Day 13, Home at Last

Our last two days on the road were uneventful. The La Salle ran with few problems across the flatlands of western Kansas, Oklahoma and Texas. We spent our last night on the road in Guymon, OK at the same hotel we enjoyed on the way out. This made our last day an easy 400 miles to Albuquerque.

We had a great meal at the former Club Cafe in Santa Rosa. This family restaurant has good food at reasonable prices. We stopped at Archie Lewis' junkyard and museum in Moriarty. Archie was friendly and showed us his fine collection of Ford products.

Traffic in Albuquerque was unbearable, I had to drive to Rio Rancho and back starting around 3:30. It seemed to take hours, and the La Salle was jumpy as she started boiling her ethanol in the carburetor. Wendy and I parted, it was a great two week adventure. Nance and I had a great reunion with each other and our pets. It felt good to be home. Our only action item was to visit our injured nephew Glenn in the hospital. He has a long way to go and has more surgery scheduled for tomorrow, but he looked OK considering the severity of his injuries.

La Salle is now resting in her garage with a short list of repair items. She took us 3428 fairly trouble free miles. Gas mileage was OK, it ran around 14 to 15 MPG. This car is hard not to like. Moving across the country at 65 mph in a comfortable 68 year old car seems improbable. But it happened and we are better for the experience.

See you on the road.....

Day 10-11, Valentine, NE, 575 miles

The 2008 AAA Glidden Tour officially ended Friday, September 12. The last day's touring had a moderate agenda, just points of interest in La Crosse and a riverboat brunch cruise up the Mississippi.

Noteworthy was a tour of the Skipperliner boat plant. The name Skipperliner conjures images of a small fiberglass sport boat. Not so, Skipperliners are mostly huge steel boats built for commercial dinner cruises. Their largest boats are 150' long by 40' beam. Dinner cruising is a big growth industry, if you've visited to a port city, you may have seen one of their ships. They also build boxy houseboats for individuals, the smaller ones starting at $200K. All the boats are built mostly by hand, with large steel subassemblies fabricated by subcontractors along the Mississippi. Hulls are barge like, very shallow draft. Most are motored down the Mississippi to destinations around the world, but some are partially dismantled and shipped by truck. Lakes Powell and Meade are common destinations for Skipperliners, boats are trucked there.


Naturally, our riverboat cruise vessel was a Skipperliner. This was a dual paddlewheel variant, it could seat about 100 for dinner. On board was live entertainment by a very skilled banjo/bass team.

The delicious closing banquet was a fitting conclusion for this tour. The organizers did a great job and all tourists enjoyed the entire week. It went very fast. It was sad for it to end. We said goodbye to new and old friends.
Portland, Oregon will host the 2009 Glidden Tour. Hmm, that's just a tad closer to Albuquerque.

I was planning a more southern route home, but it looked like the remnants of Hurricane Ike would cross that path. We decided to return the way we came, heading west to Murdo, South Dakota and down US 83 through Nebraska, Kansas, and Oklahoma. As often happens on the way home, we covered more miles than we expected on the first day. We went 575 miles, thanks partially to staying on I-90 for most of the day. Traffic was light and La Salle seemed to enjoy the interstate. The miles simply rolled by.

Day 8-9, La Crosse, WI

I was going to take Wednesday off to deal with La Salle's wheel bearing. That was until we found that UPS would deliver our package sometime between 9 AM and 7 PM. It made no sense to sit around our dreary hotel waiting for a package. So we called our friends the Houdeks to get a ride with them on Wednesday's tour.


They were in a modern car which was very comfortable, especially after spending so many days in our 68 year old model. But at the first coffee break, I decided to ditch them and ride in an original 1925 Packard Touring car. What a great call. This Packard, their first straight eight model, was both elegant and practical. She cruised easily at 45 mph. The diamond pattern worn leather seats were comfortable. She could not go like our La Salle, and her transmission howled like an old school bus. But she seemed quite at home on these rural winding roads.


A touring car has no windows, but this one had most of its original side curtains installed. It felt like being in a cozy tent in back. The front seat was not quite as comfortable, winds easily defeated its complex, multi piece flat windshield. The owner, Ted Bunnell of West Virginia, drove her beautifully. Someday, it would be great to own a car like this.


The tour brought us to southeastern Iowa, through Amish, Czech, and Norwegian communities. Most interesting was the Czech town of Spillville, named after a river mill in town. Here we had a Czech lunch joyfully served at the Innwood Ballroom. A slippery round wood dance floor looked well worn by many dancing Czech feet. I learned that Spillville hosted Anton Dvorak over the summer of 1893. It left a lasting impression on both Dvorak and Spillville. He wrote some music about the town, including some of the New World Symphony. Memorials to him are everywhere.

We crawled into the hotel around dark, just in time for another banquet. We had German knock wurst and sauerkraut, very tasty. Live entertainment by a local singing group was outstanding.


Wendy and I hitched a ride back to the hotel to find that La Salle's bearings had arrived. We slept better, knowing we had the parts to fix the car. We decided to leave that project to the morning, with better light and rest.

Guess what, it was raining when we got up. No problem, we attacked the bearing problem at 8 AM anyway. The outer bearing was the culprit, it had a damaged inner race. We replaced both inner and outer bearings. This solved the problem. The La Salle front end was smooth and quiet again. I think this bearing must have been failing for years, I don't recall the car ever rolling so quietly.



We were on the road by 9 AM and went off to catch up with the tour. Old cars were gathered by the hundreds at the amazing Habelman Brothers cranberry farm. This 600 acre farm produces a significant fraction of all the whole cranberries sold in the US. We were given a vine by vine tour of the entire process. It was quite a show, they brought all their staff on-line to show us the production and packaging process -- even though the berries harvested were several weeks too early to be sold. This was a large operation, but it is still a family farm. It was started in 1907 by the grandparents of the current brothers.


La Salle headed home. On the way we stopped at a doll (wife) and model train (husband) museum in Wisconsin. Check out http://www.raildoll.org/ I was particularly impressed with the Barbie collection, I'm not kidding. I have never seen so many Barbies.


This was about the end of our day. La Salle's new wheel bearings were great, but she developed a misfire that was mainly annoying. I think the points need to be opened a bit, hopefully that will get her purring. We'll take care of that problem later......

Day 6-7, La Crosse, WI

Monday September 8 was the first driving day. We embarked on a 140 mile journey north of La Crosse along the Mississippi River. We began on the Minnesota (west) side of the river and crossed back about 40 miles north of town. From there we travelled a series of obscure farm roads through severe hills along the eastern side of the Mississippi. We were treated to occasional glimpses of the river through breaks in the trees and hillsides.

This continued for miles until we reached Elmer's Toy Museum. Elmer made his fortune in the auto salvage business, and poured all of it into collecting things. Mostly toys for children and adults. He has a vast automobile collection, including several cars he bought new and never drove. For example, he has a 69 or 70 Corvette with only 5 miles on it. Most of the cars are of the 60's and 70's muscle car variety, all in excellent condition and quite valuable today. This is a fairly secret museum. It is well off of main roads and there is little effort or interest in generating traffic through it.

The toy collection is astonishing, there are thousands of collectible toys from the early 1900's on, many with their original boxes. It would take months to simply list what was there. What we saw occupied several large barns. Elmer pointed out there were many other toys in storage. He must not have had any toys as a child.

We had great coffee, cookies and moved on, still wondering about what we had seen.

After a lunch at a War Memorial Park pavilion in Arcadia, WI, we went on to see the Brush Wildlife Museum. This consisted of stuffed trophy animals placed in a huge diorama. All the animals captured by the Brushs with bow and arrow only. Their catch included big animals like rhino, elephant, and tiger. This reminded me of the Bolack museum in Farmington.

On the way home the La Salle front wheel bearing was getting louder. I tried to locate a replacement locally, but did not have much luck. I decided to have bearings shipped from my usual parts supplier in California via next day air. I learned they would not come until Wednesday.

We started on the tour Wednesday, this time south of La Crosse on the Wisconsin side of the river. A highlight was an antique tool store with very inexpensive tools for sale. I almost bought an original Lufkin micrometer for $32. This a very good price for this. Instead, I got a Brown and Sharpe surface dial gauge tester for just $28. There was a feeding frenzy for the car guys in this store, they must have sold hundreds of items in just a few minutes.

Unfortunately, as we continued toward Pierre du Chien, the wheel bearing started to howl disturbingly. I was afraid if we continued there might be damage to the spindle. This would be very hard to repair. We called for the AAA tow truck. In a half hour, Bob the friendly towperson arrived and quickly returned us to our hotel. We took a nap, did laundry, and let La Salle sit and wait for her part to arrive.

Day 5-6, La Crosse, WI

Glidden tour arrival day is lots of fun. We get to see what cars come in and meet friends from earlier tours. We were delighted to see Pat and Wayne Young, Patti and Mike Werckle, Mert and Dorothy Houdek plus many others. There are about 185 cars here, many I have not seen before.

There was a 1911 Stanley Steamer that we got to ride and then learned to drive it. It's generous owner enjoyed letting others experience the joy of driving a Stanley. It was easy to drive, lots of smooth power with that 500 psi steam. What a huff!

Other cars seen in the parking lot were several Pierce Arrows, Auburns, and a Cord. There was another 1940 La Salle, this one a convertible coupe. A 1940 Chevy Business Coupe very similar to Mom's appeared. This car was driven 2000 miles from Seattle, WA and outdistanced us by about 500 miles. (few cars are driven to this meet, probably less than 5%).

Older brass included an Oakland, Kissel, Peerless, and Cadillac. We enjoyed meeting these cars and their owners on the road the following day.

Dinner put us together with a group from Buffalo. I dazzled them with my interest and knowledge about Buffalo, one of my favorite home towns.

Day 1 on the tour was busy, 140 miles or so through spaghetti roads north of La Crosse. Lots of turns and up and down. A roller coaster, shear fun in a new or old car. We ended at a vast collection of toys, cars, and other things in the rolling Wisconsin hills overlooking the Mississippi. This is Elmer's Auto and Toy Museum. Any toy you can think of is probably here and many more you can't. Ditto for the cars. This is a well hidden attraction, many folks in the area don't even know its there.

We cruised home through more serpentine roads, stopping for a catered lunch at the town of Arcadia Soldier's walk and the Brush Museum. The former is a US war memorial and the latter a collection of trophy taxidermy -- all captured with bow and arrow. This includes elephants, rhinos, bears and other really big game animals.

We collapsed after this one. The La Salle did fine, but she began to howl from her front wheel. Bad wheel bearing, I think. I tried to find one in La Crosse. No luck, so one will be Fedex'd in for Wednesday.

Day 4, Saturday September 6, La Crosse, WI 350 Miles

We are here at last, one day ahead of schedule. Our last day through South Dakota and Minnesota was a topper. We continued on SD 34 all the way to Minnesota. There, we switched to US 14. This rural road took us across southern Minnesota. We stayed on it until just east of Rochester. We switched to I-90 to make the last 30 miles into La Crosse.

On the way, we found a snazzy old car yard, specializing in muscle Mopars and a few Hudsons. The friendly folks here enjoyed checking out the La Salle and showing us their treasures. They had a very rare '61 Plymouth with a cross-ram 383 engine. Lots of rust, but some potential. These Plymouths were the most outrageous designs of the 60's and they were forgotten by even the most fanatic Mopar collectors. Just when they were almost gone, interest was rekindled by a few beautifully restored samples of these cars.


In La Crosse, we found the host hotel and met several friends from tours past. Had a great meal overlooking the Mississippi.


The news from home about nephew Glenn has been better but I am still very concerned. His life is not in immediate danger, but the prognosis for recovery from his severely broken legs remains guarded. Nance says his feet are warm and he is in good spirits. We are all rooting for him at this point, what else can be done? What a bummer.


We will go off the air for a few days. I will try to send some pix from the tour early next week.

Day 3, Friday September 5, Madison, SD, 350 miles

We awoke to a very un-New Mexican morning with steady drizzle and gray skies. The LaSalle's wipers had not worked well when we needed them on the first day. I crawled under the dash to see if anything was dragging against the mechanism. No problem was evident. We motored off anyway. Fortunately the rain and traffic was light enough so we could get by with our intermittant wipers -- about one wipe per minute when coasting downhill. Absolutely no wipes going uphill. What a breakthrough, these vacuum wipers!

We passed out of the rain in about 20 miles. Wendy and I applied some RainX at an attractive rest area, we'll see how it works if we get any more rain.

We entered southern South Dakota on US 83. This area is very beautiful, it reminds me of the Black Hills. Rolling hills with golden grasses, perhaps a bit drought stressed. We saw many streams, ponds and even a herd of 20 or 30 small deer. Traffic here was light but dominated by heavy trucks. There aren't many N-S interstate highways nearby, making US 83 an important commercial artery.

The big hit of the day was the Pioneer Auto Show museum in Murdo, SD. Their logo is a very stretched 20's Dodge coupe. Inside were hundreds of old cars, farm machines, and you name it. We were thrilled with it all, took hundreds of pictures. Don't miss it, especially if you like pre-war cars. Many slightly known obscure makes and models are here. Check out the 1917 Crow-Elkhart, for example. You won't find any high end over-restored garage queens. All the cars are dusty and devoid of flashy accessories. Many had flat tires. Most probably don't run, but they look like they could with a bit of effort.

The diner in the museum had a great lunch. After three hours of museuming, we were back on the road. We headed east on I-90 but got bored with that. We exited to cross through the Crow-Creek reservation on SD 47 and 34. This area is lovely and very lightly populated. We made sure we gassed up at every opportunity. There were almost no hotels. Then suddendly, in the small town of Madison, a nearly new Super 8 appeared. It seemed too good to pass up, we collapsed into the room and ended a very great day in South Dakota.

The LaSalle continues to impress. She coughed a few times today on ethanol and her voltage regulator needs attention now and then. But mostly she provides smooth, quiet and comfortable transportation. We usually drive around 65 MPH, most folks when they pass offer a friendly wave. We hope for continued good luck.

I was disturbed to hear today that our nephew Glenn Hulkenburg of Albuquerque was hit by a car near Santa Fe and was badly injured. We understand the damage is not life threatening but it is still quite serious. Get well soon Glenn, you are in our thoughts and prayers.

Day 2, Thursday, September 4, Thedford NE, 420 miles

We awoke to clear skies and cool temperatures. This was not going to be a vapor lock day.

LaSalle's engine looked good, I made a few adjustments to her balky voltage regulator. Oil and water consumption were minimal. This car has been running beautifully, she is smooth, quiet and reasonably fast.

We proceeded northeast via US 54 to Liberal, KS through the Oklahoma panhandle. This was a working corner of the breadbasket. Scenery was minimal and traffic was surprisingly heavy with cattle, corn, and farm equipment trucks.

North of "you dirty, rotten Liberal" Kansas, we switched to US 83, a route I've never been on. This good quality N-S road bisects Kansas, Nebraska and South Dakota. You like ethanol? Well, there are miles and miles and miles of cornfields to satisfy your need. Just to break the monotony, we did find one or two fields of bright yellow sunflowers smiling at us.

Oakley Kansas brought us: The birthplace of Wild Bill Hikock. There was a very impressive sculpture and cabin marking the spot. How our entertainment has changed.

We still do have some travelling shows, NASCAR and sports teams performing weekly before millions. But nothing like the vaudeville of Wild Bill and Annie Oakley.

North of Oakley heading into Nebraska the terrain developed a few wrinkles and the roadway turned into undulating ribbon. It was fun to drive and the LaSalle took to it well. We were almost to South Dakota when a nice Roadhouse Hotel and restaurant showed up. I thought we could go a bit farther, but it was 60 miles or more to the next town.

How good are the LaSalle's headlights? Not very, so it seemed best to call it a day. So here we are, relaxing after a steak dinner in this comfortable Roadhouse Hotel.

Day 1, Wednesday Sept. 3, 2008, Guymon, OK 400 miles

Welcome to Day 1 of our trip to the 66th AAA Revival Glidden Tour in LaCrosse, WI.

The Glidden Tour is an annual gathering of cars built prior to 1942. It is a week long driving tour that covers four or five hundred miles. Day tours radiate and return to a hub, this year from LaCrosse, Wisconsin. The AAA Revival tours started in 1948. They were a revival of the original AAA Glidden Tours of 1905-1913. These early tours were cross country endurance events, designed by industrialist Charles Glidden to promote the automobile. Today's tours are just for fun, aimed at exercising ourselves and our old cars.

For us, our tour begins with getting to La Crosse. This is a major endeavour for our 1940 La Salle. She will be driven all the way, barring any technical problems. It's about 1400 miles each way.

I am travelling with my friend Wendy Walker. He is a total car nut, specializing in fast collector cars. Like his "71 Dodge Challenger or his '69 Pantera. Nance is staying home this time, taking car of her gardens, animals and houses.

Day 1 started like most antique car trips: a total frenzy of packing, repairing, checking, rechecking and forgetting. Somehow I managed to get the La Salle going and on the road by 10 AM. After picking up Wendy, our day went smoothly. We had a little rain outside of Santa Fe. Looks like the wipers need some work, one wipe per hour was just not adequate. There was a minor problem with the voltage regulator. We have a spare if this persists.

Otherwise, the car ran beautifully and we covered about 400 miles to Guymon, OK. We were tired but delighted with our first day. We found a nice new Super 8. It has high speed internet, is cheap and comfortable.