<VV> Longest Vair trip in a day

[Chris & Bill Strickland]

 > > something about being young, invincible, and stupid. < <

My new (at that time) bride and I had to go to Texas from Oregon the 
summer after we were married (1972) -- I got this old free shell of a 95 
panel that had been robbed of parts for a dune buggy (couldn't afford 
new Corsas or Yenkos, besides, I'm not quite *that* old) -- paid ten 
bucks to get it winched out of the mud field it was buried in. slapped 
some primer on here and there, painted the inside blue, stuffed some 
Toyota buckets in the front, and with a brand newly rebuilt two carb 140 
(zero miles) drove it a 560 mile round trip to leave some stuff at my 
folks house -- we got some weird looks though with the three tone paint 
job with the blue overspray (no exterior masking when we painted the 
inside), so, thinking weird looks were not the thing we really wanted 
when headed cross country, stayed up all night when we got back to put a 
solid color on the outside, and left dead tired the next day with fresh 
paint and a fresh 560 mile engine for Denton, TX, from Portland. With 
Chris and I alternating driving 'cause no one could stay awake very 
long, we got to Pueblo, CO (about 1400 miles) before we just had to 
crash at some KOA and get sleep.  We had been on the road over 24 hours 
at that point, however. Seems like, but things are a bit blurry about 
the rest of that trip, after a few hours sleep we got to Denton (2100 
miles) before we stopped again for any length of time. Chris had classes 
at TWU that started the next day.

We made many miles in that old van over the years -- 500 to a thousand 
miles a day was nothing for us back then, and we did it often enough 
that it was never such a remarkable thing that we took much notice of 
it, more like we'd look for the long way around through someplace new to 
get to where we were going, like when we went from Portland via Hat 
Point, Jordon Valley, and the Steens Mountain summit to get to Klamath 
Falls, but we weren't in a hurry and camped out a few days along the way 
so that doesn't count for longest single day.  Lotta miles on one trip 
without leaving the state though ...

young and invincible, for sure,

Bill (& Chris) Strickland