We were an hour off our start time. We were shooting for 9:00 A.M., but figuring out and loading the new luggage carrier took time. Connie had purchased the carrier after realizing that her purchase of a new Rendezvous included changing from her previous bench seat in the middle to bucket seats which eliminated a place in the middle and forced us to drive with the third seat raised, which in turn left us enough room for a cosmetic bag, a bag of shoes and Connie's carry bag of golf clubs in the "trunk" space in the back.
Thus the carrier.
The carrier is black, soft-sided, and says "Weather-Tech " on the outside. The underside of the carrier is like a soft blanket so that it will not scratch the roof of the Rendezvous. Tom and I figured out how to install the carrier after some deliberating, some arguing, and finally some reading of the directions.
Once the bag was attached to the roof, Tom loaded my ONE suitcase that contained THREE people's clothing for a month, Connie's suitcase, his suitcase, and a blowup mattress. He insisted that we put in the suitcase full of DVDs and CDs and my carry bag of books, but we protested this, and the carrier was closed and attached to the luggage rack. There was some discussion of taking a test drive through the neighborhood, taking corners on two tires to make sure the carrier held, but that plan was abandoned.
Connie decided that riding in the middle bucket seat with Madison would be a better arrangement than last year's passenger choice. Tom took that seat. I drove, and Darcy rode in the back on the bench seat along with the cooler, three bags of food, the pillows, and the other odds and ends that we insisted that we needed for a month away.
We left Largo at around 10:00 A.M. The weather was beautiful, sunny, hot, and humid. I had MapQuested directions. The trip to Savannah would take 5 hours and 18 minutes. Tom had consulted the instructions on Rand McNally, and it claimed a journey to Savanna would take 8 hours. Since I was driving, I opted to follow my directions. A small heated discussion occurred, but since I had the wheel, I didn't feel any other opinions really counted.
The driver is also in charge of the radio, and Connie has satellite radio, an added plus. My half of the driving was without incident and really quite calm. Tom read the Sunday paper. Madison and Darcy watched movies on the handheld DVD players Connie purchased, and Connie sat quietly in the back, rubbing her feet, moaning occasionally and crying softly as she was having a painful morning with her neuropathy.
Tom took over the driving after three hours. The weather had changed and was no longer sunny. The sky was overcast and then dark, and it drizzled a tad as we moved north through Florida.
When we reached Jacksonville, we stopped off at a truck stop that housed a gift shop, restrooms, and fast food joints. Outside the truck stop were three tables with umbrellas. We sat at one of the tables and enjoyed a picnic lunch Connie provided. The entire time we ate, the sky grew darker, and bolts of lightning could be seen in the distance. Thunder rumbled, and we calculated the storm about 4 miles off. The wind picked up as we finished, blowing our plates and napkins around the parking lot and stirring up sand from the road. We hurriedly packed up the car and got back on the road.
Right into the storm.
It stormed and stormed. Visibility was hard. People were pulling off to the side of the highway without warning, their taillights flashing. Traffic was slowed.
Tom was a champ. The rain came down in sheets, but we weren't worried. We had the "Weather-Tech" carrier.
The rain stopped when we arrived at our hotel outside of Savannah. We registered, unloaded our bags, and got into our two rooms across the hall and catty-corner from one another. I opened my suitcase and admired my packing job; my clothes on the left, Darcy's in the middle, Madison's clothes on the right. I went to pull out Darcy's pajamas, and as soon as I hit the middle of her stack, I felt water. I dug deeper and found more water. I began to frantically pull out clothes. Wet, wet, wet.
Some items were soaking wet, and I could wring out the water into the sink. I filled 3 trash bags of wet clothes. I went to the other room and broke the news to Connie. Her suitcase was full of wet clothes too.
Tom's suitcase and the blowup mattress: bone dry.
Our hotel on the Gateway to Savannah did not have laundry facilities. Tom took the bags of wet clothes and hiked across the street to another hotel and dumped them into a dryer. He then went to the store and bought trash bags to wrap the bags for our trip to South Carolina.
Just in case.
While he was gone, the heavens opened up and dropped upon us a storm full of gushing rain, wind, and wicked lightning. It was a couple of hours before we saw Tom again. He was stuck in the laundry room of the hotel across the way.
Day one came to a close with a nice dinner at a local seafood joint dressed in dry clothes, thanks to Tom.
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