Day Four: The "Easy" Road

Today started with a rumor. That half of Iowa was washed away. So I hopped on the Hot Rod Magazine website and it was correct. They had new directions to follow to go around the washed out portions.

So we get loaded up and head out. With the weather still looking like it is going to pour at any moment, we make way.

We are travelling on the Cornhusker Hwy. When all of a sudden about a dozen Hot Rod Power Tour members come screaming past us in the opposite direction. And the guys in front of us do a U-Turn and follow them.

So I joined them and we grabbed I-80 East. We had a bunch of us going the safe way. We were cruising on the highway around 80 or so. It was a very boring ride though. I loved travelling through small town America, going on a major highway wasn't my idea of fun.

Nothing really happened for the next few hours, the cars in our caravan were just booking it to Ames.

The Caprice pulled into Ames at 1:30 with overcast skies. All day it looked like it was going to rain. Thankfully is stayed away until after our show.

I spent most of my time walking around seeing all the new cars that came in. I met some members from the Forum Freaks at www.carjunkieforums.com and www.dodgecharger.com. It was really cool to see the cars that they had.

There was also an autocross event there. It was really interesting seeing the whole gaunlet of cars going out there. There were wagons, muscle cars, hot rods, street rods, Atoms.

I made my way into the back corner of the show with some friends and just hung out for most of the last few hours of the show. It was until some friends from the night before came over and began chatting.

We get near the end of the show and they tell us that their starter was dead and that they were going to go work on it. And of course we all decided to help them out.

So with everyone gone. Napa was gone, GM Performance rejected us, so we were in the middle of the parking lot with muscle cars circling the near dead Camaro.

The guys came back with the new starter from Napa and a better jack to get the car up. We had a jack and jackstand keeping the car up as we took the old mini-starter out. But the new one was bigger, so the guys had to pull the header to get the new one in.

It was a real pain in the rear, but they got the new starter in and got the Camaro running. The funniest thing was about 30 people stopped by through the two hours we worked on the car. They were saddened that they had missed the show. Even a lady cop came over and was talking with us and taking pictures.

In the end we all had a good time and made new friends. We left there feeling good and headed to our hotels.

Now there are strong thunderstorms going through and I'm wiped out. So to sleep i go, with another adventure awaiting me tomorrow.

Ryan
HemiPwr70@aol.com

Picture upload problem with storm, will upload in AM































































To view all of the pictures from fixing a Camaro to flooding on some rivers. Check out the link below.
http://www.flickr.com/photos/hemipwr70/sets/72157605564293612/