I Killed the Van

We are all settled in Nebraska now, but our trip here was quite adventurous.  We had planned to spend a week in Utah while Eric attended EFY. Mario was to fly in late Thursday night and then we planned to drive out Saturday evening with visits to Martin's Cove and Mt. Rushmore on the way to Omaha.  Well, as we found out, things to always turn out the way you plan.

We were having a great time in Utah.  Saturday evening, my parents came up to Park City and brought us dinner.  Then Sunday morning, we all went in to Salt Lake to watch the Tabernacle Choir perform for the Spoken Word.  We met the Trawick family and my cousin Tim McCreary's family at Temple Square.  We enjoyed visiting and seeing the visitor centers.  Then Monday we dropped Eric off at BYU and my parents and I visited Tim's family at their home in West Jordan.  The kids had so much fun with these cousins that they had never met, they begged to go back on Tuesday.  So after going to a museum and "This is the Place" in SLC, we headed back to cousin Tim's home.  Tim was building a shed so I offered to help while his wife, Wendy, made dinner.  I was having so much fun building the shed, that we didn't end up leaving till after 9 when it was getting dark.  On the way home, just after getting on a busy highway, my engine light came on.  That had never happened in my van but it seemed to be running fine so I figured I would just take it to the mechanic the next day.  Well, then I noticed that the thermostat was all the way on cold.  I figured that was better than being on hot and kept driving.  Then I got into the canyon going towards Park City and the van started making strange sounds.  I didn't know what to do because it was late at night and the highway was busy and windy and I was a little nervous about pulling over.  So I kept driving until it was obvious that my van was not going to make it any longer.  I had to call a tow truck.  My parents drove in from Heber to rescue us and take us back to our condo in Park City.

We had the van towed to Toyota thinking they would be the best and fastest to repair it.  It took them until Friday before they even knew the engine was destroyed.  It was a bit frustrating.  Mario had changed his ticket to Thursday early afternoon and he immediately began looking for a new vehicle for me. I didn't and still don't want a new vehicle.  I LOVE my Sienna.  I've driven it for the past 8 1/2 years and it has been a wonderful van and I have done all the preventive maintenance through the years. So it is puzzling to me why it had engine trouble.  The mechanic told another employee that he thinks the last mechanic didn't properly remove the air pockets when he changed out all the fluids.  But they can't prove that and so apparently we don't qualify for any warranty work since they can't be 100% sure.  It has been very frustrating.  We ended up buying plane tickets to get us to Omaha and we flew home late Sunday night.

So now it is Friday of the following week and we still don't really have any info on the van. But it is supposed to be fixed by Monday and then it will be shipped to us here in Omaha.  I hope the repairs go as planned and I can get my van back soon.  I have missed it.  Fortunately Mario has a 7 passenger SUV for us to drive here in Omaha, but its not near as good for the family as my beloved van.  Plus Mario and I aren't very good at sharing a vehicle.