Another perfect day ay thye show, beautiful weather, 80's, slight breeze. I got there at 9AM (late for me) but with special parking for the "cruise" cars I did not have to worry about a parling spot.
I was interviewed on film and tape from an internet car program, should air in a month or so....www.speedsecrets.info , they walked up to me and asked if I would be willing to do it....cool.

I had most all of the cruise guys sign my metal Americruise license plate, will make a nice garage wall hanger. Tonite I went to the Speedway ice cream social, toured the museum, got Speey Bills photo and autograph and gave him a keychain. About 7PM I went to "10 cent Joes" Folsom Street Speed shop party at his private "museum'. Another free dinner, toured his place saw many Deuce friends there. We were entertained by Elvis singing and performing on stage....fun time.
In the morning I will head north for home...about 500 miles, not bad. Can't believe its almost over.....oh yea almost forgot, I leave Thursday morning for 2 weeks in Des Moines and Columbus, it's not over yet, just a different car! We will be in the Deuce Delivery on this "leg" of the trip.
The "Deuce Cruise across America" continues......................talk to ya soon!

We left Broken Bow t 10 AM headed to Central City NE, toured Valley Speed Shop, what a cool place, an old historical building down town, 2 story brick with an elevator. Upstairs was a full machine shop and a storage area. In the storage was a real full fendered deuce roadster, a 3 window body, an old Hemi on a pallet and another engine and stuff...Wow! On the main floor were several projects under construction, like around 9 or 10. They feed us roast beef sandwiches, pop,chips, beans...more free food!
On to Lincoln.....we arrived at Speedway Warehouse, they had a welcome group with water, pop, cookies...more free food...and a tour of the warehouse. They ship 80,000 items a week, it is 520,000 sq ft, 42 acres, 3 miles of conveyors (almost like a Walgreen Whse). Very interesting.
Lola, my GPS will not hold a charge, so off to Circuit City...they decide it is a defective docking station, not covered by warrenty, only 30 days and I have had her for 6 weeks. Only option is to buy a new docker for $55.00...I was not a happy guy. I asked them to put my defective part into the box and give me the new part, send back as an intial failure (I was in retail for 40 years), they said no, so I buy the new docker, go to the car, plug her into my old cord...no work! I use the new cord and it works, I go back and say I just want to buy a cord, no problem except they are out of cords...I say I want a refund and I will go to Best Buy and buy a cord...OK. I go back to the car to get all of the box and whatever, and then .....wait....I will put my defective piece in the box and keep the new stuff..and get my $55 back.......Bingo! Can't fool an old man all of the time!!
I stopped by Roger Nunn's shop Autografics, on the way to dinner....finally get to cafe at 10PM, but had a few beers and traded stories and lies with the guys, had fun. I met Roger's neighbor, Jerry,he invited me to his house Friday AM to use his lift to check for lose bolts, nice guy. I went there Friday morning, tightened up some bolts, new exhaust rubber cushion on hanger, little stuff. Then off to the show.
Nice show, nice fairgrounds, some vendors, great goodie bag. I got to park in the special area for the "cruisers", had a nice day.
I'm going to Carlos O'Kellys for dinner, Roger gave me a free meal ticket...more free food!!
Back to the show on Saturday, ice cream social at Speedway museum Saturday night, then I got an invition to Folsum Street Speed shop party Saturday night from friend Joe (10cent special)...a fun guy with lots of hotrods. Talk to ya tomorrow Dale

We left Hot Springs at 9 AM to drive 120 miles to Alliance NE, my hometown. We met the local car club at the world famous "Car Henge". The local paper was there for photos, music playing several local rods and customs...we are all celebrities. Next stop was a real Nebraske meal at the local VFW, chicken fried steak, mashed potatoes, corn, salad, and dessert for lunch!!!!
Then it was off to Broken Bow a short 190 miles away. We arrived there about 5 PM. We stopped to change a fuel filter on a 34 Chevy from PA, helped but he still has problems. The locals here all came out, on the town square, had DJ playing music, the local's cars, signs and banners welcoming the "tour". We checked into the motel and went back to the square for the festivities. Rita and I ate at the Arrow Hotel bar and Grille, a great salad and a tall Bud light!! A good day, a little wind burned, red face. Tomorrow its on to Lincoln. See ya........

I'm in Hot Springs, a short trip, about 4 hours to get here, cool about 75 degrees...nice.We were held up in WY with construction, fresh oil and gravel, one way road.....fun. Since noon I have been driving thru the Black Hills, Crazy Horse, Rushmore, Keystone, Hill City, saw the Narrow gauge RR, beat it across several crossings, stopped to take photos of it and the passengers me.
Lots of fun people on this cruise, 3 cars from other cruise, 2 cars from Australia, Brizios new gold R&C mag cover car 55 chevy, left CA with 200 miles on the clock...my kind of car!! Also Brizios blue full fender 32 roadster, I will have photos when I get home. Around 25 or so cars.
Tomorrow its off to my home town for lunch, pick up my sister and onto Broken Bow NE.

Its Monday night, I'm in Casper WY. I took Rodney to the airport this morning to fly home. We spent the night in Denver. I got the roadster pinstriped yesterday, looks really good. Done by "Shartell" from CA.
We drove to Denver to have dinner with the inlaws, found mother in law in the ER room with a very bad bruise on her arm, she was released at 8PM then went to dinner. Mother, father, two brothers in law, was a good time, then onto Denver. Thank goodness for "Lola" thye GPS, I never would have found the hotel!! We got there at 11:30.
Arived in Casper at 4PM, put the dirty clothes in the laundry and went to see friend Rick of Rick's Rod Shop.Tonight I had dinner with niece and her 2 daughters, good time. We all went to the park where the local club had a fried chicken dinner for all of the Americruisers. We just had dessert because we had already had dinner. After the park thing I went back to Rick's to help fix two cars from CA. One is a truck with a leaking rear seal and a bad bearing, I just left there, it was not done yet, I did all I could do, and I am tired.
Drivers meeting in the morning and off to South Dakota. Talk to you all later.

A great day at the show. We saw old friends from New Mexico at breakfast. We parked in the Deuce Day section, walked around then grounds passing out flyers for key chains, got several calls on the cell for them, sold many at the car, set up 2 more vendors for wholesale accounts....good day! 2000 cars, but lots of nice ones.
Made some friends from the cruise, a couple from Hawaii, Jack and Gail, they will be on the Americruise with me and Lincoln, Des Moines, and the Columbus cruise, Louisville and Dearborn, neat!. Back to the show in the morning, we will stay all day, hoping to win a door prize in the afternoon and then off to Denver.

I think last nights blog dissappeared, so here it goes again. We drove over the Monarch Pass, what a beautiful site 11,000 ft high. On the other side we stopped at the Sonic drive in for lunch, neat deal, all full of hot rods. The mgr was very pleased, came out and took photos. We arrived in Pueblo, registered and went to the free BBQ at the lake, lots of cars.
This morning we went to the fairgrounds, nice place. Lots of quality cars. Lots of deuces. We sold several keychains. Made several new friends.
About 3 PM it decided to blow and rain....my covers were at the hotel!! Jerry Dixey let us pull under the Street Rodder tent to stay dry.
Tonight we went to the SoCal grand opening, had free food and looked at more cars. Tomorrow will be back to the fairgrounds for "Deuce Day"

Made it tp Pueblo at 4 PM today, went to registration to pick up the buttons and stuff. We drove over Monarch Pass, 11,000 plus ft high, pretty cool. We drove to Sonic drive in for lunch in Salida, we filled up the drive in with hotrods, the mgr camne out to thank us and take photos.
We drove on to Royal Gorge and then on in to Pueblo. I helped a guy patch his radiator last night, he took the short cut so I have not seen him here yet, I hope he made it. We will go to the show at 8 in the morning, parking at Street Rodder tent, so we dont have to go early.

We made it to Alamosa, CO. We went first to Moriarity, NM to what he calls Lewis Auto Muesem, it is a wrecking yard on gravel, no weeds and a huge building of old cars. Tons of stuff outside, all presixty, lots of model A's, a couple of 34's. Inside model A's. 4 t/birds, model T's, I took several photos.
From there itwas Santa Fe for lunch and onto Alamosa. We drove with 5 others, one 32 tudor had a radiator problem, so we stopped several times. Kept the cap loose and added water, ran cool, so he kept on going. We arived here about 6PM
It ws 93 in Santa Fe, 79 when we got here. Tomorrow we go over the 11,000 ft high mountain.
I hope all ther minnesota friends have fun at the 50's. Talk to you agsin tomorrow night.

Check out this link to the news article.......be sure to click on all 22 photos.........
http://valleynews.com/Burbank/Stories/Reviews/General-Reviews/Story~323940.aspx
We drove 400 miles again today but only in 90 degree temps, yesterdays temp as I said was 112 and it was 400 miles also. We went thru the antique town of Jerome and then thru Sedona in oak creek canyon. The last time I was there was in 77 in the Wild Turkey #1. We drove thru, did not stop more than 10 minutes, we knew we had lots of miles ahead of us. Had to be at the "Mild to Wild" rod shop for dinner at 6PM. We arrived in Albuquerque at 4:45, time for a quick shower, change of clothes and onto the rod shop. Most of our group were about 2 hours late. Rodney and I left there and drove across town to see our old house, pretty neat to see, we drove up as the young lady was pulling out of the drive way, so I told her that we lived there in 1970 and was just looking, not "casing" the joint. She looked releived. From there we headed to "old town" to eat at the 100 + year old "la Placetia". very good food and the margaritas were good too. I am tired tonight...too much fun or sun.......no not really.

We made it to Prescott, AZ. We all met at C W Moss store in Orange this AM @ 7:30 for coffe and bagels, left at 8:30...about 43 of us, all have maps, by the time we got to the edge oa LA there was 5 of us together, the first gas stop was 3, when.... we left the station we were alone.....
thank goodness for the maps "Lola" the GPS girl. Driving across the dessert in the middle of the dsy was HOT...112. We drank our blue gallon jug of ice water empty 5 times. We came across a model A sedan driving along at 20 MPH, helped him get to the rest area to cool off the computer/fuel injection system.
After leaving I10 and driving the 2 lane, I think it was Hope AZ we found several cars at a little station, there was a 32 steel phaeton with a 50 Olds motor, and a lone driver about 75 yrs old, no top, (I could just see me in that car looking like him in a few years) with fuel filter problems, helped him clean the filters and away we all went. The phaeton first then us, then the other 4, 70 MPH for several miles then again would starve for fuel and slow him down to 40, after several times of this, we all pulled over again, this time he found a hole in the gass line and thought the pump was collapsing the line, replaced the line and away we go.
We all (I think) arrived at the hotel and then drove to Bitchin Products for a BBQ beef dinner.
Another great day...heat and all.Our car is running fine.
Forget to tell you about Friday night, 3 of us filled up thre tanks ready for Saturday, parked at the hotel, I put my total cover on, the other two had tops, next morning they each had only a half of tank of gas! I think my cover saved me!
Time to take a shower and go to bed...all starts over in the morning with meeting at 7:30...Sedona AZ is thre first stop.

Well the LA Roadster show is history, what a great show, 1000 roadsters, 500 other rods and customs, sell out swap meet..awesome! We had bbq chicken, beef, slaw, beans, pop, ....cake for "free" dinner last night, no entry fee, dash plaque, pewter mug....what a great show. Sold lots of key chains Saturday and a few more today. Saw Randy Fish, old CT friend now living in CA and his roadster, he is in the magazine business here.
We were interviewed by the local paper for Father and son driving the roadster, photos...might be famous some day!!
Saturday I went directly to the t shirt booth and collectables booth, they always sell out of the neat stuff early.. Cool t shirt, tin 50th anv sign, pewter roadster, coffee mug, hat pin.
In the swap meet I bought a hand painted Big Daddy Roth shift knob...really neat!!
Tonight we are in Orange, we meet up with the Street Rodder Tour in the morning and head for Prescott AZ , tour Bitchin Metal co, free BBQ, more fun.
Happy Fathers Day to all the dads....talk to you tomorrow.

What another great day. We drove to Long Beach to see Hot Wheels designer Larry Woods' private garage. Full of neat stuff, hot wheels, 34 coupe with a Buick v6 in the trunk, a COE truck to pull his camp trailer (Steve would like this one)his 32 Nash. He took us to Jessie James West Coast Choppers, then to Steve Penningtons I thnk was his name, personal home, cool trucks, machine shop, nice place. Next was Foose's shop, lunch and California Street Rods. Then it was time to head to SoCal open house in Pamona. We started with 8 roadsters, all got lost, took wrong turns , luckily I had Lola with me, she guided me right to SoCal. As I drove down the street, I was flagged to pull over, the guy said do you want to park here? Right in the front row, in the middle of the street, first car......Duh!! You bet!!! Later 2 of the roadsters made it there, the rest I never saw until tonight at the hotel. I saw lots of old friends from VT, SD, AZ, CT, SC, CO, Fl,.......cool!
We will leave at 630 AM to go to the fairgrounds, it is only 9 miles away. Will be fun again! Rodney flies in tomorrow at 530PM.

We left Lake Havasu at 6AM to beat the dessert heat. It was 300 miles acros the Majave dessert and did not want to be out there in the afternoon sun. We stopped for gas in Needles, saw the coolest bike, a 3 wheeler powered by a VW rabbit engine, not air cooled, all 3 wheels had pod covers, painted flat army green, with a white star on the rear ones. The fenders were pieced together metal with unground weld seams, sort of a rat rod bike. Behind the seat was a pile of bags about 3 feet high all tied down. A older woman was driving/riding it about 65 or so, she told me she was from the state of Washington, "the kids are gone away, I sold the house and I'm going to Maine" She said you have your childhood there, I have mine!
We had a late breakfast in Barstow.
I drank 2 cups of coffee at the hotel, 2 more, 2 big glasses of water and a large glass of milk at Barstoe breakfast. I must have been about 3 quarts low, because I did not pea untill I had 2 bottles of pop here at the hotel!!
We arrived at the hotel about noon, nice ride, only about 90 in the dessert, much cooler than yesterday, and several hours earlier. There were several totaly black trucks and vans drving thru the dessert, dark glass, big black boxes on the back, they had a periscope type thing on top, must be some sort of narc trucks, weird!
We checked in, washed the cars, I swam, relaxed. Nice to wind down.
Gordy drove to Kugels to get his rear springs replaced and a new rear gear section installed, he is all happy now!
Kenny Larson is here with his roadster too. We have been in the parking lot BSing since dinner.
Tommorow at noon is the SoCal open house. That is always a fun time with hundreds of rods showing up.
Saturday we will be heading for the Fairplex at 6:30 or so, I hope. At least that is my plan. They did not seem to keen on leaving that early. I may go alone.

We left Albq at 7AM, it was sweatshirt weather.....by noon I was in a tank top!! Ate lunch in Flagstaff, I found a Sprint store there and bought a new phone. Now I need all of you to email me or call and leave a message so I can rebuild my phonebook. Email me at thewildturkey46@aol.com or thedeuceguy3@aol.com
. My phone number is the same as before.
It was HOT the last 3 hours of driving, the temp was 108. My negative cable on the battery worked loose and with the intense heat, the battery cooked itself to death. At the last gas stop it would not start at all, not even a click, the battery was red hot!! Ronnie made a call to Ed Ebach in Lake Havasu, he picked up a new battery and brought it to me. It startered right up with the new battery. Gordy caught a rock in the construction zone and broke his mirror. His AC compressor froze up too for some reason. He took his top off the last 3 hours and became a "real roadster pilot" like me.
We went to Ebachs house for a great steak dinner, lots of food, very good. On the way there stopped at a guys house...awesome huge garage, a 406 ford, 3 deuces, a 34, 36, 29, 48 olds woodie, 55 safaria wagon, beautiful tiled floors a party room with full bar. His house supposedly built for 6 million $. He is having Steve Moal build him a new deuce roadster, to be done by Christnas. This town lookes very expensive!! Many many million $ houses.
We leave in the morning at 6AM to beat the dessert heat, only 300 miles to go. Drove 500 today. We started seeing other roadsters in NM this morning, makes it even more exciting. Saw Jerry Dixey from Street Rodder Mag on the road side taking photos, saw Bart from VT that I met in York, cars from IN, makes it real neat to see others on the highway.

Don't forget to send me phone numbers, I have none in my phone book right now.

Talk to you all tomorrow from LA

We left about 7AM, cloudy skies, I watched them all morning, finally after luch it started to rain, after driving for about an hour in on and off rasin, I decided to put the top on. Within 30 minutes the sky was clear blue!! Go figure. I left the top on but it is hot with it on, and very windy, the top kept lifting at the right windshield post, finally I got tired of stopping and resecuring the top and having the guys wait, I took it off and threw it in the seat!
Late this afternoon in Tecumcari NM at the Loves truck stop, some a/hole stole my cell from the front seat!! I got Sprint called with Elvis's help, actually she did it all, and cancelled the signal to my phone, now I am "phoneless" Hopefully we will get to Lake Havasu AZ tommorow early enough to find the Sprint store and get a new one.
We ate dinner in Morarity, 40 miles east of Albuquerque, we got to the hotel at 9PM local time, that's 10 PM our time, 600 miles, lots of wind, lost the phone but still a good day. Oh yea, Gordy had the engine cover blow off of his LS1 engine somewhere, no one saw it go, maybe the same little Sh-t got it that got my phone, he lost it about the same place. He has been running without hood sides only a top.
We drove thru the town of Greenfield,KS, the town that the twister hit...amazing....everything gone, even brick buildings blown apart, huge oak trees with no branches and leaves, National Guard guys all over, FEMA trailers, thinking back on that site makes the phone loss seem really minute!!! I took photos as we drove thru town, just cannot describe the destruction, like a war zone.
We will leave at 7AM for the steak fry in Lake Havasu with car guys, some garage tours if we get there in time, mthe GPS says 450 miles, so another good day of driving. I am tired...bvut this is fun
Talk to you all tomorrow

We left Belle Plaine at 8AM picked up 2 roadsters on a trailer in Mankato, makes 4 on the road and 2 on the trailer. It rained overnight but by the time breakfast is over the sky had cleared. We made it to Salina KS, 530 miles arrived at 7:30, got a hotel went to Chilis for dinner. Tomorrows plan is Albuquerque, 630 miles. Wednesday night is now Lake Havasu AZ for a styeak fry by some local rodders...cool. 530 miles in a topless roadster, a couple of tall beers and a rack of ribs...life doesnt get much better!! Gotta go to bed now, I am tired, leaving at 6:30 for more fun.

Start of the West Coast Trip

I'm in Belle Plaine, MN tonight, I meet the other roadsters tomorrow morning at the cafe across the street. I did not want to drive for 2 hours in the morning to meet them at 7AM so I am staying the night here. The car ran fine, I adjusted the throttle spring so now the throttle pedal is not so hard. The sirus radio works great and the Garmin is a nice addition. Always nice to have a female voice to the right of me telling me where to go!! I am looking forward to a great 3 weeks or so. I would guess we will stay around Omaha Monday, Liberal KS Tuesday, and Albq, NM Wed....... or something like that. Talk to you all tomorrow night.

Left Rockford IL this morning at 7:30, rained for a couple of hours off and on. We stopped in Wisconsin Dells for some photos (drive by shootings) and a snack. We stopped to see Rodney at his work for a few minutes, sat in rush hour traffic for ever, finally got to St Cloud about 6 PM. We stopped to see Michelle, Le, and Cooper, had dinner and now we are home. A great trip, 2600 miles,about 180 gallons of gas. Gas was down to 2.94 in the cities, back to 3.09 here, tops was still 3.49 in IL. The average price per gallon came out to 3.23 gallon. The gas bill came to around 560.00 for the trip Ouch! but the fun was worth every penny of it.
This leg one is over, leg two starts officially at 7AM Monday,altho I am leaving home Sunday PM to stay overnight in Belle Plaine to save leaving here at 3AM!! It looks like about 2100 miles to LA, who knows how many miles to Pueblo and Lincoln and home.
Talk to you all later............................Dale aka the deuce guy/wild turkey

We left this morning at 7:30, nice day until afternoon. It rained off and on all afternoon, a real "gully washer" for about 10 minutes, found some new windshield leaks!!The last few hours was very windy. After stopping a couple of antique stores, we arrived in Rockford, IL at 7:30. A good day, no problems with the car.
Will be home tomorrow afternoon, a day early, at least that is the plan for now. I need a couple of days to repack the suitcase, do a few items on a list and leave Sunday afternoon for the "Topless" part of the trip with the roadster....on to LA!! (I was glad that today was in the delivery during the rain storm)
I just added a side trip in August right after the Nats in Louisville. There is a big Deuce deal in Dearborn, at Ford Headquarters, sounds really neat, drive the test track, visit Greenfield Village, Sunday brunch at Edsel Ford estate and a tour of the Ford Estate Mansion and more. I got rooms tonight at headquarters hotel. This should be cool.

We slept in this morning, did not go to the fairgrounds untill 9 AM. Had to go back to get a T shirt that I decided I could not live with out! We left town about 10:30, spending the night in Zanesville, OH, 316 miles, nice easy day. The car is running very nicely. Really rides and drives nice. Tons of cops in Ohio today, luckily they did not see me when the Garmin said I was going 83...opps! The sky is very dark blue tonight, looks like rain, it sprinkled for a couple of hours today, just enough to have the wipers on. I would guea that Indy will be the stop for tomorrow night. You ought to see the peoples faces when we pass them on the highway, I'm sure they think they are seeing things, this "old raggy" car passing them!!!...funny! Have a good night.

Spent 2 great days at the fairgrounds. Very hot but had a great time. The Wild Turkey was a real "hit". Parked today in the Deuce Day parking. talked to many deuce guys, and sold several key chains and buckles. Showed the delivery to a guy that owns an original deuce delivery, he looked it over real close, could not tell it was not Henry built!! I did not tell him either way.
We will leave in the morning for home will arrive probably Wednesday afternoon, not going to hurry.