The Journey Begins...NOT!

A journey of 1000 miles begins with a single brake job.

So much for leaving on time. A simple oil change, tire balance and rotation on Friday morning mushroomed into new front brakes, rotors, struts, and sway bars (the mechanic said one sway bar "broke" because it was "rusted" and the other one looked bad). And after all the parts were installed, an alignment. In all honesty, we were probably due for front brakes. "You have a lot of rust under this car. You been driving in salt?" Indeed we had. Our Grand Caravan is a New England car, born in Massachusetts, raised in New Hampshire.

I picked up the car on Saturday morning, abandoning all thoughts of staying someplace nice on vacation. Visions of McDonald's, Motel 6 and Super 8 danced in my head as I forked over a sizeable portion of our vacation fund.

After sparring with the mechanic who left black footprints on my front carpets and long dark smears on the steering wheel, door handles, and everything else he touched, I drove the car home. It took an hour to clean the grease. M scrubbed the mats and set them out to dry in the sun. A few hours later we drove to Punta Gorda to pick up some dog food. It was then we noticed the shimmy in the wheel. I couldn't keep the car on the road and had to oversteer 20 degrees to the right in order to track straight. We kept drifting to the left, over the center line.

Back to the shop we went. By this time, my right arm and hand had cramped from trying to keep the car on the road. The manager asked us to leave it and promised it would be ready by 8 PM. I urged him to make sure the interior was kept grease-free. He assured me he would.

When I arrived to pick up the car Saturday evening, it was still on the lift. I was told it would be ready Sunday morning.



We picked up the car a little after 8 on Sunday morning, determined to take it for a long test drive before going home. This is what I found on the carpet.






This is what I found on the steering wheel.





I wasn't able to get a good photo of the grease on the driver's side car seat.

The worst part was being told paper mats are available for the mechanics' use. I was not pleased. So we cleaned the car again. The good news is that it seems to be driving well now.

However, these guys never checked the fluid levels in the car and now we're off to get some antifreeze because the radiator is well below "MIN." I just added nearly half a gallon of windshield fluid to the washer reservoir. I specifically asked these guys to check all fluids and belts. This makes me very nervous. Is there anything else they forgot to do?? What's more, I checked the service slip and discovered I was charged for a "one year alignment" special package, which is $20 more than a standard alignment. I never asked for an upgraded alignment, nor was I ever given the opportunity to choose.

The upside of not leaving on time is extra time to finish long-neglected projects in my office. As they say, it's all good.

Perhaps we'll leave tomorrow...or not. Our pool has never looked so inviting. I am now officially in vacation mode.