cars were leaving the lot, "we shouldn't be last in case something is wrong", go to start the van, dead battery. someone has cables and we get jumped. off on the road we go, the first days challenge is taking pictures of what the organizers has taken pictures of. so we have 15 images to find, some edited out. so instead of the full street sign we have nothing but one letter on the picture. we end up getting 8 out of 15. at the end of the challenge there was an alternative route through skyline drive (Shenandoah park). We decided to take it, we didn't know it was going to be $15 and 65 miles up up and down and curves. but in the end it was worth it. we arrived right in the middle of the pack so we've had plenty of time to relax and enjoy the company. met more teams tonight and jason has been helping out fixing some cars. we'll have a bit of a challenge tonight because we'll be sleeping in the van tonight, cheesing out on paying for a hotel room, we'll see how that goes.
dan0 on 05.22.08 @ 07:30 PM CST [link] [1 Comment]
CT - staten island,ny
so a couple words on night zero, as we wind down the night in the hotel room. we have delivered the tv. i couldn't back up the van into this narrow spot first i'm too far on one side then as I'm backing up a second time.
"building!"
"how close?"
"your're about to hit it"
"ok I'll stop here"
also notable on the trip down, passing newark NJ, "i wish i could take a picture of this smell" -jason
upon pulling in the first person we meet is Jim, one of the things we hear later from him is "by day 2, you'll be planning for next year" We already are.
Its an amazing sight to see in the parking lot, cars in all sorts of fashion, highly deocarated, rusting, clean arizona bodied cars, attempts to fix rear shocks, timing, discovering leaking headgaskets.
While our van that seemed to stand out in CT, it is bland, boring, plain in the field of cars we see, but a trip to Home Depot should fix that.
dan0 on 05.22.08 @ 04:53 AM CST [link] [No Comments]
I left the van off last night at the emissions shop and got a call this morning at 8:20am, "come pick up your van", in disbelief I said its ready? "yup, all passed, even brought the co2 and noX down too" So off to pick up the van I went, I left my Jetta there at the shop, hopefully someone from work can pick it up and bring it down there atleast but they have a big lot/field in back so its not a problem if they don't. Off to the DMV and about an 1.5hrs later PRESTO! I'm bolting up the license plate and heading home to fill the van then head to Bridgewater to pick up my teammate and a TV I'm delivering to Staten Island tonight (5 minutes away from the hotel check-in)
dan0 on 05.21.08 @ 09:10 AM CST [link] [No Comments]
mood: nervous
so i went to dmv today, and there is a limit on temp plates, 21 days total, so all i could get today was a one day temp. i ran (well drove) to emission with the van and failed. now while i thought that would be ok, and i could just get plates after that i was wrong. the new test date stays the same which is past so i have to go to the dmv tomorrow with either a pass or a waiver. and all i failed by was 7 parts per million on the hydrocarbons. now i'll know for next year, 10 day temp plates to get me home with my purchase, and 10 day temps to run the rally on.
so right now the fate of my rally is in someone else's hands.
dan0 on 05.20.08 @ 03:18 PM CST [link] [No Comments]
mood: excited, can't wait to leave!
So while I've set this up as a chronicle of our day to day on the rally I also want to write up a little backstory as to how I got into this mess. I had heard about the BABE Rally last year via vwvortex.com (aka thecarlounge.com) as some participants readied their cars. It was far too late (or so I thought at the time) to properly prepare for such a journey. So in the fall I started thinking seriously about 2008. The first person I called was my friend Jason, we'd been up in Mass earlier in the year ATV'ing and got on the subject of road trips, buying clean aircooled beetles in California and driving them back. So I figured he'd be up for the challenge, plus I needed at least one person with more than my limited mechanical knowledge.
It started with an astrovan (we fell in love with the cluster). I had been scouring craigslist and eBay daily looking for the vehicle of choice. I found a astrovan on ebay in ct and currently registered and through emissions. It didn't sell and I contacted the seller askin for a $250, he said he'll list it again with no reserve, things were looking good until the final hours, it sold for $255. I kept looking and came across a Taurus in NY with some front end damage, not all that bad. Low miles and ran and drove great, but the "clean" title had the box checked on the back that it was in a accident, thus possibly requiring more loopholes to get it registered. I paid $129.50 for it and it got picked up by a recycler for $175!
It ended with an astrovan. Randomly looking through the vwvortex classified I found a astrovan in NJ and ended up buying it for $200, it had been a delivery van for the Jersey Journal Newspaper. It was perfect. After vain attempts of my usual AAA trickery I ended up having to get temp plates and drive it home, all 95 miles with no knowledge of anything about it, other than it stalls at traffic lights and it has a dead battery. After a free toll on the GSP (they don't accept $100 bills) we made it home. Due to some scheduling problems I don't feel like typing out now, we never got it fully registered and I head to the DMV today to hopefully get another set of temp plates for 10 days to cover the rally.
So thats it for now.
dan0 on 05.20.08 @ 08:51 AM CST [link] [No Comments]
music: weezer
mood: happy
So my Monday is going well so far, I should be picking up my fridge later today. Bought some supplies for home and the rally. Just need to finish this log software install, find a superman costume, and register the tomato van. Can't wait for BABE '08!!!
dan0 on 05.19.08 @ 11:58 AM CST [link] [No Comments]
