2019 Toyota Corolla Across Pennsylvania

Our family’s return trip from the Cayman Islands met with some difficulty when we arrived at our connecting flight’s gate to find only a man in an American Airlines uniform shaking his head and saying, “It’s gone.”

I’m still not ready to talk about how it came to that, but the result was that we were in need of transportation for 5 from the Philadelphia to home, somehow. A 20 minute wait at American’s customer service desk got us an offer of mayyybe they could get us on a flight 24 hours later. I was about done with flying at that point anyway so I asked if we could get some help with a rental car, and I was told that if I go on the airline website and explain what happened, mayyybe they would refund the cost of our PHI-PIT leg. So no.

Off to the Hertz desk, which is the world’s longest shuttle ride away. At least our baggage was in airline limbo somewhere so we didn’t have to carry it around. The woman at the rental desk greeted us with a start, as if we were the first customers she’d seen in hours. I explained that I wanted to rent a car from her and return it in Pittsburgh the next day. This kind of thing happens all the time, right? Apparently not, as she summoned her manager who shrugged. At this point I deployed the best weapon in my arsenal: “I’m a Gold Club member.” The manager looked at me like I had spoken another language and summoned a voice on the radio who replied that they do not do “one-way walkups”. There was a silence hanging in the air as I imagined myself stepping outside, making a reservation on my phone, and returning to the desk for my car. But that was unnecessary, as the voice on the radio reconsidered and crackled, “Nah, go ahead and do it.”

Twenty minutes passed while clerk and manager tried in vain to make a paper receipt issue from one of the 6 computer terminals in the office. I kept apologizing, noting that my trip was jinxed and I was sorry to have brought the curse into their office. At the end of the twenty minutes, they either got tired of watching me try to look relaxed, or tired of the kids’ singing, and offered that they would just call the gate guard and have him let me out. I just had to go select a car from Row 2. What I found there was all essentially the same car with different badges attached- a Chevy Cruze, a Toyota Corolla, a Nissan Sentra, and the Kia and Hyundai equivalents. I was holding out for a Ford but none was forthcoming so I fired up the Corolla.

Having just returned from a week of driving in Grand Cayman, I quickly realized that I was navigating the rental lot on the left, which wasn’t going to go over well on the streets of Philly. I made a mental note to switch back to the convention I’ve been practicing for the last 30 years.

All of this must have taken an incredibly long time, because by the time I returned to the office to pick up the family, a miracle had occurred- a paper receipt had printed! Paper in hand, carry-ons in the trunk, we sped away from air-travel hell.

Life was good. The Toyota was excellent, with an eager engine, snappy transmission, and steering and suspension that seemed up to the task of getting us home before sunrise. We were getting close to 40 mpg and the headlights were incredible. I have cars with good headlights, but these, these were special. And they needed to be, since my retinas were being seared by the interior lighting. First it was the central screen, which barely dims at all witht he brightness turned all the way down, Then I remembered a trick I had learned 1500 miles into my 4Runner rental- you can hit DISP->SCREEN OFF and it does just that. But then the instrument cluster just blinds you almost as much. After some groping though, I found the dimmer for that and on nearly the lowest setting I was finally fully ready for a late-night sprint across the Pennsylvania Turnpike.

Then it began to rain. Just a few drops at first, but within minutes it was a full-on deluge, windshield wipers on high. The Corolla handled it well though, and despite plummeting fuel economy and a massive increase in noise, I continued my 80 mph clip. But something was bothering me, and that was our range. We were barely a half hour into the trip and the fuel gauge had already dropped by more than an eighth of a tank. I checked the car’s range estimate and it showed 277 miles, while Google Maps said 290 to home. We weren’t going to make it, not without risking a predawn breakdown.

There were other concerns cropping up, too. The coolant temperature gauge, which like in all modern cars doesn’t ever really move except from Cold to Normal, always indicated just a bit colder than a perfectly vertical needle. This shouldn’t bother me, but the vertical needle is so universal these days that it seemed to me like a mistake.

More troubling was that when the engine was asked to put out some power, which it did admirably, it would tickle my right foot with unwelcome vibrations through the accelerator pedal. Things like that can really sap the joy out of an otherwise fun powertrain, and this did. I would call on the engine when needed, but the romance was gone.

In its place I was hoping to kindle a romance with the radar cruise control. I’d driven a few cars with it in the past and just never really “got” it. I could kind of see where it might be useful to follow a car at a preset distance, but my driving style and the implementation of the cruise control has never meshed well enough that I could consider it a desirable feature. However this night would not be the night for that, either. There were very few cars on the road so I was never really following anyone, and the system had a glaring defect- it would sometimes slam on the brakes as I was approaching a slower car that wasn’t in my lane. In fairness, this was probably a difficult situation: it was raining hard, and as fellow Turnpike travelers will know, the road has a Jersey barrier as the center median about two feet to the left of the passing lane. And because of the rain, some traffic was going slowly, maybe 50 mph or less. So I was closing at 30 mph into a space just a few feet wider than the car which was mostly obscured by road spray. But still, it was horrible when it happened and I couldn’t figure out how to turn the radar part off without taking my eyes off the road.

Up into the mountains, the temperature dropped to 33F, so I slowed my pace considerably. Salt trucks sat roadside every few miles, ready to go to work as soon as the torrent turned into a squall. But it never did. East of Donegal, down the western slope of the Alleghenies, the temperature rose with every mile, up to 50F by the time we crossed the Monongahela on I-70. But now my fuel level was getting critical, less than 20 miles to empty. I found an exit with an all-night GetGo and managed to navigate a roundabout in the American direction. At the pump, I was simultaneously mad that I had had to stop at all, and pleased at how little time and money it took to fill the 10 gallon tank. The same song was still playing on the radio when I finished and restarted the engine, $26 later. The calculation came out to just more than 30 mpg, which was acceptable given the extreme circumstances.

By this time, the rain had stopped, revealing the Corolla’s Achilles Heel, road noise. The car doesn’t seem to have any rear wheel-well liners. And maybe no sound deadening on the interior side, either. The result is that every puddle traversed sends a roar through the cabin, and every rock, pebble, or grain of sand that the rear tires encounter seems to get flung directly at the backsides of the rear-seat passengers. It’s incredibly loud from the front seat, and reportedly deafening in the rear at times. All involved agreed that we could not own this car for this reason alone. It’s that bad.

 

2018 Toyota 4Runner To Vermont

I’ve always thought that Toyotas in rental-car fleets were nothing but legends, made up by people who just didn’t want to admit to driving a Hyundai or a Nissan for a week like the rest of us. But I finally got one, and I have the pics to prove it.

It began with a phone call from the local Hertz office.

“I’m sorry sir, but we aren’t able to get the 3-row SUV you requested.”

This happens pretty much every time with the local place. I don’t know why I even get a choice when I make a reservation. It should just say “automobile” and I would select it and then they could call me like they always do to work something out. This time, the choices weren’t all bad though.

“I can get you a Toyota 4Runner, which is big but only has 2 rows, or a minivan if you need the seating.”

“Is the 4Runner four wheel drive?” It is a ski trip.

“Yes.”

“Cool, I’ll take it.”

I spent the few days before my pick-up appointment imagining how impressive the vaunted 4Runner was going to be. After all, this was the heavy-duty, body-on-frame, off-road capable 4Runner, not a reconfigured Camry with a lift kit. And when the day finally arrived, first impressions mostly confirmed my excitement.

It had huge 265/70 tires on 17 inch wheels, not the silly blacked-out 20s that are all the rage in the preschool parking lot. It sits high, with lots of ground clearance. And the styling, which has been around since 2014, didn’t have any egregious features, which is just about the kindest thing I can say about most modern car designs. It was more plasticky in the front end than I would have liked, and there seemed to be a lot of front overhang, but overall it was pretty honest and unpretentious.

Once the clerk had photographed all of the many cosmetic imperfections this example had suffered, I jumped in, tuned the radio off the pop music station, and drove off.

2018 Nissan Altima to Asheville

 

Rental car trip to Asheville, NC

The Altima is an extremely competent car. So competent, in fact, that I’m not really inclined to write a proper review of it. It simply does almost everything just well enough so that there’s nothing to say about it, good or bad. It just works.

However, it does have a few areas I’d like to note where it particularly shines or stumbles.

The Good:

Fuel economy! Wow. In 1200 miles of driving, the car never failed to deliver stunning fuel economy as indicated by the display (and a cursory check on fill-up roughly confirms those results). At legal highway speeds, it will deliver about 42 mpg. Even at 80+ mph with the A/C on it does about 38 (which is the highway label). And in mixed urban and rural roads around Asheville, NC, it did about 36 mpg. The highway range with the 18 gallon tank is well over 600 miles, so you drive all day without ever needing fuel.

It seems like low roads loads are a key enabler here. It’s actually apparent from the driver’s seat that the car is extremely slippery, and it often becomes moderately annoying, even. There is virtually no noticeable lift-pedal decel at any speed. If you’re cruising at 75 and come up behind a slower car, even if you lift your foot well in advance, you’ll have to tap the brakes to slow down. If you have the cruise set at 75 and encounter a long downhill grade, you’ll find yourself doing nearly 90 at the bottom unless you ride the brakes (and then you have to manually resume cruise control).

The rental of the car cost me $200 for the week. The car used $100 less fuel than either of my BMWs would have. Then I figure I saved $50 in oil, tires, and other wear parts by not driving my own. So that leaves $50 that I have to chalk up to the convenience of not having to think about if the car was going to make it. I think that’s fair for a trip like this.

Space! This car is huge. It doesn’t seem to be constrained by the world-car need for tidy proportions. So Nissan just made it enormous. I can sit behind myself in the back seat… and cross my legs. My three kids rode back there for a short while and immediately proclaimed it more spacious than our long-wheelbase BMW 7-series. It’s big on the outside, too, and has the turning radius of a cruise ship, but this is the Good section so I’ll gloss over that part.

The Bad:

Transmission. I realize that the CVT contributes a lot to the incredible fuel economy, but its driveability is pretty bad. For starters, it’s a CVT. It pushes around the engine in a lumpy porridge of motion, and it has a large tachometer to rub your nose in the mess. But it gets even worse- sometimes the transmission tries to not act like a CVT. It seems like this pseudo-automatic mode is triggered at deep pedal positions, and it is truly dreadful. It chooses from among some set of fixed ratios, and won’t let you have anything in between. So if you mat the accelerator at highway speeds, you don’t get 6500 rpm, you get 5500. You have to be going slower or faster if you want the full 6500. And in a large car with something like 170 hp, it’s sort of important to be able to wring every last drop out of the engine. At first I thought it was no problem, I’ll drop the shifter into “Ds” and that will give me all the power, all the time. But no, there didn’t seem to be a way to disable the simulated shifting.

And it doesn’t even drive like an automatic. The relationship of vehicle speed, pedal position, and wheel torque is just completely crazy, with large holes in which the driver’s desired acceleration rate is simply not available. This kept happening on our way home from North Carolina, when we took the scenic route through the mountains of NC, TN, VA, and WV. The roads would typically be 4-lanes with 60 mph speed limits, but occasional traffic lights. When the light would turn green, I’d give a healthy boot to the pedal in an effort to get back to 60+ mph, often when pointed uphill. After some transients off the line, I’d get maybe 5000 rpm and a reasonable acceleration rate. But the engine speed would climb with vehicle speed toward a raucous 6000 rpm, which was too much for the situation. So I’d back off a touch and the trans would “upshift” to 4000 rpm, which gave too little acceleration. So I’d tip in just a hair and now get 6000+. The first time it happened, Raina asked me if the car was going to make it up the hill. I said that it would but once we got to the top I was going to set it on fire and roll it back down.

Part of the problem with the transmission is that the engine never sounds like it wants to even exist, much less propel the car. I don’t understand all of the technical details about what makes an engine sound willing or not, but I do know that a BMW I-6, for example, sounds like it wants to move the car. The Nissan I-4 sounds like it’s trapped in an exploitative indentured servitude agreement.

Idle. The car shakes at idle. You feel it through the seat, the steering, wheel, the floor under the brake pedal. Nissan- please just shut the thing off at idle. It’s awful.

Satellite radio reception. There is none if you are anywhere near a tree. Like when on the interstate and there are trees 50 feet off the shoulder. On the Blue Ridge Parkway there was more silence than sound. It’s the worst reception of any car I’ve ever driven. Something had to be broken, there is no way it should be like that.

Climate control. In mixed sun and clouds, like most of our trip, when the sun comes out from behind a cloud the system quadruples the fan speed, just in case the passengers wanted to freeze. I ended up just punching the A/C button to disable the compressor when this would happen, then turning it back on once the system had calmed down again a few minutes later.

Road noise. The car is generally quiet, but on certain road surfaces the tires and chassis would interact like I’ve never heard before. I have cars with noisy tires, and the sound always seems to come from the tires themselves. But on certain surfaces, the Altima would radiate tire noise as if from the structure of the car itself, in all directions around me. It was rare- there was just a low moaning on the Blue Ridge Parkway (which is impeccably paved because trucks are forbidden), and a really bizarre hum on I-77 north of Parkersburg that sounded like a high-powered amplifier like a rock band would use, with the input unplugged so you just hear a 60Hz hum. That was an annoying 15 minutes or so.

2017 Hyundai Santa Fe Sport in Florida

My rental car reservation was for a Toyota 4Runner, but I was pretty sure I wasn’t going to get one. I don’t think I’ve ever gotten the car I reserved, only an “equivalent”. So when the silver Hyundai Santa Fe pulled around the building for me, I wasn’t surprised. I was a little bit excited, actually. Surely this thing was going to be terrible, right? And ripping into terrible rental cars is more fun than driving a good one. At least I think so. I think the last good rental car I had was a Euro-market Ford Fiesta in Italy in 2003.

So I hopped into the Hyundai just as the world turned into a life-size snow globe, the flakes falling so heavily that the headlights turned themselves on. I like to handle some tasks myself though, so I moved the switch from Auto to On. OK, grab the steering wheel, shift to Drive, and… aaaah! Why are the wheel and shifter made of plastic?!? Maybe I’m spoiled, but I haven’t seen that in a while. Jeez, this car is going to be terrible!

But then, I began to drive. Within a quarter-mile, I could feel it- the unmistakable aura of a Pretty Good Car. It just felt competent. The body felt stiff. Road imperfections were dealt with and dismissed, utterly without drama. The suspension was just right- firm enough not to be wallowy, but compliant enough for comfort. It was devoid of squeaks and rattles, and the controls all felt natural. I was impressed. Then it started to get too warm in the cabin, so I reached for the climate control knob… and realized that it had manual HVAC controls. It might be a good car, but it was a good car with no options.

When I had gotten it home, I was curious to look up its specs. I went to the Hyundai website and discovered that what I was driving was not a Santa Fe, but a Santa Fe Sport. It’s pretty cynical to call anything in the low-priced, midsize SUV class “Sport”, but Hyundai doubled down by endowing the Sport with an engine that makes 100 horsepower less than the one in the standard Santa Fe. The other main difference is that the Sport only has 2 rows of seats.

Complaints aside, the 190 hp that the 2.4L 4-cylinder makes is adequate for the job. It delivers all of the performance you need, and none that you don’t. As a benefit, it can return some very good fuel economy numbers if driven sympathetically. We rented the car to take us to Florida, and I saw 30+ mpg indicated on the display in several sections of the trip where speeds were in the 40-60 mph range. Some of tis fuel economy can be attributed to a very aggressive transmission shift schedule which allowed significant lugging. At 38 mph, I could induce a 1200 rpm boom like nothing short of a CVT-equipped Nissan. But honestly, the lugging was never excruciating. More interesting than unpleasant, even as my hands and feet got massages from the vibes.

Where this powertrain really showed its warts was in the mountains. We were pretty heavily laden for the long trip, and generally traveling around 80 mph. This resulted in a serene 2000-some engine RPM when going downhill or on nearly level ground. But throw a typical West Virginia interstate grade at it, and the transmission would downshift not once, but twice, and scream up the hill around 5000 rpm. Like the lugging, it wasn’t excruciating or anything, but after about the 37th hill I did begin to wonder what the 390 hp V6 would drive like. The engine got thirsty in this workout, too, showing about 25 mpg. But it’s only rated at 27 mpg on the highway so I can’t complain about 25.

So we drove to Florida, did some theme park stuff, the Hyundai mostly sat in parking lots. Then one day the group were were with didn’t have any plans. They all just wanted to sit by the pool. I don’t really like to just sit by pools, especially when there is interesting stuff to explore. OK, we were in Florida so nothing was particularly interesting, but at least there was stuff to explore. So I bid my 13 fellow travelers adieu and headed for Ocala National Forest, about an hour and a half north of Orlando. [Side note: Florida uses SunPass for tolls, not EZ Pass. I learned that they are incompatible systems after I had driven through several. Will they ever catch up with me? I don’t know.] I “hiked” the St. Francis Trail. I put hike in quotes because when the land is totally flat, it’s more of a walk than a hike. But who says they walked a trail? I don’t know, Florida is weird.

I noticed during my hike that the forest was criss-crossed with forest roads. Nice, packed sand roads just wide enough for, say, a midsize SUV. I got back to the rental a bit ahead of schedule, and decided to go explore some of the forest roads. I picked one that Google maps knew about, though there seemed to be many others that Google had missed. It turned out to be a fun road- just bumpy enough to exercise the suspension, and as I gained confidence, I gained speed too. Soon I was in Rally Mode (me, not the car. It doesn’t have modes besdides Drive and Reverse). This is probably a good time to mention that my particular Santa Fe Sport, being devoid of options, was also devoid of all-wheel-drive. But who needs it, I figured? The road is flat and traction is good, and worse come to worst, I have cell phone service for a tow. Some of that was actually said by a devil on my shoulder as I careened through the palms and pines.

After some dozens of minutes and about 8 miles of sand roads (never having seen another soul), I steered toward the pavement again so I wouldn’t be late for dinner in Orlando. There was a quick way out without having to backtrack, but I did notice that the trails were a little wilder in this part of the park. Ruts appeared in places, some so deep that the car’s belly pan glided across the sand in the center at times. I came to one intersection that looked especially soft. So much so that I got out and scouted it. Yeah, the sand was unusually churned up, I guess because of the traffic in multiple directions,but it didn’t seem much more troublesome than some of the other sections I had been through. So I hopped back in and carefully crawled into the intersection. And slowed to a halt. The front wheels had sunk into the soft top layer of sand and were now just taking turns spinning uselessly. This would have been a good time to get out and do some simple recovery steps, but the sun was hot, I was tired from hiking, and I had more than enough adrenaline flowing from the rally-car vibe to make me feel invincible. So I tried to shake it off. Maybe some reverse? How about wheels turned? No? More throttle!

But it was all in vain. I was stuck. And now I was really stuck. When I finally came to grips with the situation and got out, I found the front subframe sitting on the sand and the tires basically hanging with little weight on them. I did some digging and tried to drive out. Then some stick-jamming. And lots of angry yelling. But the silver SUV only sank deeper. I knew it was time to face defeat. I texted Raina to tell her I wouldn’t make dinner, then called the local towing company.

The man on the phone was nice. He said my kind of thing happens now and then, and he’d personally be out within the hour with the 4WD truck with a winch. No sweat. I relaxed with the problem now out of my hands, and began to realize that I was thirsty. I had long since finished the water that I had brought for the hike. And the bottle I found in the trunk when I had gotten the jack out. But I knew I could count on my kids to leave half-finished water bottles in the back seat. I found some of those and drank whatever they offered, but then I began to wonder about the future. What would I drink next time? The sun was still bright, but much less hot, and unmistakably headed for the horizon. I paced around a bit, straining to hear the engine of my rescuer.

Then he called. He said the trail he tried to come in on was too soft and he was risking getting stuck himself. He was going to try to come in from the north. I shut the engine off, thinking about the future. I pulled up the forest website and studied the map. There were only about 4 ways to get to where I was from a paved road. They all looked the same on the map though.

The tow driver called back, an hour after the last call. This other way was too narrow, he couldn’t fit between the trees. He said these trails were the most extreme he had ever been on. He wanted to know how I had gotten in; he would just retrace my tracks. The entrance to that road was an hour from where he was. I hung up the phone and started digging. Really digging. What I had done before was noting like this. This was digging to save myself. From what, I didn’t know, but probably from at least a night in the forest. There was no way the tow driver was going to get to me.

S and is good stuff to get stuck in. It moves readily without a shovel, and stays where you move it to. I knew that all I had to do was dig in front of the tires enough that they weren’t in a hole anymore, then dig out from under the car so that the tires would have weight on them again. It was a lot of sand to move with just my hands, but I dug fiercely and it went more quickly than I had expected. I ignored the rocks and twigs mixed with the sand and the cuts they made on my hands. I ignored the thirst, and the jeering text messages of my compadres, now eating dinner without me. After an hour with my face in the sand, I felt like I had a good chance. One final detail- airing down the front tires to 10 psi, for some more traction. Then I wiped the blood off my hands and started the engine. If this didn’t work, what would I do? Start walking? Cry? I don’t know. But I never found out, because my efforts paid off and the Hyundai rolled forward as easily as if it were on pavement.

I got well free of the intersection and called the tow driver. He couldn’t get in the way I came in, no surprise there. He was happy that I had gotten out, but I could tell he was thinking he had just worked 2+ hours and was going to get stiffed on the bill. I assured him I’d pay him. He suggested I retrace my route so I was unlikely to get stuck again, which would also meet up with him. That all sounded good to me, I was just happy to be out. It was starting to get dark enough that I needed headlights now, but the elation of freedom meant that I was absolutely bombing the route this time. Upwards of 50 mph at times, with palm fronds smacking both mirrors on the narrow trail. There was a section of whoops, maybe 2 feet high, that had barely been interesting on the way in, but I hit them so hard that the suspension bottomed jarringly and I was sure there had to be body damage. But I didn’t care, I just wanted to go back to the hotel and sleep in a bed free of sand. I stopped at the intersection with the main road where the tow driver was waiting. I paid him and we used his flashlight to inspect for body damage but found none. I crawled to a gas station about 5 miles away and restored the tires to 40 psi and the gas tank to full. I bought a six pack of the best beer they sold, Miller High Life, and aimed the Santa Fe for Orlando. Santa Fe Sport, I should say. I think it earned it today.

Rescuing Matt’s Supra From Jacksonville

The phone rang while it was still dark outside. I ran to answer it, and heard Matt:
“You awake?”
“Yeah.”
“Sure, I’m outside”
I thought he was crazy, but my phone said 6 am, just as we had planned. I should have been ready to go. All I had to do was change clothes, but the hard part was convincing Raina, who had just come home from work 4 hours earlier, to wake up and take us to the airport. Luckily, she was too groggy to really argue. As we were about to leave, Matt asked if I knew which airline we were on, which confirmed my suspicions about his level of planning for the trip.

Raina dropped us at the US Air terminal, and Matt thanked her as we got out. Her reply, “You’re not welcome.” I think she was starting to wake up. We went inside to find a huge line. and most of the E-checkin machines were out of order, so we tried the curbside checkin. The line was still long, but better than inside. However, as we queued up, the agent made an announcement about not being able to check in the 7 am flight to Charlotte. With a curse we joined the hours-long line inside. It was 6:20.

I’ve never missed a flight in my life, and that record owes much to the people who walk through the giant check-in lines, ask what time your flight is, and send you to the front, further screwing everyone who got there at a reasonable time. Just like always, the airline angel swooped in just in time and sent us to the first-class checkin, where there was a solitary E-checkin computer. We used it and bolted for security and our gate. Even had time to pick up an orange juice before boarding.

The first flight was the long one, but I thought I lucked out by scoring an exit row seat with lots of legroom, but I had forgotten that those seats don’t recline, making sleep near impossible. Worst of all was the complete lack of bottom cushion padding, but this was apparently endemic to the whole plane. Our sore asses arrived in Charlotte with plenty of time to catch the connection to JAX, so we checked out the news stand. With a fresh European Car magazine in hand, we moved to the gate and compared tickets. I began explaining to Matt that the boarding Zone is solely based on seat position, with the back rows boarded first, when he pointed out that my ticket was for Zone 4 and his adjacent ticket was for Zone 2. As i sputtered for an explanation, they announced Zone 2 boarding. There went my plan to slip into the window seat and leave Matt with the middle to elbow-joust with a stranger.

Maybe because it was his stupid trip, or maybe he had already realized that the flight was nearly empty, but when zone 4 finally boarded, Matt ushered me into the window seat. As I stowed my backpack, he asked what I had brought. I told him a laptop, a GPS antenna, and a pair of sunglasses. He noted that he had brought the same things and I probably could have gone without a bag, but I had felt like I needed one. Who travels by air with just a wallet and a cell phone? It would’ve looked weird.

As we taxied to the terminal in Jacksonville, we started to plan for all the terrible things that could befall us in the coming hour. I made Matt show me the claim ticket for the parking lot where the Supra had spent the entire spring. It was some sort of photocopy, with the ticket number written in pen. I gulped. He called the number on the back and asked to be picked up at the terminal. He gave the months-old hand-written number, which didn’t seem to cause any consternation on the other end of the line. Maybe this would work out. However, I still had my concerns that the car had long since been dismantled, and they were sending a car to kill us for inquiring about it. I resolved that if the shuttle didn’t look legit, I’d go back inside and book a flight to Detroit.

A white van with cheap magnetic signs identifying it as the Park N Fly shuttle screeched to a halt in front of us, and an older tweed-coat chap posing a businessman jumped in. Matt followed. My split-second assessment was that if they were going to kill us, they would’ve sent a car. With a trunk.

The extended-parking area of Jacksonville consists of a single road lined with lots, the quality of which diminishes with distance from the terminal. We passed the manicured palm trees, and began to see signs extolling, “Paved”. I think I visibly blanched as we pulled into a business that was clearly more chop shop than parking facility. However, this wasn’t the Pank N Fly. Our companion jumped out and the van continued down the road. We pulled into what appeared to be a mobile homestead with cars parked in the yard to keep the weeds down. Matt’s Supra was out front getting an improbable car wash. The driver surveyed us in the mirror, and asked, “Is that your car? That thing’s been here forever.” How would the shuttle driver know that?

He dropped us at the trailer, and we entered the most spartan office imaginable. The key room was wide open, and we could’ve had any key there, but I think Matt’s 20 year old Supra was the best. The gentle man who had ben washing the car joined us and gave Matt the total- $320. I expected a confrontation, but this was somewhat less than he had expected so he handed over his credit card without a sound. We asked if it had started by itself or had required umpers, and the man proudly told us he starts every car once a month, and it didn’t have any trouble. Our suspicion is that he had been driving it home every night.

Once in the car, the first order of business was to make sure the air conditioning worked. Check.