Peter Koning in USA Peter is a long time hot rodder and supporter of Let's Go Cruisin. He's left his business, Hoppers Stoppers in the capable hands of his staff to travel the US for 12 months. Sure makes some interesting reading!

Follow Peter's Trip

Pick up the Chev

This is the biggy, the drive across from LA to Illinois.

Been a few days so time to follow up from where I was last week, that was, on my way to Los Angeles to pickup the 36 Chevy. So a fairly uneventful train ride to Chicago O'Hare airport, there is no bus or taxi transport in country USA so thats why I set up in Joliet because there are trains in this area. (pronounced Juliet over here by most people, took me a while to figure out why no one understood where I was)  Anyway got to LA ok by Continental Airlines, that airport in Chicago is huge, supposedly the biggest in the world.

Checking in with shipping agent they were still waiting for Customs approval and even though I had filled in about 20 pages about personal imports (and EPA stuff which wasn't applicable in any case) I was warned it could take 5-7 days and so off to see the sights like Disneyland, Universal Studios and Peterson Museum, just as well they change the displays and shows here because I've seen these before.

Anyway Friday Morning I finally get approval and the agent has arranged the container to be taken from the Terminal to their unpacking agent which was a small subcontractor about 15 minutes from the port in Long Beach. They said they would have a truck down the port about midday and he would bring it back about 2 or 3 Pm but he didn't get back until 5.00 PM
Opened up container with much trepidation and 36 Chevy is all in 100% perfect order, tied down using the D shackles I had attached and all just as I had expected. Took all of 10 minutes to get her out , shake hands with the guys and pay a small fee, then off into 5.30 Friday PM Los Angeles traffic !!!!!! RHD car on RH side of road and limited visibility with top chop and all. Thank god for Sat Nav.

The plan here was to make a bee line out of LA and head for Las Vegas for the night, supposed to be about a 5 hour drive, but took 2 hours to get to the outskirts LA foot hills, and it seems everyone is going out of town on the Friday night, freeways realy solid, stop start and from the temp gauge on the Chevy I reckon the Thermo fans died already. As long as we move a bit she's manageable but pray I don't get stuck one spot for long. Finally get out of LA but its all uphill from here and we are now driving pretty fast, gotta keep up, so sit on 75 MPH and its all a climb from LA to Vegas 4000 foot drag uphill so temp gauge on 200 degrees the whole way. Finally got to Vegas around 11 PM along with half of LA and yes I can have a room at the Luxor but its gunna be $190 so what can you do, and I'm outta here first thing in the morning.

Big plan was to head up into Utah and across the Rocky Mountains , over to Denver, then across to Illonois the scenic way rather than the old Route 66 way down through Arizona and New Mexico. And now I know what a real Mountain Range is !!!   Into Utah all I seem to do is drive up long hills, like 50 miles at a time of climbing hills like the Pentlands in Baccus Marsh, and in 35 degrees heat, so this is real test for the radiator, sitting on 200 degrees all the time. Then the old girl gives a cough and shuts down, this doesn't look good, I'm miles from anywhere. She starts up again after cooling down for 5 minutes but I only get another few miles and we stop again. A guy pulls up and we decide the fuel pump is playing up and I did bring a spare but it has different electrical connections, but it turns out his son has a garage a few miles away and he has a flatbed tow truck, so 20 minutes later we have it on his hoist and the new pump fitted. But still didn't sound right and then memories of a problem I had with a fuel filter in Bright came back to me.
Yes he says, those plastic filters block up in 5 minutes with Ethanol fuel and that's what I had just bought 100 miles ago. (did so in Bright too) So he had a better metal filter,all fitted and ready to go, but those Yanks don't do anyone favours, cost me $250 for the tow and the garage.

Everything seemed good for another few hours then bugger me, car conked out again on another steep climb, so whats going on here, Chevy has never done this before, we have two problems. Sit a while, let her cool a few minutes, then she starts up again, did this three times before I finally got to Grand Junction for the night. Those mountain ranges are 7000 feet high, pretty hard work as the air is thin so the engine has to work harder and being thinner the air cools less as well. Up to 215 degrees at one stage.
Not happy. And now  I'm having a beer at the Hotel and a trucky tells me I haven't seen the worst yet, Vale Pass is 11000 feet, car playing up big time and I'm heading that way in the morning !!!!!

So didn't sleep that well that night but then something Gary Stott once said came back to me. Back home I had fitted an isolation switch on the fuel pump wire as an anti theft device. And yes I had checked that it was rated for the amps but you can't trust those Chinese, can you. Now I recall the pump was shutting down and starting up when things had cooled down. Maybe the contacts on the switch were getting too hot from the continual power drain. So up early next morning, nice and cool and take the isolation switch out just in case.

And I've been misled, the big climb is coming the other way from Denver, I'm just cruising along following the Colarado River and dont seem to be climbing much at all, beaut scenery and car running cool and nice as ever. Its been a few hundred miles and just gone through Aspen, the most amazing looking town. Its Autumn here and all the leaves are red and yellow, we can see the ski slopes beside the highway and its all beautiful. Bit of a climb for 1/2 and hour but the air is cooler and , hey look, Vale Pass, 10603 feet.
Last bit of a climb to Loveland Pass 11990 feet didn't seem so hard, car running great and its all down hill into Denver, still one mile high at over 5200 feet above sea level. I later met a retired Helicopter pilot and he tells me they can't even fly a chopper this high because the air is too thin !!!!!!

Cruise past Denver, out onto the flat lands east towards Nebraska, now all flat farm lands, wheat and corn for mile after mile, and car running spot on, which is just as well because we are all going 80 MPH, the speed limit is 75 but many do 90. Stop in Kerney Nebraska for the night. Off early this morning and shoot across the rest of Nebraska, through Iowa, hundreds of miles of farm lands,  trying to keep up with the trucks at 80MPH, into Illonois and arrived back at the RV Park about 4.00 PM.
Today I did 1000 KM in 8 hours. Whole trip is 3000 km, and boy do I need a good nights sleep.