Waiting for a Transplant....

As you can see from the previous post, we had a wonderful road trip to Idaho and Utah. We planned our road trip home in between snow fall in Utah and rush hour traffic in California.

All was well until we made it ...

HERE!!!!!!! Fernley, NV

Four hours and 200 miles from home!

Just outside of Fernley, the oil light in my beloved mini van came on. Of course as most of you know my specialties are in the kitchen, not under the hood of my car, so my first thought was call Dave! He told me to pull over and check the oil. Hailey and I checked the oil and it was fine! I had had a tune up and an oil change right before the trip so I knew things were in proper working order. Dave called our mechanic in Santa Rosa and these two advised me to pull into the town of Fernley and try and find someone to look and the car. I found an oil change place and a nice man came and looked at the engine and checked the oil. He came to the same conclusion as Hailey and I had. There was plenty of oil! The van was diagnosed with a faulty light in the dash and we headed on our way to California! Well as you can probably guess, it was not a faulty light in the dash. One exit outside of Sparks, NV the van started losing power and then began to make horrible noises and there on Interstate 80 Exit 22 my mini van's heart stopped! The AAA ambulance was called (thank Heaven for cell phones) and two hours later we arrived at Reno Toyota. The prognoses was grim...things did not look good. Meanwhile, we called our dear friends Shane and Janey who just happened to live in Fernley, NV. Janey's Dad was in Reno so he came and saved us and ALL our stuff. They invited us to spend the night and stay in there wonderful home until Dave could come and get us the next day. For such a traumatic event, we had a blast with the Chapman family. We caught up on each others lives and did a ton of laughing! The next day the diagnoses was in....the van needed a new heart.. A donor was found in Redding, CA. Now all we could do was wait. Dave came and picked us up Friday after work. Of course a visit to In and Out was what everyone needed to cheer us up, and it worked! Finally, almost three weeks later I hitched a ride to Reno with one of my co-workers and picked up my van. She is working great! The used heart we got from Redding has shown no signs of rejection so far. Only time will tell! Now to play the glad game.....1) It was day time when we broke down 2) It was not snowing!!! 3) We were actually near a major city.....we could have been in Battle Mountain, NV 4) We actually have friends in Fernley, NV ! Thanks Shane and Janey.....our lifesavers!

A word to the wise.....DON'T DRIVE YOUR CAR IF THE OIL LIGHT IS ON!!!!!!