Under the Bus

YEP… that’s ME

I was a bus model. You’re picturing a chubby guy that people thought LOOKED like a bus, but you underestimate me. Eagle needed someone to be the “finger model” on their new Model 10 dash, and I work cheap (free, actually)

In 1979 they needed someone to drive a demonstrator to the beach at South Padre Island so a photographer could take pictures for their new brochure.

Since I was new, and could easily be spared for the day, guess who they chose to drive, then position, the coach for the photographer?

After backing it to the waters edge, I watched as the photographer worked. What I SHOULD have watched was Mother Nature working… as the tide slowly rose, creeping towards the drive wheels.

It was the photographer who noticed water encroaching on his photos, and a mad scramble ensued, in an effort to move the bus before the wet sand swallowed it.

The pictures were fine… except that every one showing the stainless bumpers had a reflection of my blue jeans. Since one of them was used in the brochure, that makes me a bus model. Aw heck, I model at least as good as I write.

You’d think I’d have learned from Rapid Roger’s sinking years before. I was riding shotgun while he followed a car pulling a travel trailer down Colorado’s Wilkerson Pass. It was so painfully slow that the Scenicruiser’s brakes began to heat, and Roger decided we had to pass the knucklehead (apparently downshifting was for sissies).

We ALMOST made it, but the car driver panicked when he saw us in his mirror. He weaved a bit, and the Scenic kissed his trailer.

Wow are those things fragile.

Rather than kiss and run, Roger looked for a safe place to stop and get better acquainted. The two-lane’s shoulder looked solid, black just like the asphalt road, so we pulled over (and over). The shoulder wasn’t asphalt… it was dirt that the DOT oiled to hold down dust. The Scenicruiser sank in and listed like the Andrea Doria.

That winter, one night, after dropping a ski group at their lodge, I pulled my coach down a ramp onto what looked like an empty lot. I waddled into the restaurant for a coffee, and the cashier said “You aren’t going to leave that bus there, are you?” It seems I had driven down the beach and parked on a frozen lake.

Sometimes signs are posted, and when in doubt, try asking locals. If parking is in short supply, but an area is wide open, it might be a trap.

A couple of lessons from all this. I’m not too bright AND when you’re driving a coach, it’s a good idea to know what’s under you.

One rarely sees quicksand around here, but some of its’ extended family skulks about. Coaches are heavier and longer than cars, easy prey for lurking hazards.

What looks like a puddle may be a bottomless pit, particularly in areas where flash floods eat roads. Parking on a grass field may be fine… or not, depending on how wet the grass, and what kind of soil is under it.

As Roger discovered, not all shoulders are the same. Concrete and tarmac are good, gravel... maybe, and soft dirt… nah. In his defense, the oiled dirt shoulder that nearly capsized the Scenic looked like asphalt.

It’s not a bad idea, before pulling into a questionable spot, to get out of the coach and walk through it. That’s kinda difficult with puddles… so if you can’t avoid them… wait for another vehicle to come along, and let someone else take the plunge (pun intended). This cowardly, but effective, method also works well on grass and sand.

Buses have long wheelbases, which makes maneuvering in tight areas difficult (so avoid them when possible). The long wheelbase also offers opportunity for other mischief.

One dark morning I was driving a demo up an interstate ramp that was under construction. Those crafty engineers hadn’t counted on bus’s long wheelbases, and a hump was high enough that the bus was high-centered.

For those who are unfamiliar with this phenomenon… your bus becomes a $600,000, 45’ teeter-totter, rocking back and forth on it’s tummy, with neither drive nor steering axles embracing the road.

Sometimes construction sites include sharp turns that a bus simply can’t make. Check those suckers out before you enter them, and, when possible, employ my cowardly method.

The point of all this is that it’s good to know what is under your vehicle… or will be.

In Beverly, MA there’s a boat ramp with a beautiful view of Salem Sound. At night it’s a romantic spot to park with a date. In ye olden days I did just that… at low tide. Being a gentleman, I was paying attention to the young lady when the rising tide tried to eat my car.

Mother Nature hates me.