Hello,
Welcome to the Great Broken Van Adventure. I hope you enjoy your stay!

During a beautiful Thursday afternoon I went for a drive with my youngest child in our farm truck to get some gas and make some copies for someone that was to visit later that afternoon. I had only traveled 7 miles when I noticed that the oil light was lit and white smoke or steam was billowing out from under my old 65 Ford truck. I limped the truck to the nearest parking lot and went in to the grocery store that sat before me to purchase some coolant, oil and a soda for my 8 year old daughter. I lifted the hood and waited patiently for the engine to cool enough to open the radiator and apply the coolant and add a quart of oil.

Again, I set on down the road, stopped at the local library to obtain my copies and headed for the gas station only a couple miles away. As I pulled into the gas station, white clouds surrounded my truck and the sound of boiling water and hissing steam filled the air. A gentleman from next door at the car repair shop ventured over and said it looked like I had a bad thermostat or worse yet, possibly a blown head gasket! With this encouraging news I put $10 of gas in my poor old truck, added some more coolant and headed for home.

That evening, my husband, Satch, was late arriving home from work. Finally, at 6:00 I received a phone call from him explaining that he was stranded at work (25 miles away) and did not know how he would get home, the starter or solenoid had gone out on the van. As I looked out at the broken truck in the front drive and the broken down '87 Honda Accord that has thrown a rod, I wondered what we would do? We really couldn't afford to do much, so the first thing I did was asked God to intervene! I began to explain to Satch what had happened to the truck and we both agreed he would need to find a way home from work.

Later that evening, I was talking with our pastor to tell him that we couldn't make it over to help and told him of our dilemma. He suggested removing the thermostat from the truck and see if it would work ok. Upon Satch's arrival I promptly told him of the idea and he removed the thermostat. I drove the truck about 7 miles and back without overheating.

The next day, Satch took the last of the gas money and drove the farm truck to work and to picked up a thermostat and solenoid to begin repairing the vehicles.

I again prayed and said, "God, you know we need to have the funds for this, I'll be waiting for it from somewhere."

Several hours passed and I heard someone drive up in the driveway. It was one of my families that I support through our homeschool organization. She drove all the way out to our house to give me $75 cash! This was to pay for the next 3 months of consultation services and school coverage. Money that I was waiting for from God.

At lunch Satch called me and said that he had spent $61 on the parts. After discussing the situation at hand, we decided to tow the van later that night with the truck to bring it home and fix it.

Later that night when he got home, we prepared to leave. We took the youngest child with us and set out for the big city! On the way (about 3 miles from home) we saw a deer crossing the road, and then the second, but couldn't stop in time to prevent hitting her. We were crushed! The front of the truck hit her and she fell and went under the front, just missing the tires and then falling down the bank of the road. We turned around to see if she was laying there suffering, in an effort to alleviate it if necessary, and found that she was gone! As a quiet prayer went up, "Thank you, Lord," we both sighed with relief and began our journey again.

About 6 miles from our destination the truck began to sputter and give out. I wondered what it would be this time. There we sat on top of an overpass in an old beat up pickup truck on the side of the road, out of gas! Satch got out, popped the hood and white steam slowly climbed up over the raised hood into view. So he poured in some coolant and water that I had put in the back the day before and headed down the embankment with the empty jug to get some gas. A few minutes later he came back with a full jug and poured it into the gas tank and we headed off the highway to find the nearest gas station. He put $2 of gas into the tank and we got back on the highway on our journey.

When we arrived on the military post we stopped and bought gas and some dinner at the local fast food place and headed for the van. After hooking the van up to the back of the truck with a couple of towing straps we were off. Satch was driving the truck and I was in the van.

Now I have to tell you this, the truck has no brake lights, speedometer, or gas gauge (as you have probably figured out by now), the van has no power to the power steering or power brades (for those of you who don't know that makes it VERY HARD to turn and brake), and the straps are keeping us together at about 7 feet! After sharing my concerns about not knowing when he is braking, he said that I would be the one that stops him and slows him down and he would give me a hand signal to slow down when I needed to. And off we went!

I was leaning up over the steering wheel, my stature wouldn't allow me to see the straps holding us together from a naturally seated position, and trying to watch for slack in the straps and Satch's hand signals, as well as watching the road ahead of him for signs of upcoming situations. We cruised down the road at a whopping 25 mph for some time, which was a comfortable speed in our situation. As we neared an intersection a small car decided to jump out in front of us and Satch's hand went out the window, but I couldn't see it! I did see the car, however, and the slack in the straps, so I slammed on my brakes (very funny, nothing happened and my foot felt like I was pushing the truck itself expecting it to move!) I pushed harder and finally felt the van slowing as I watched the trucks bumper approaching rapidly! We stopped at a gas station and he asked me what was wrong. I told him I couldn't see his hand and we decided that he would hold his hand up in the cab window for me to see when he was going to slow or stop.

Again, we hit the road and traveled another few miles. I noticed that we were traveling at almost 50 mph and I was getting extremely nervous! I tried to slow down the truck by applying pressure to the brakes and realized I was only wearing down the brakes. After a nerve wracking several more miles we stopped in a church parking lot. The truck was clouded in steam as it came to a halt. There was a fire station next door to the church and I wandered over with the jug we used earlier to get some water, complained about the speed, and called the kids to make sure they were doing ok and we started again.

About 8 miles from home we stopped at a gas station and refilled the radiator and let it cool. A truck stopped and a helpful man asked if everything was ok. We explained our situation and he wished us luck as he pulled off. I went inside to buy another jug of coolant and answered all the questions that were asked of me while I paid. They originally thought that I was pushing the truck until they saw the straps! That would make sense, since the truck was the vehicle with steam boiling up from underneath! After a brief stop, we headed home and pulled into the drive with pillows of white puffing into the air!

This morning Satch began to replace the solenoid in the van. It now works fine and we are most blessed that it wasn't the starter! After inspecting the truck, he found that a belt was broken and sent our son in to show me. "Here is why the truck was overheating." he said matter of fact-ly and held up the broken belt. So off they went in the van to find another belt and in the mail came two checks from DHR for children we have kept in our home this last summer, almost $200! God is good! :)

I hope you enjoyed this little adventure and please share it with others if you would like!

Written by Christie Berry, Oct. 21, 2000