Dick had selected an interesting route with sharp turns in moderate traffic up and
down fairly good hills.
With Laura behind the wheel and Jerry riding shotgun we
were off through the city. At the first right turn onto a 4 lane road, Jerry had her
pull straight out without turning until the front of the truck was almost parallel
with the center white line. While just creeping, Laura cut very sharply to the right.
The result was that the truck advanced very little swinging abruptly to the right,
but with the trailer well extended into the intersection, as it truck came around the
trailer fell perfectly in place in its proper lane. As Jerry pointed out, “You may
get some terrified looks from the people in cars you are approaching, but it does
get you around tight corners.” As we drove through the back streets of Moscow,
Jerry pointed out several other important aspects of pulling a high trailer. He gave
a simple formula for determining what gear you should be in when going down
steep grades. He also showed Laura how to gauge the height of oncoming
branches. His last piece of advice was a formula developed by the driving school
itself. Jerry called it the 5 by 5 formula and it goes something like this. “When
going down a grade, if you increase your speed 5 mph in 5 seconds, then you’re in
the wrong gear, move to a lower one. At the end of the day we were left to repeat
the street driving course as many times as we felt were necessary and then depart
for our camp site.
The next morning we circled the wagons again and refreshed the use of the
mirrors and finding the location of the trailer wheels. Once familiar, it was off to
Viola, about 10 miles away with an instructor riding shotgun. We practiced
positioning the rig to the right side of the road to minimize vacuum when the
large rigs went speeding by us. We got back in time for lunch. The afternoon
brought the biggest challenge of the course. Backing! and the instructors were
right there slowly and steadily giving advice while they revealed the little tricks of
the trade that make backing one of these behemoths so easy.
By the end of the
day both Laura and I were somewhat accomplished at backing the trailer to a right
angle parking spot from either left or the dreaded right. With this Dick happily
announced that we had passed the course, as our smiling faces were photographed
in front of our rig for Dick’s scrap book.
We pulled out of Moscow right after the last lesson ended, and headed to
Clarkston WA. for a few days, before returning on Friday to get a good parking
place for the actual conference. As we pulled in Friday I met the incomparable
Jerry Stevens who’s powers of persuasion were irresistible, as he talked me into
the position of volunteer parking assistant.
After going to the registration tent and
picking up our packet that contained our blue name badge and our graduation pin
from the driving school, I assisted in parking the beginning of the 238 or so rigs
that were registered. The next morning, we ran off to Spokane for some shopping
but were back in time for me to join the final parking crew on Sunday as the two
lots filled. That evening, we all gathered in the Kibbie Dome, an indoor football
stadium, where we were greeted by the very humorous
Bill (Andy) Anderson,
author and instructor for the coming week. He was great as he introduced the
creator of the “Life on Wheels” program, Gaylord Maxwell. Gaylord, who in turn
is no amateur when it comes to humor, continued by introducing the remaining
instructors and support people. There were a few schedule changes and some
more encouragement and the meeting was called.
Monday morning came early, with the first class at 8:00. We wondered up past
the registration tent where donuts and coffee were available. The class rooms
were a quarter to a half a mile away depending where in the parking lot you ended
up, but the day was warm and beautiful and the crowd talked and moved in unison
and we were there in no time. It was a strange feeling sitting in a college
laboratory seat, looking at the periodic chart on the wall and the gas jets and
rounded water spigot with their pitchouts sitting in the center sink at the end of
the long black lab table. It had been a very long time since I had seen a University
class room, and it brought up so old time memories. Reality quickly returned as
Paul Gamache started the lecture entitled “Battery Basics 101” . With the use of
an overhead projector and handout material,
he followed the deep cell battery
from it infancy to present. Everything was covered from when and how to charge
them to determining how many you might need. The classes were 90 minutes long and there were four sessions a day, with an hour
and a half for lunch. I often met Laura during the 30 minute break between the
morning classes and the afternoon classes. After batteries, I attended the class on
inverters. Those sometimes noisy little boxes, often found with the fuses, that
change AC current to DC current and recharge the batteries.
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