Driving to San Diego in the midday sun over I-5 had the Jeep close to overheating, even with the windows down and no A/C. Going over the Grapevine, the Jeep's coolant temperature began to creep toward the red, so I cranked on the heat to help cool the engine. This helped, but not enough and I had to pull off the road to let the engine cool off. The Jeep had plenty of power, but the cooling system couldn't keep up.
With the sun setting and the Jeep cooler, I made it up the Grapevine and began my descent into Southern California. The trailer brakes made a huge difference and the 4000lbs trailer didn't push the 3500lbs Jeep around at all. Between the trailer brakes and manual transmission I was easily able to slow safely, even downhill. Unfortunately, Southern California drivers can't merge at freeway speeds, even though they're driving a BMW, which forces the Jeep with the big boat to take evasive maneuvers to avoid them. At night this was even harder and I almost took out a black Mini Cooper that decided to cut me off and then do a brake check. I got to San Diego without any major mechanical issues and it was great to see Sheehan after 5 weeks of being apart.
We spent a few nice days in San Diego; Sheehan showed me the sights, including the BMW Oracle trimaran "Dogzilla." But we had to leave with enough time to make it across the country with break downs and have Sheehan in Naples by August 24th for her wisdom teeth.
Our plans of leaving early on August 17 failed, though this was for the better as our first leg would be across the high deserts of California, Arizona and New Mexico. Even still, I had to drive with the heat on full blast in the 100 degree desert sun to keep the Jeep from overheating. All I can say is this sucked. I was also amazed that there were Border Patrol check points on the freeway. All traffic had to bottle neck through a checkpoint, with each vehicle stopping to answer the Border Patrol officer's questions. My boat in the desert really interested them, but the officers were always polite, even friendly, and I was never searched. We made it to Yuma by sunset for dinner at In-N-Out Burger and an air conditioning overdose at Best Buy.
To keep the Jeep from overheating constantly and me being miserably hot, we decided to keep driving through the night. This worked much better, the Jeep and I were both much cooler, though I still couldn't use the A/C. We made it to Las Cruces, NM, by sunrise, got a motel room and crashed for the day. That night we set off again, taking an alternate over some mountains to avoid the constant Border Patrol check points. As we drove up the mountains, a thunder storm rolled over them, illuminating part of the mountains with flashes of lightning. We cruised down the back of the mountain range, the peaks silhouetted by the passing lightning storm. Sunrise found us in Texas, and while getting gas I found a leak from the rear differential pinion seal. I got more gear oil at the gas station and added some; though not much was gone. Hoping it would remain a slow leak, I decided to check the gear oil level at every gas stop (of which there were many). With the sun coming up, we stopped in Ozona Texas to get a motel room. A friendly local woman gave us directions to a nice and cheap motel when she saw me checking the rear differential oil.
As the sun set, Sheehan and I got on the road. The long straight Texas freeway never seemed to end until we hit morning traffic at dawn in Houston. Not in the mood to fight traffic after driving all night, Sheehan and I tried to sleep in the boat until it got too hot. This had been our original plan to save on motel bills, but the boat became an oven during the day. After our nap we pressed on into Louisiana. The desert morphed into wetlands and we were soon driving in white-out conditions from a rain squall. The rain was a great change from the desert sun, so I cracked another Red Bull as we drove over the rivers and marshes of Louisiana.
Other than the overheating issues in the desert, the Jeep was running great and the trailer was holding together. Near the Mississippi-Alabama border, the trailer tongue jack vibrated its pin out and made a bid for freedom on the highway. It also landed so the left trailer tire would run it over. Sheehan immediately called me and we pulled off the highway. I ran back about half a mile to find the jack in the bushes next to the highway. Amazingly it was still intact and luckily no one else hit it. To be on the safe side I threw the jack in the back of the Jeep. An hour later the left trailer tire blew out in three places at 55 mph. The trailer swerved some and eased the Jeep onto the shoulder. A quick tire change and we were back on the road, but soon decided we'd had enough carnage and got a motel room for the night.
Being able to sleep at night and drive during the day was a welcome change. Since my spare tire was a Load Range D and primary tires Load Range E, I thought it be best that I get a new tire with the correct load range. I bought a lifetime tire warranty with the tires from Discount/America's Tire, too bad there aren't any in Alabama. I found a small shop that could get me a tire in afew hours for $50; with that ordered Sheehan and I got breakfast at IHOP and waited. When the tire arrived, they mounted it and let me back the trailer into the bay so they could install it; of course it was pouring rain outside. We chose to get back on the road despite the rain, with Eckerd and Naples our final goal. This was our last leg, everything just had to hold together.
About 150 miles out of Tampa I felt the Jeep vibrate badly for a second before the rear u-joint came apart and the rear drive shaft banging between the road and floorboards. I put in the clutch and the drive shaft luckily caught itself on the e-brake cable. Coasting to the shoulder, I found myself asking the Jeep why it had to break so close to home. To keep going I would remove the rear drive shaft from the transfer case and then drive in 4 wheel drive with only the front axle getting power. To keep from overloading and destroying the Jeep's transfer case, Sheehan would tow the boat the rest of the way with her Nissan Xterra. The Jeep was now a real handful in front wheel drive because of the locker, whenever it engaged or disengaged the Jeep would try to change lanes. The Xterra was also having a hard time, its rear suspension nearly bottomed out. But we finally made it to Eckerd, I stashed the boat and Jeep in the gravel north parking lot, put some of my stuff in Sheehan's car and we headed to her mom's house in Naples to get some sleep.
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