Roadtrip Day 6: Mystic Arrival!

We had a short day yesterday, since New York would not let us into the state on a Sunday. To while away the time, we did a little fancywork on the cabin supports for proper handholds. This is Saint Marys Coxcombing. Spencer got the hang of it quicker than I and beat me by a Turks head in the end.

We thought we had found a quiet corner in the truck stop with no room for a truck next to us, but nooooo. Sure enough, an especially loud truck, with much late night protesting from other drivers, parked right next to us and left their engine running all night. The noise from all the engines is the worst thing about living at truck stops. I guess I'll never complain again about people running their gensets in anchorages ...

The day dawned beautiful for the last leg of our epic journey. We have our habits now. I rise before Spencer and get the heater running to warm the chill out of the cabin before he will venture from his sleeping bag. A cup of pressed coffee, granola and yogurt, a quick clean up, and off we go. Slowly. Up and down. I had no idea it was so hilly out here and we struggle to hold speed up some of these climbs. And struggle to keep the speed down on the descents. Just like trucks, we have to stay off the brakes lest they overheat.

Another detour just before heading into New York. Beautiful forests, but nerve wracking to pull a wide heavy load along the narrow, winding roads. Slow too, since we are limited to 10 MPH below the posted speed limit.

Inevitably, Pennsylvania came to an end and New York was a quick, straight shot across with no worries and good conditions. Into Connecticut for the final haul into Mystic. We're bootlegging it now. We had a wide load permit for Connecticut, but it expired Sunday and there was no time (5 days) to get another one. I had my story straight if we got stopped. From what we can tell, cops have no interest in us at all, so we went for it.

Coming into Mystic was like going down a funnel. It just kept getting narrower and narrower. The turns tighter and tighter. Pedestrians - ack! After a clean run of some 2300 miles, we thwacked a stop sign with the tip of the mast on the last turn into the boatyard. No big deal, but rats!

We'll be working on the boat for a couple of days before Spencer heads back to Boulder and I'll be on my own for awhile. This was a crazy adventure. I could not have done it alone. It's full time driving the rig and full time navigating the often complex wide load routing. It was a team job with the boys in the field hauling the load and Cath providing home base support along the way. We did it!