You're coming home with me tonight

In a now familiar vein, I found myself able to go get the bus from Vernon the day after I passed my air brakes exam. After 3 weeks off work, on my first day back I mentioned that I'd have to take a day off to get it some time this week. My current employer suggested that Tuesday would be a good day as he'd be away in Calgary so I checked the local Facebook rideshare page and found someone was leaving at 6am for Vancouver and would be happy to take me to Vernon for my suggested donation of 20 bucks gas money. That was 5 bucks cheaper than the useless Greyhound service that went once a day in the middle of the afternoon. Click!

I was in Vernon by 7.45, at the garage where I'd, by chance, met Trevor the first time, and texted him to let him know. He replied saying he'd be there shortly and with instructions to cross the road to Capri Insurance and get the paperwork going - the office where he has his buses registered and insured is on the opposite corner?! and had just opened at 8am?! Click!

We had transfer of registration and issuing of a Temporary Operating Permit wrapped up within 3/4 hour then jumped in Trevor's car for the ride out to the bus. I spent the drive asking Trevor about day to say running of the bus - starting/stopping procedures, pre-trip inspections, where to gas up, etc.

It was a very nice, cool, dry and sunny Spring morning - perfect for a first drive of 40' of behemoth. The bus was pretty much where we left it last time I was there and his mechanic had just finished giving my bus a promised oil change.

We got the necessary masking off of the 'School Bus' signage and the 'STOP' sign covered up then took the beast for a blast down to where we'd driven the time we'd gone for a test drive - a perfect quiet, smooth and windy 60kmh road. It was different but very driveable and I loved the feeling of so much weight, solidity and momentum - it reminded me of the difference between riding an unloaded bicycle and one fully loaded for touring.

I dropped Trevor back at the bus parking site on the way back past, said my goodbyes and thanks and headed back towards the highway. Once on I realised I had no idea how far the 1/4 tank of diesel would take me, where the cheapest fuel was, whether I'd be able to get into the station easily, etc. I figured I was good for a few hundred km's and pulled over just south of Armstrong to find an Esso station - if I was filling this thing up I wanted Aeroplan points! (reward miles for AirCanada supported by Esso)

GasBuddy (a cheap gas finding app) couldn't tell me how much prices were for some reason so I headed to the gas station I'd filled at last time I was down there which had been the cheapest at the time. It was full of customers when I got there and a little tight for a bus so I rolled on. Just north of Enderby I spotted two hitch-hikers thumbing and pulled over. Julian and Martin were in their 20's, from Germany, heading to Banff and stoked to get a ride in a bus! We had a good chat about English/German stuff (and DIDN'T mention the war once!) and invented "bus-king" - which is playing guitar and singing on a bus for a ride.

At Sicamous I had to divert briefly to pick up an old CNR water can and cup that I'd bought on a Facebook classifieds page and we headed down an exceedingly narrow (for Canada and a guy drivign a 40' bus for the first time) dead-end road to the address. Missed the turn and had to carry on a little way to turn around but was gifted a full 'hammer-head' at the end where it terminated at a golf-course! Too tight to drive direct now I parked up and left the guys to hang out while I ran down the 300m to the house where I found fencing contractors just packing up who told me they'd just gone out for a couple of hours. It was 11.45 and I had said I'd be there early afternoon but come on! Back to town we went to Shell (no Esso and Aeroplan but I still get AirMiles!).

A couple of beautiful foreign pump attendants

100 gallons! That's 1000 miles range at 10mpUSg, which is possible but pretty much max you can expect. It's odd to find myself hoping for 10mpg!

Some time later... it could be worse, I'd heard stories of $600 fill-ups. This would be under 500 from empty.
 
Julian noticed that there was oil leaking from the rear. and the back was spattered with oil spots. I wondered if it was just spilled oil from the oil change.

Back on the road we made a brief stop at Craigelacchie National Historic site, because I'd never been and I was hosting tourists. It's the site of the last rail spike driven into the railway across Canada linking east with west. There was no gold spike that I was looking forward to. It was mildly interesting.

 

1/2 hour later I dropped them on the highway at Revy and left them to carry on to Banff where they wanted to get to that evening despite my telling them how nice Revy was and them saying they had plenty of time and didn't want to rush through anywhere! Then I drove home to grab my bike so I could get back from Roberts shop up the hill and headed over that way, thinking I'd take the old bridge to the other side, avoiding having to cross the main highway twice. Got about a bus length on to it before I realised that I wasn't sure how much my bus weighed because I'd just passed a sign saying 'MAX GVR - 5 TONS' (GVR - Gross Vehicle Weight) I back up off the bridge then scoured the bus trying to find the decal or label that stated the weight (completely forgetting that it's on the registration docs).

The bridge. I wasn't parked in the middle of the road - this is a Google Maps screenshot ;)

Decided not to risk it and took the long way round to the long hill that climbs to Robert's shop. Was a little disappointed to find that it couldn't pull more than 40kmh on the steepest bit but I know they don't go fast up hills. Robert was in but busy, and once he was off the phone showed me where he wanted it parked. While he'd been talking I'd chatted to his wife about the oil issue and she said she had a mobile mechanic friend who could come up and look, had called him and he'd be there in 30 mins! Click!

Had a brief chat with Robert about a rear bike rack, seats, running power, etc then Mickey the Mobile Mechanic (I'm not kidding) showed up shortly after, looked it over, declared the sump shot but the rest of the bus sound and solid and a deal at the price I paid. Stoked.

Next job/episode - pulling seats out to see what the floor's like!