As a number of other riders have mentioned in the past, sometimes half the
adventure of doing a ride is actually getting there.  This ride would be no
different.  But I am a firm believer that everything happens for a reason.
Had we simply hopped in the truck and driven uneventfully from Texas to
Florida and back, we would have missed the opportunity to meet some
wonderful people, such as Scotty and Debbie Hart, and Wayne Sumrall.  But
I'm getting ahead of myself...

Our group of travellers underwent several revisions in the weeks leading up
to our departure.  Our original plan was for me (Dawn Carrie) and my gelding Bear to do
our second 100, friends Lianne from Houston and Kris from College station to
do their first 100s, and my husband Ross to do the 50 on his Paso Fino, and
then crew for the rest of us.  But Kris's mare had been having some issues
with tightness in the rear that we'd just resolved in her last ride, but
then Kris was unable to get away to come to Goethe.  Ross, who runs his own
consulting company, was inundated with work at the last minute, so couldn't
come.  That left Lianne and me.  A mutual friend, Denette, decided to catch
a ride with us as far as Gainsville to visit family for the weekend.

So, at 7 am on Wednesday Dec. 13, three 40-something women and two Arabian
geldings piled into our truck and LQ trailer and pulled out of our driveway
west of Huntsville, TX, headed East.  Look out Florida, there's a whole
lotta estrogen headed your way!  LOL  We took the back roads to Cleveland,
then hit Hwy 105 enroute to Beaumont, where we would pick up I-10 all the
way to Tallahassee.

We fell in behind two 18-wheelers and a car transport truck.  We
periodically got a whiff of something burning or oily-smelling, not unusual
behind these trucks.  All the gauges read ok on the truck.  The truckers
pulled ahead after 4 or 5 miles.  About then, Denette said, "Is it just me,
or is it getting smokey in here?"  Oops, yep, there was a blue haze in the
cab.  I pulled over, and smoke started coming out from under the hood!  We
all three uttered something along the lines of "Holy sh**!!" and burst out
of the truck.  Upon opening the hood, we saw oil all over the top of the
engine and underside of the hood.  Now, I'm a blond, but even I recognized
this as Bad.  A pool of oil began to accumulate below the truck.  However, I
have US Rider, and between us we had three cell phones.  No problem, right?

None of our phones had a signal.  We were in the middle of nowhere.  Well,
actually, we were in the middle of Deep East Texas, which is the same
thing.  We walked up and down the road, Lianne climbed up on top of the
trailer, all to no avail.  It was 9 am.  Not a good start.  A few minutes
later, however, a couple stopped to help, and offered to take me down the
road to where I could make a call.  I took my phone and Lianne's and hopped
in their truck.  About 2 miles down the road, we were in cell phone heaven,
and I was able to call US Rider and explain the situation.  While waiting
for US Rider to call back, I made the acquaintance of Scotty and Debbie
Hart.  Scotty was a team roper, and he and Debbie bred QHs and lived in
nearby Batson.  They were on their way to Beaumont for Christmas shopping.
They were full of questions about endurance riding, as they had never heard
of the sport.  After not hearing back from US Rider for about 20 minutes, I
wondered outloud if they were having trouble finding someone to haul our big
trailer, and decided to call them back.  At that point, Scotty said if so,
he'd pull it into nearby Sour Lake for us, as his truck was set up for a
gooseneck.  He also said that if we got stuck overnight, he'd come get the
horses and keep them at his place till we could get on the road.  Nice
folks.  Sure enough, US Rider said that was the stumbling block, so I took
Scotty up on his offer, and US Rider said that a tow truck should be there
for our pickup in about 45 minutes.

Back at our rig, we unhooked the trailer, pushed my truck ahead, Scotty
hooked up my trailer, and headed into Sour Lake, 10 miles ahead.  Lianne
went with him to be with the horses, leaving me and Denette with the truck,
figuring two would be safer than one.  Good thing!  We had quite a
cross-section of East Texas citizenship stopping by to check on us.  A
single woman, several couples of varying financial levels, a 20-something
self-proclaimed truck driver who stayed and talked for a long time (he made
me uneasy, so I had my knife out and open and held out of sight till he
left), and a variety of other folks.  Then there was Eugene The Pervert.

Eugene was in his late 50s or early 60s.  He popped out of his truck, and
immediately asked us if we wanted to hear a joke - the only clean one he
knew.  My knife was out again.  We heard it whether we wanted to or
not...and then had to listen to a series of progressively more off-color
jokes.  We retreated to the truck.  He'd start to leave, then come back.  He
offered us a place to spend the night, bragging about his ribeye steaks.  We
assured him we'd be fine.  He promised to stop and check on us on his way
back home.  Uh...we could hardly contain our excitement.  After Denette
wrote his phone number down to appease him, he left, right before we
resorted to getting in the truck and locking the doors.

I found that I could get a weak signal on my phone by laying it on the front
passenger seat, and bending double to talk on it.  I was about to call US
Rider as it had been 1 1/2 hrs since I'd last talked to them, when my phone
rang...it was the tow truck driver, saying he couldn't make it (45 minutes
after he was supposed to have arrived).  I called US Rider, and they were
mortified...they called another tow truck, and it was dispatched.  About 20
minutes later, a pickup pulls up with Lianne in it, driven by Wayne Sumrall,
one of the salesmen from the Ford dealer in Sour Lake.  Lianne had gotten
worried about us (it was now nearly 2 pm), and asked Wayne to bring her
out.  Wayne towed my truck a short distance down the road, where we met the
wrecker, loaded the truck up, and at last headed into Sour Lake.

We all kept our fingers crossed that the problem with the truck was
something simple, but it was not to be...the high pressure oil pump had
blown.  At first they thought they'd have to get one from Houston, which
meant the next day, but by some miracle they had one in stock.  It would be
a 3-4 hour repair...it was now 3 pm.  However, at a few minutes past 5, I
heard my truck start up...the service manager had put two technicians to
work on it, and gotten it done in record time.  After they washed all the
oil off the engine and undercarriage of the truck, and test drove it to make
sure all was well, we hooked up the trailer, loaded the horses, and pulled
out at 5:35pm.

While waiting for the repairs, the folks at Calvin Ford were super
nice...they'd had a Christmas party the night before, and told us to help
ourselves to the remaining food.  We sort of made ourselves at home.  Wayne
let us drive a King Ranch Ford truck...wow, that thing was the prettiest
truck I've ever seen...first one I've ever felt I should take my shoes off
before getting in!  LOL  Chocolate and cream colored leather, sun roof,
wow!  Wayne breeds miniature donkeys, and showed us some pictures of babies
on his computer...talk about cute!!!

Later Lianne and Denette went down to the grocery store, while I crashed in
the trailer for a bit.  I was woken by knocking on the escape door of the
trailer, and then by someone asking "Who are you looking for?"  Someone
responded that he was looking for "those two girls who were stuck along the
highway."  Then the other guy said that we were fine and our truck was being
taken care of...the "visitor" said that he just wanted to check up on us and
visit, whereupon the other guy repeated that all was well and we'd be on the
road soon.  I peeked out the window, and guess who the guy was who wanted to
check up on us?  None other than Eugene The Pervert!!!  The car dealership
guy persisted, and moved Eugene along, but not before he left us a note:  "I
was here but you were gone, now you're here and I am gone.  The dirty old
man.  Call me.  Please!   (phone number)"  Hope you weren't sitting by your
phone waiting, Eugene...

Finally - on the road again!  Through Beaumont, onto I-10.  I traded the
driving off to Lianne.  Luckily, both Lianne and Denette could drive sticks,
and were also comfortable driving my dually with the big trailer, so we
could trade the driving off three ways.  Lots of fog on I-10 as we crossed
Louisiana.  Denette took over at some point.  We made it to the Mississippi
border, and stopped at the big Miss. welcome center and rest area at
midnight.  There were signs everywhere saying "no overnight parking," which
we figured was Mississippian for "overnight parking ok" since every 18
wheeler parking spot was full, and we had a hard time finding a place to
park our truck and trailer.  <G>  We walked the horses and let them graze
and drink for about 45 minutes or so, then mixed up some beet pulp slurries
for them, put the pans in their mangers, loaded them back up, and we went to
bed around 1 am.  Got up at 3:45, walked the horses for another half hour or
so, watered them, then hit the road at 4:30 am.  Perky morning person Lianne
drove...Denette and I considered ourselves lucky to have located the truck.
First stop - COFFEE!!!

We quickly zipped across Mississippi and Alabama, and it felt good to cross
those states off our list.  I was driving as we entered Florida, and we
celebrated by whooping and hollering...at last, we'd reached our destination
state!!!  As we zipped along, I saw what I thought was the Florida welcome
station, but then thought I saw "Ag" at the last moment.  I asked Lianne if
that had been an Ag Inspection Station.  She looked back and said it might
have been.  Truman hadn't mentioned one at the border...hmmm...well, I knew
they'd come after us if it had been one.  I kept watching in the mirror.
Nothing.  Nothing.  Then...ahhhh, here they come...flashing lights.  I
pulled over, and the nice man came up.  He admitted that this was a new
station, just built about a year ago.  He examined our paperwork, and gave
me a warning.  We filed it with Eugene The Pervert's note in the glove
compartment.  We promised to make sure to stop at the next one, and he
seemed pleased that I knew exactly where it was, just south of the Suwannee
river on Hwy 19 (thanks to Truman).  We pulled back on on the road and
continued on.

And on, and on, and on.  That #$%@ panhandle went on forever!!!  You Florida
people need to do something about that thing.  Give part of it to Alabama or
Georgia, or something.  Or make it separate state.  It's mentally a huge
drain to finally hit the state and then have to drive for hours and hours
before getting to turn south.  It was interesting, however, to see some
slightly rolling hills in the panhandle...I was expecting it to all be
flat.  Parts of it were actually quite pretty.

We persevered, with periodic stops to let the horses out to pee, graze, and
stretch their legs.  We finally got to Tallahassee and turned south on Hwy
19...we dutifully stopped at the Ag. station right after the pretty Suwanee
river, where the man made copies of our paperwork and my drivers' license.
This is where Denette met her family and headed off to Gainsville.

We were close now...another 45 minutes or so, and we arrived at camp!!!  It
was a gorgeous pasture with a few scattered trees.  We found a great camping
spot, very near the vet check and P&R area.  We were also right along the
road where all loops would come in.  I had heard that most SE rides require
tack be removed for vet checks, rather than making it optional as at most CT
region rides.  So, it would be very convenient to stop by the trailer, drop
tack, and continue right on to the P&R area.  We got the horses set up and
fed, leveled the trailer, ate a quick dinner, and fell into bed.