SO4420 FlyNgrab - Escape from Florida

[Kommercial]

Thanks Malokin

Finally hit route66 in Tulsa! First stop was POPS 66 for any soda pop you could dream up, then spent the day touring the countryside which was great as we hardly saw a soul all day! Was so perfect for bus driving 60mph.

As we snaked down to end up in OKC during rush hour, there wasn't much to see downtown and with Bex up at the wheel, she wishes we woulda skipped that portion as she didn't sign up for leg day lol. Stopped at a cool Iron bridge near Lake Overholser and also snapped a pic at a WW2 B26 Marauder. Hit up Sids burgers on WADE ST. in El Reno for their "world famous onion burgers" which were accompanied by "world's worst fries" in my opinion

Proceeded out and found a rocket and a teepee.
Stopped bleeding oil after installing the missing capnut and tightening the others. The bus has been treating me better the farther I drive it.

Back to the old 66 driving down the old 66, we took the 1930's road in Calumet which was cool followed by 3/4 mile pony bridge over the South Canadian River, but we transitioned into a very very vacant dark tight portion of route66 on the way to Hydro around 10pm. The 6v headlamps couldn't soften the blow of every rut and variable road condition that we were encountering on the backroads of 66, mainly poor cement lump repair, and when I heard one of my Hehr window screens hit the floor, I finally called it and jumped back on the highway to zip over a bit to Clinton, to be near the Route66 museum in the morning.

[Bobs67vwagen]

Nice shot of that B26 bomber. I have read quite a bit on WW2 aviation and that plane was a difficult plane to fly for young aviators. It needed a lot of runway to get off the ground and was a handful with 1 engine out. If interested there is also a WW2 submarine off rte 66. It is the USS Batfish which managed to sink 3 Japanese submarines in a 72 hour period. I have enjoyed following your travels as I drove a 64 bus across country in 1975. Good luck-Bob

[ryans65]

My thoughts exactly, social media has destroyed so much of what I used to enjoy but I miss these types of threads most of all.

And craigslist.

[zuggbug]

[pom2ter]

nice topic like to follow bus trip !

[Kommercial]

Thursday morning the rains came and we hid out next to a gas pump at Love's truck stop waiting for the downpour to subside (after filling up and 2 seperate coffee purchases), until an employee literally walked out and kicked us out "per his boss" haha. Joke's on him, because the rain had just stopped anyway.
Hit the museum and they had a "30's garage display" but I found 60's vw wipers in the display. Obviously very upsetting.

Mutant Aphid stopping by

Super cool museum though, but imagine my suprise when I turned the corner and found a 67 Dormobile! It was 'peaced out' and had everything glued or screwed shut (even the gas door) and needs alot of work, but cool to see it in there nevertheless!

Spent the day beating the route66 pavement, mostly rt66 frontage roads for fun, and opted over to some super old abandoned sections of route66. Very overgrown and had to get out to move a few logs to continue on before I encountered a fallen tree that was still partially rooted and I couldn't move it. Again we rarely saw anyone on the rt66 frontage road from Oklahoma to almost New Mexico, so you can imagine how desolate and quiet it was another 50 overgrown yards away. Very nice, just the Bus and Us.

Found a fully restored 1929 Route66 gas station in McLean Texas.

Later on we chose another pre30's old section of rt66 that actually started to rot away into dirt as we went, but decided not to persue it based on it getting late and it heading the opposite direction of the highway, so we pushed toward Albuquerque. On the way we got blasted by a nasty storm so we stopped just short of Albuquerque and called it a night. Ironically found ourselves sitting at a Love's gas pump again in the rain lol. Averaging 16mpg, 20mpg on the flats

[DrivewaySurfer]

Hey Wade, glad to see you DID escape from Florida. Thanks for all the pics and narrative. Makes me wish I was cruising with y’all. Doc

[Kommercial]

Yes we did eventually escape, but we miss our new friends already.

The morning showed us a nice view in Santa Rosa NM. Checked the valves and #3 was still stable. #2 exhaust had slightly tightened again but noticed the exhaust header had loosened on that side, so tightened all that up.

Back on the route66 side roads through the cities in NM. Took us through a massive lava rock field and we then stopped at El Cafecito for lunch. Always gotta keep an eye on the bus

Black Lava rock mounds everywhere.

Route66 can be easy to lose and hard to find, sometimes where parts of it are closed or have become private property. We did manage to find the Continental Divide

Most gorgeous scenery was at the AZ border, winding through a massive canyon overlooking the running rail.

Found this cool 1923 bridge closed to pedestrians, south of Allentown

But the best part was- we made it to our goal, Seligman Arizona, the final route66 stop on our trip. And a good buddy from Phoenix rolled up in his 63 panel to meet up in Flagstaff and escort us across the finish line. Bus is running great and this morning we will drop down into the valley to home, about 3 hours away. Currently at 101% of people calling it a Van. I added 1% because someone called it a bug lol.

The so44 has the most massive bed of all the westy's I have slept in without a closet in the way, plus the head cushion tilts up at an angle when the bed is pulled out.. So it gets my vote of most comfortable.

Safe in Seligman. Thanks again to all of you that helped along the way!

[mtnbus]

good times !

thanks for the ride along

[DanM]

Well done. Any plans for the bus, or rolling as-is?
_________________
drive it. break it. fix it. repeat.

[Kommercial]

Thanks!
Gonna do rockers/cargos and other rust repair. Lots of cleaning and polish that Bex wants to get her hands on as well. Underside had undercoating, so apart from outer rockers it is still super nice. Have to address rear corner and see what that reveals. One overrider tube had randomly rusted at its base and broke off, can't wrap my mind around that random sniper rust attack.

Will start on rebuilding og SP blown engine in a few months, after we get back from the local Jerome show, along with correct distributor/carb setup.

After 2600+ miles the replacement engine decided to start overheating a mere 10 miles from my house after I had started driving across the surface of the sun, reducing top speed to 50 and oil light at idle. I limped it home ok. Drove it today and it ran fine, will drop current engine and retorque heads and do a compression check to ensure its OK. I want to make sure it has the hoover bit installed also.

Ironically my buddy Jared was not so fortunate and his engine overheated and locked up on the way home from Seligman! He was about 25 mins away from his house so I gave him a ride home and he went back and grabbed it with a towbar.

This Westy came with some badass Eberspacher BN4 literature and parts list that I need to get scanned that Everett doesn't have on the site, as well as some hand written Westy dealer quotes I am trying to decode. I think the owner was looking to trade in a deluxe for a Westy. Also had the well known flipseat brochure and the bag that the seatbelts came in.

Old newspaper ad seeking oldest camper for museum. Looks like he thought he might have the nicest original based on writing the VIN on it and saving the clipping. Interesting import numbers in the article-

The biggest discovery so far- this westy only had **8k miles** as of the year 2000!! It has multiple inspection pink tags from Virginia with documented miles. As you can also see, they only drove it 4000 miles in 8 years. Still has the 66 Virginia plate on the front. Could it be that 20k is the original mileage when pulled from the barn???? It is starting to look that way. Need to dig into the paper trail more. Will be interesting to see if the og engine has never been rebuilt. The first shop thought the thermostat flaps had stuck closed causing it to overheat so we will see if it was low mileage. Also the transmission doesn't look like it has ever been out which the first shop commented on when the og engine came out. The shifting is very solid and precise vs some of my other worn-in transmissions, even stiffer than a rebuilt tranny I have that has 30k on it.

Anyone want to have a try at German translation from the dealer letter or better yet the handwritten English cursive on the velum which is harder to read than the German? Lol

Also this- a breakdown of the so22, so33, so34 price list from the bus's dealer! How cool is this

[ricekooker]

I know there were some speed bumps along the way but what an adventure!

[EverettB]

Thanks for doing this thread, great stuff driving across the country.

The overrider rust is crazy, I've never seen one that bad before.

I like the Everett sign too
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[Malokin Martin]

What a great trip! Thanks for bringing us along

[karl h]

just FYI, the plane is an Invader, not a Maurauder
very nice trip!
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[Bobs67vwagen]

Good eye karl I stand corrected on that. It is an A26 not a B26 as I stated. That was a very versatile plane used from WW2 to Vietnam and later as a firebomber with the forest service.

[Kommercial]

We debated this on the trip actually. Pre Korean war, so A-26. But the interwebs are all over the place claiming B-26, and even some saying A-26 Marauder lol.
Good to see some other aviation buffs in here.

Guess it sounds cooler to say you have a "bomber"

[Bobs67vwagen]

Commercial I have enjoyed following your travels and the photos really bring it to life. I did a cross country in the mid 70s from Long Island to San Diego in my 64 bus. Following your journey reminded me how exciting it was. I started off with a freshly rebuilt 1600 in my bus and luckily had no problems and it pulled the mountains very well. I did the valve adjustments and oil changes just like you along the way. Keep posting we all enjoy it regards Bob