Date:         Tue, 30 Jul 1996 16:36:41 -0400 (EDT)
Sender:       Vanagon Mailing List <vanagon@vanagon.com>
From:         ERIC ZENO <emz@viper.nauticom.net>
Subject:      Re: Yankee bus invades the South! (Part I long)

  Sorry but I disagree with the fact of OEM rotors on a bug.
  Not in the USA anyway, maybe an unintentional offering but
  almost all had drums brakes. 
  I am in PGH. PA. If your anywhere near by there  are 2 VW 
  shows coming up. 

                 Eric Zeno
                 emz@nauticom.net
                 86 Syncro
                 86 GL
                 72 240Z
               1936 Chrysler

On Tue, 30 Jul 1996, Ron Van Ness wrote:

> Hi folks,
> 
> I'm back from a fun-filled ten day adventure through the South!  Originally
> the plan was to visit a friend in North Carolina and spend a week camping in
> the Carolinas.  In the end, we completed a 3,435 mile round trip from
> Connecticut through the beautiful South and into New Orleans and back again
> in our homey, reliable '71 Westy.
> 
> We left Friday, July 19 after much last minute packing.  That morning we
> installed a rear hatch window seal.  I had removed the old, dry seal and the
> window on Wednesday to remove the rust and rustoleum the sill.  The window
> eventually went back in fine, but no thanks to me.  Lajiri, my fiancee,
> ended up figuring out how to install the window after I stared at it,
> frustrated and puzzled.  It was our first window installation and once she
> figured out it would be a good idea to wrap the string around the seal
> channel a couple times it was a cinch to compress the seal and pull the lip
> over the channel.  Fortunately if one of us gets stuck solving a car problem
> (usually me), the other is there to troubleshoot and straighten things out
> (usually her).  With the van now watertight (heh heh), we finished stuffing
> it with spare parts (including two spare tires which would come in handy
> later) and camping items and pulled out onto the open road.
> 
> The drive to our friend's place in North Carolina (mostly down I-95) took
> close to 14 hours thanks to some traffic in New York.  Amidst the major
> domino-effect car accident in the northbound lanes we saw a highway car fire
> in NY going and coming (both nonVW).  Ahhhhh, lovely New York--bye New York!
> We chose to take the Pallisades Parkway through NJ to avoid the George
> Washington bridge and enjoy the tree scenery along the parkway.  Our arrival
> in Bynum, NC, just outside Chapel Hill, around 5 am was unceremonious: we
> shut the engine down just after dipping into the driveway, and stealthily
> rolled to a stop by our friend's house.  There we slept until our friend
> took Buddy the wonderdog out for a walk at 9am.  Buddy, a playful black lab
> mix, (who didn't hear our bus roll in the driveway hours earlier thanks to
> the din of the house air conditioning) was very much alarmed at the sight of
> our red bus and his frantic barking became our wake-up call.
> 
> We spent the weekend in NC, touring lovely rural Bynum and walking along the
> Haw River.  Bynum is an old mill town and the houses on our friend's street
> have only had running water and electricity since 1978.  One of the
> neighbors told us a story about an elderly woman who rented a house in Bynum
> since the Dark Ages and until she moved recently was payed a whopping rent
> of $36/year.  The most famous Bynumite lives across the street from our
> friend.  Clyde is an artist who is famous for making the world famous
> "Clyde's Critters", which are basically carved out hunks of cedar log and
> miscellaneous added-on plastic bits to form animal-statue-art.  His house
> has paintings of critters on the outer walls and roof, and his yard is
> literally filled with his creations.  Clyde is very genial and welcomes
> tourists to walk through his yard and view his art anytime--a really nice
> guy and a nice, funky neighborhood.
> 
> While we were sorry to end our stay in Bynum, we had a big plan to meet with
> a magistrate on monday morning and get hitched--our real reason for this
> trip--and a nice surprise twist to this story!!  We figured we'll do a big
> ceremony with friends one of these days, but we both liked the idea of
> taking off on a roadtrip vacation and getting married.  So with little pomp
> or circumstance we bought our license, swore our oath, said our goodbyes to
> our friend, and hightailed it to Lousiana.  
> 
> We've always wanted to visit New Orleans, and last year when we spent time
> in the Tennessee area we wanted to visit Lousiana, but ran out of time.  So
> now, on the fly, we made another marathon drive from Chapel Hill, NC to New
> Orleans, stopping every 400 miles or so for gas and taking shifts at the
> wheel.  Our trusty 1600cc engine with 60k miles on the bottom end and 45k on
> the top performed admirably.  At every fillup I checked the dipstick and it
> was hot as finger burning hell, but we pressed on carelessly, confident that
> our little bus would give us this trip as our wedding gift...and it did!
> 
> We passed through Atlanta, GA at 10:30pm--so no olympic-sized traffic
> hassles on I-20--and vowed to see the sights on the way back through Alabama
> and perhaps stop off in Washington, D.C. at a more liesurely pace.  When we
> both tired of driving in shifts we would pull off at a rest area and catch
> some sleep before the next leg of our journey.  A couple VW items that
> complemented the trip well were the VW-Grundig shortwave radio that Michael
> Heron sold me and our newly installed VDO clock.  The shortwave kept us in
> touch with the olympics and other news around the world, so the further we
> drove away from home, the smaller the world felt as we tuned in to radio
> Netherlands, BBC and of course radio Deutschevela (sp).  And there's nothing
> like relying on an original VDO clock in a German car for the time ;-). It
> was at a KOA outside New Orleans that we decided to spend the night with
> showers and a swimming pool, and hit the famous French Quarter the next day.  
> Unbeknownst to us, what lurked at our campsite was a confederate army of
> Lousiana ants that saw their chance to attack some yankee tourists.  While
> that night's sleep went well, in the morning as I began packing our
> makeshift awning I noticed a steady stream of ants climbing one of the
> awning poles, marching across the awning, and disappearing under the front
> door gasket.  When I opened the front passenger door, to my horror, I saw
> the invasion was nearly complete!  The whole underside of the front mat was
> infested with at least 4 regiments of the ant army and they were using the
> cover of the dark red carpet to move reserves up the lines toward the
> cooler.  The carnage that followed is too horrific a story to tell--as I
> mercilessly crushed every soldier in sight.  The remaining holdouts would
> get their revenge on me later, though. Somehow Lajiri went unscathed through
> the whole ordeal.  The ants knew their real enemy and despite further
> extermination efforts I was left with battle scars from the renegade ants
> who attacked me later on our journey back through Alabama.  Those Lousiana
> ants are tough cookies!
> 
> Hope this isn't too long for y'all--I'm having fun remembering and I'm
> really excited about planning your next road trip.  Stay tuned for part deux
> of our trek through the south and the further adventures of our fiery red 71
> westy!