My Archives: August 2004
Thursday, August 26, 2004
Be careful where you dump, or you could make the national news as well as be the butt of the late night comics' jokes! The driver of one of the buses for the Dave Matthews Band allegedly dumped his holding tank through the grates in a bridge directly onto a tourist boat in the river below a couple of weeks ago in Chicago. Although he has denied it, apparently video security cameras at some local businesses helped pinpoint the source, as well as one witness catching his license number. According to an article this week in the Chicago Tribune (click here), the holding tank could be emptied by a toggle switch behind the driver's seat. If that's true, I can see how it could have happened accidentally if the switch somehow got bumped. That can't happen on the coaches I drive -- you have to manually open a valve outside the rear of the coach to dump the holding tank -- impossible to do when you're driving. The driver faces a $70,000 fine for the incident which sent at least five persons to the hospital to get checked out, and ruined the clothing of several more. Jimmy Kimmel did a video "re-enactment" on his late night show on ABC last night; it was pretty funny -- unless you're a motorcoach driver.
Posted by Bob @ 11:57 AM EST [Link]
Sunday, August 22, 2004
It's been awhile since I updated my blog, so I'll try to do a little catching up. Yesterday was an easy but mostly boring day, not too unusual for a Saturday -- I drove for a wedding, taking guests from a hotel in Malvern, PA, to the beautifully restored Columbia Station (former railroad station) in Phoenixville, PA for the reception. Parking in the lot at Columbia Station was pretty tight, but I only had a 40-foot coach and could turn around okay; a 45-foot coach would have been much more of a challenge.
Friday night was the first Eagles home game of the season! Hard to believe it's already football season. Parking at the games is still a problem, as the new parking area where the Vet used to be is behind schedule and still not done. But it worked out okay, and I talked with parking security and will have a better spot next week and for the rest of the games along a curb near Citizens Bank Park and away from most of the cars. Many fans left the game early, so it was easy getting out of the lot, for a change. Plus the Eagles won, beating the Ravens, so it was a good evening overall.
Posted by Bob @ 11:16 PM EST [Link]
On Thursday I drove for a company tour first to the "River Lady," a paddlewheeler on Tom's River, NJ, where the group did a two-hour dinner cruise. I couldn't park near the dock except to drop off and pick up, so couldn't go along on the cruise, but they reported the food was great. Parking was in a small public lot (free) just across the inlet from the dock. Following the cruise we continued on about an hour south to Atlantic City for a drop off at the Trump Plaza. I parked at the AC Transportation Center, as usual. The NJ DOT was there doing bus inspections, but there were hundreds of buses there on Thursday and I wasn't picked -- just as well, as I had one of our brand new coaches there so they wouldn't have found anything anyway, I'm sure. I did notice, however, that the older buses likely to have problems didn't seem to be getting checked -- they were picking mostly nicer, newer buses -- made me wonder if they weren't really looking for buses that might involve too much paperwork. Maybe, maybe not -- just happened to see them checking some of the nicer coaches.
Posted by Bob @ 11:06 PM EST [Link]
On Wednesday I finally had an opportunity to see Sight & Sound's popular production, "Noah," at their huge, beautiful theater near Lancaster, PA (photo above right). I've been to several shows there, but had never seen this one, probably their most spectacular show to date. I drove for a company tour, stopping first for a family-style dinner at Willow Valley Resort in Lancaster, then on to the theater.
Both locations are very bus friendly, with well organized, dedicated bus parking. Willow Valley has about seven bus parking slots toward the rear of the parking area behind the resort. Sight & Sound can accommodate dozens of buses in their lot -- one of the most well-designed parking areas I've ever seen for buses. They have well-positioned white boxes intended to be exactly by your door no matter what size motorcoach you have, making it very easy to line up your coach with everyone else and making it look as great parked as it is easy to park (although you must back into the spaces, but that's no problem for a pro, right?!). Drivers get free admission to the show, and a significant discount on food purchases at the snack bar. So it's a very nice trip for drivers.
Posted by Bob @ 10:49 PM EST [Link]
Two trips to Toronto in two weeks weren't quite enough ... so I made a third trip to Toronto in three weeks! This time it was "just" an airport run. I was aiming to be at the Toronto International Airport by 6 AM Friday, August 13. The group I was taking was to be picked up two hours away in south-central PA, making the trip too long to do one-way by myself, so I left early Thursday morning with a company van bound for Corning, NY. I got a hotel there by about 2 PM and went to bed to make sure I was well rested for a midnight start. Another driver did the pickup and brought the motorcoach to me at Corning, and arrived exactly at midnight, where I'd had more than the necessary 8 hours off and was raring to go.
So we left Corning at midnight and arrived at the Queenston-Lewiston bridge to cross into Canada at about 3 AM, where we ran into a slight problem. I had 14 international passengers -- none residents of either Canada or US -- which means they needed to have passports stamped and paperwork reviewed (most were staying in Canada a year or more). But the immigration office closes during the night at that bridge, and they turned us away, saying we had to cross at the Rainbow Bridge at Niagara Falls, where the immigration office was open all night. So they gave me a piece of paper that I thought would be a free pass back through US customs so we could get to the Rainbow Bridge -- but US Customs didn't take it that way, and it took us 30 minutes to satisfy them that we hadn't left the country and that everyone was legal. Then off to the Rainbow Bridge, where we apparently woke up a grumpy Canadian Customs officer, who wasn't happy to see us at that hour, but reluctantly processed everyone over the next hour and a half anyway. By 5 AM we were finally able to cross the border, and arrived at the airport about 6:30 AM, just in time for a 7:30 AM flight for one of the passengers (others were later in the day).
I headed back home until I ran out of hours at Bath, NY, where I got a hotel and slept 8 hours, then hit the road again. I ended up with 683 miles in the 24 hour period on Friday, my personal record -- all done legally, of course -- my longest day since I've been driving.
Posted by Bob @ 10:26 PM EST [Link]
For the second week in a row (first week of August), I took a teen group to Canada for a week -- actually a five day trip -- of touring Niagara Falls and Toronto, Ontario, Canada. We covered many of the same places as the teen group last week -- the Falls area plus Skylon Tower, whirlpool jet boat ride, the Playdium in Mississauga, Canada's Wonderland, and a Blue Jays baseball game at the Skydome in Toronto. It had been raining earlier in the day of the Jays game, but just before game time the skies cleared, and they opened the roof of the SkyDome, revealing a beautiful view of the CN Tower next door -- see the photo above left, taken from our seats in the SkyDome.
Bus parking at the SkyDome is the most convenient I've seen at any major league stadium -- it's literally just across the street. The photo above right shows my motorcoach parked in the bus parking area (I was one of the first to arrive that day). Following the game, the yellow trusses are moved and you can drive right out of the parking area -- couldn't be much easier! It's not inexpensive, though -- parking was $40 Canadian ($31 US at the time I was there) -- the most I've paid to park at a game, with the exception of Yankee Stadium in the Bronx, NY, where I paid $40 US.
Posted by Bob @ 09:45 PM EST [Link]
Sunday, August 1, 2004
Wow ... time flies when you're having fun! I've been driving some longer trips, to the detriment of this blog, so it's time to do some updating, if briefly, on where I've been.
Yesterday (Saturday, July 31st) I drove for a company tour to "The Lion King" Broadway musical at the New Amsterdam Theatre on 42nd Street in New York City, NY. It was very warm in the city, but I found my favorite parking space by the Lincoln Center on 62nd street unoccupied, and spent the day in the public library there, working online.
Thursday, July 29, I returned home from a five day trip to Toronto, Ontario, Canada and Niagara Falls. I drove for a summer camp trip with high school age kids. We stayed at the Westin Harbour Castle Hotel on the waterfront in Toronto -- a beautiful hotel. Stops in Toronto included BCE Place, the Hockey Hall of Fame, a Bluejays game at the Skydome (photo above left), Canada's Wonderland, and the Playdium in Mississauga, ON. We concluded the trip with a day in Niagara Falls, including a jet boat ride at Niagara-on-the-Lake, Maid of the Mist, and breakfast in the Skylon Tower (photo of the Canadian Horseshoe Falls, above right, was taken from the Skylon Tower).
And I get to do it all over again this coming week, starting tomorrow, for another teen camp. They'll be visiting many of the same locations, so I'll post more photos next week.
Posted by Bob @ 10:28 PM EST [Link]
Saturday, July 17th marked the beginning of my longest trip since I started driving two years ago, through the deep south from Philadelphia, PA to New Orleans, LA. The group was a family on vacation -- several brothers and sisters, their families and a few friends to fill up the coach -- and eight days through southeastern US. It was a lot of driving, and a lot of packing/unpacking luggage, but it was a great trip.
We headed first to Charlotte, North Carolina, where we spent the first night. After a little shopping at Concord Mills just up the road from the hotel, we headed to Atlanta, Georgia, for the second night. We arrived in time to head on over to Stone Mountain, GA, for the laser and fireworks show held each evening all summer -- a great show if you ever get a chance to see it (and it's free!). On the 19th we did a driving tour of Atlanta (with a less-than-competent walk-on guide, unfortunately), visiting among other sites the Rev. Martin Luther King Historical Site, and King's tomb (photo above left). Late morning we headed for what would be our base hotel the next three days in Biloxi, Mississippi -- the Imperial Palace (photo above right), one of the currently 12 casinos in the Biloxi area.
Tuesday, the 20th, we did a very interesting driving tour of Biloxi with, fortunately, a walk-on guide who was as good as the previous guide was bad. We visited a number of landmarks in the Biloxi area, including the Church of the Redeemer (where Jefferson Davis and family attended church), and St. Michael's Church of the Fisherman (with 4000 sq. ft. of stained glass depicting the sea, and a seashell-shaped roof), plus a drive-by of several of the casinos (all built over the water as required by Biloxi ordinances), and along some of the 26-mile man-made beach, the longest man-made beach in the world. We had lunch at a restaurant on the gulf called McElroys, where I had my first Po' Boy sandwich with fresh fried shrimp -- absolutely delicious! Dinner Tuesday evening was at another of the casinos, the Grand Casino, with a fabulous buffet (I didn't lose any weight on this trip!).
On Wednesday we headed two hours west to New Orleans, Louisianna -- or "Nawlins" as it's pronounced there. The group took a steamboat paddlewheel ride up the Mississippi River (photo above left), followed by a driving tour of
New Orleans with another excellent walk-on guide, and then shopping in the French Quarter. Thursday we headed back toward Atlanta with a stop in Montgomery, Alabama for another short driving tour, starting from Union Station and Visitor Center (photo above right). The adults of the group then went to Victoryland Race Track for greyhound racing while the kids went to a FunZone just outside Montgomery. Friday morning we went to Stone Mountain, Georgia again (photo at right) for a daytime tour with another walk-on guide, this time much better than the first Atlanta guide we had. We headed back to Charlotte that afternoon where we spent the night before heading home to Philadelphia Saturday. Eight days, ten states plus Washington, D.C., and 2,800 miles! Although it was a LOT of driving, I had one of our new 2004 MCI J4500 coaches that I really enjoy driving, and everything went very smoothly, so it was a good week.
Posted by Bob @ 10:02 PM EST [Link]
Tuesday, July 13th, I drove for one of our public tours to Williamsport, PA. We first stopped for lunch at the beautiful Lewisburg Hotel in Lewisburg, PA, just south of Williamsport. The hotel (photo above left) is beautifully restored both inside and out, and the food was excellent -- a very popular stop. Then we did a driving tour of mansions old and new in Williamsport, famous home of Little League Baseball, followed by an hour ride on the Hiawatha Paddlewheeler (photo above right) up the Susquehanna River. It was a perfect day for the ride -- very warm, but cooler on the water, with beautiful scenery along the way. The Hiawatha is diesel powered these days with just a free-wheeling paddlewheel, but nevertheless was a very nice ride. It was one of the most relaxing trips I've done.
Posted by Bob @ 08:54 PM EST [Link]
Friday, July 9th, I did another of our regular public tours to Ocean City, New Jersey, for the day. It was a very warm day, great day to be on the beach if you were so inclined. I spent a little time walking the boardwalk, but it was too hot to do much, and I didn't feel like swimming despite having taken my swim trunks along. Maybe next time. The trip was easy and uneventful.
Saturday, July 10th, was another trip to Yankee Stadium -- this time one of our public tours instead of the private charter that was a less than pleasant experience two weeks before. This time it went much more smoothly. Because I arrived a couple of hours before game time (it was Old Timers Day), parking in the bus lot at River and 165th in The Bronx was still available (although at $40), and I jumped at it after my last experience here. Because I was early I decided to buy a ticket and went to the game (photo above right) -- I even made like a Yankee fan and bought a hat, figuring it will come in handy on future trips to New York (and besides, I like hats and have a growing collection). It was the first Yankees game I attended, and an interesting experience.
Monday, July 12th, I was back in Rhode Island, taking girls to a summer soccer program at the University of Rhode Island in Kingston. Because of the length of the drive, we had five drivers for three coaches, and I spent time driving each of two coaches to ensure everyone stayed legal with their maximum driving times. On Wednesday and Thursday, I drove back by myself, going up Wednesday evening, staying the night, and returning with one group of the girls on Thursday. The biggest challenge was packing the two weeks worth of luggage each girl took for their one week stay -- that and fighting traffic on the return trip each time. Ultimately we ended up heading up to Route 84 to return west across Connecticut rather than endure the bumper-to-bumper traffic across Route 95; that added a few miles but saved a little time and a lot of frustration.
