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okay so i got the car about 2 months ago and shes been a joy to drive. a few minor hiccups so far but nothing alarming.
anyway, i had a week off work (always take my vacation areound my birthday) and typically stick close to home and get stuff done. well, this time i get a call from my aunt saying she was going to be at the beach house and really wanted me to come down.
little bit of history..
my family owns several beachfront properties on gasparilla island, in the seaside town of Boca Grande FL , an obscure off the beaten path place that not too many really know about, and confuse it with Boca Raton, on the other side of the state. (boca grande is on the west coast)
my grandparents found the place by accident but liked its seclusion and bought an old rundown house on the ocean back in the 70s, when boca grande was basically a ghost town. boca grande was a phosphate mining town and when the industry moved in the late 1960s, just about everybody else left with it. its very remote and at the time SW florida was very desolate, so there wasnt much really worth staying for. needless to say they basically stole the place. my grandfather, also a car guy, who owned 12 car dealerships at the time as well as basically invented the worlds first mass-produced affordable electric car called the Sebring-Vanguard CitiCar (another story for another day) and was a very savvy investor and businessman, ended up buying 20 properties on the beach there, and made an absolute mint on them later in life. we still own several condos there which he bought in the early 80s, and i stayed in one of them, where my family always went and i have lots of personal memories in.
told me to come down and stay for a week in "3H" as its known as. they stayed in "2C" which is direct oceanfront. 3H isnt but thats where i wanted to be since all my childhood memories are attached to that one. (i spent alot of summers down there as a kid)
anyways, i really thought about it and realized i had not been down there in 14 years!!!! last time i went was right before hurricane charley, which absolutley decimated the area in 2004, and i had a feeling i was going to see a very different boca then i had remembered (Punta Gorda was ground zero for hurricane charley and was absolutley blown off the map, and only 2 towns over from boca grande). somehow life, carrers, and other stuff basically got in the way and time just slipped by way way too fast to keep up with. my grandfather passed in october 2011 and my dad passed november of 2016. my grandad basically lived there, and my dad was there there 4 or 5 times a year. his thing was sunsets. i hadnt taken a vacation in eons and needed it for my own sanity, i HAD to go...
as far as i could tell, my car was okay, so before i made the journey to my old family vacation place long forgotten, i went by the guys at the shop to check my car, and get a turn signal socket replaced that didnt work.
she got a clean bill of health but unfortunatley my speedometer quit working a few days prior. another friend had a good cluster for me but i didnt feel like having the whole damn thing replaced, so i just downloaded a few apps on my phones.
i stuck some windshield mounts up and just used my phones.
was just slightly sketched out simply because its not only an old car, but a new (to me) car that hadnt really gained my trust yet, and considered taking my mustang convertible because it would be fun at the beach, however, the LS400 is the king of the road and they are happiest on the highway. plus it was a long drive south and i wanted to enjoy it.
next evening, i packed my bags, clicked on my phones, turned the key and hit the road.
orlando traffic is a *****. the main road that runs through orlando, (I-4) sees about 200,000 cars a day and is one of the busiest most congested highways in the country. to make matters worse its currently being rebuilt so everything is tore up. rush hour is absolute gridlock, and even during late hours, its still congested. it took me almost an hour just to get out of the metro area and past disney (about 16 miles from my driveway)
i left at a normal time. i cant even imagine how long it would have taken during rush hour.
anyway, the concrete buildings turned into small businesses, then dwellings, then pastures. the road got thinner traffic finally got lighter. i reached my normal highway cruising speed of about 90, leveled her off and eased the seat back. ac nice and cold and popped a grand funk disc into the changer. then i watched the miles roll by. furthest id had my car was about 50 miles since i got it. thats kind of my range. 50 miles is my comfort zone to where if something bad happens with the car its not going to be hell to get it home. i look down at the trip ODO and there goes 50, 75....85....100... oh crap.. nervous.. suddenly i hit tampa and I-4 wraps into I-75 and i head south.. 110 and its still running okay, 120, 130 and still okay. oh man almost halfway there!
i hit a small bump of traffic and some light rain near the ruskin/sun city exit, so i stopped there and got a bite to eat from the mcdonalds. well, it was planned. the ruskin mcdonalds is a family tradition of sorts, kinda the half/half way point of the journey, and as kids my dad would always stop in ruskin and get us a bite to eat. we would also hit a goodwill that was behind the mcdonalds (for unknown reasons), so i ate the same thing and went into the same goodwill.
in a total of 14 years. the place had not changed AT ALL.
once back on the highway, i hit manatee county and the manatee river bridge. after that things got pretty rural and i felt the needle starting to rise. on remote desolate stretches of I-75, everyone drives pretty fast. next thing i was cruising at 109 mph. i didnt feel like i was going that fast and the car felt totally stable, so i just left it there for awhile, before i saw a state police cruiser on the road about 6 cars ahead of me..
at that point i backed off a bit and brought it down to a reasonable 85 mph and stayed that way till i reached my exit. "river road/Englewood 1 mile" it said. i was relieved. i had driven well over 200 miles on the highway, without any complications at all. the Ls400 did her job beautifully. now, exiting the highway on to the back roads that seemed to take forever. i noticed a light shimmy and some tire whine, but that was it.
it would be another 30 mins (about 40 miles) of between 60-100 mph, till i reached the Boca Grande causeway bridge. i was at good ole 3H just before sunset..
now, remember how i said my dad loved the sunsets here? honestly it had been so long since i had seen one, i forgot myself just how awesome they really were.
i know my dad was around. i could feel him, and im pretty sure he called in a favor up there, wherever he is. pictured below is the sunset i saw, and my dad drinking his favorite glass of wine, in the surf watching one of the sunsets he loved so much.. i sure miss him.
after sunset, i unpacked, changed, poured a drink, sigh of relief that i made it down in one piece without overheating, any catastrophic problems, tire blowouts etc. i hit the pool ate dinner and went to bed.
when i walked into 3H, although all the furniture was different and my family remodeled it 5 times since, it still felt like home.
when i got to the island, i immediatley noticed some changes. the bridge had been rebuilt, the land on the bay next to the island had been developed, and a strange office park on the other side of the causeway that never really made any sense, had been demolished.
the roads into town had changed a little and although the island was almost completely defoliated by hurricane charley, 14 years was long enough for most of the green to grow back. i had a hard time sleeping that night and woke up early, anxious to see how different things would be around the island, and went for a morning drive..
its kind of amazing how nature can re-claim stuff. this smaller bridge is through an area at the harbor side of the island. there used to be houses on both sides of the bridge the last time i was here, which were wiped out by hurricane charley and never re-built. today you would never know it. i saw alot of changes both good and bad on the island. some just different.
pictured below is historic Banyan St, in downtown Boca Grande. these massive banyan trees are well over 100 years old as are the houses around them. as dense as the canopy is now, there used to be twice as many trees and it was so thick, the street looked like night even when it was a full sunny day. there are very old carvings in some of the trees that date back to the 1920s that i remembered as a kid, but couldnt find them now as im sure charley took the oldest trees.
after banyan street, i stopped at what used to be an oceanfront house on a dead end road. again, long gone simply replaced by the beach that swept it off the land during hurricane charley.
the are has since turned into a small public beach. you would never know it was even there.
after i gawked at more of the change the island had seen, i headed back to the condo, pulled some old family photos, and took side by sides of the same areas, 25-30 years apart, at the exact angles of before and afters. some of it is alike, sort of, some you wouldnt even know today.
one problem i had is that the image depth is different on old film style photos vs digital ones, but it wasnt such a hard task. after tweaking a little, they almost line up perfect.
circa 1987 and now
1989 and now
1991 and now.
1986 and now. im the little punk to the far right. jesus i cant believe how long ago that was.
one thing that was sort of upsetting to me was the original family beach house that my grandparents bought way way back, had been demolished and they are building this monstrosity in its place.
in this photo below, you can barley see me, but i am the only person still alive in it.
lots of happy memories of this place, but doing the before and afters made me kinda sad when i made them. either way, im glad i have the memories.
around noon, my grandmother and aunt showed up, who i hadnt seen since my dads funeral in 2016. we were so happy to see each other. while they got settled, i went inland to do some thrifting and grocery shopping.
its a 20 mile drive from the island to civilization on the inland. nearest town is Port Charlotte. with tons of fresh straight asphalt, and not another car on the road, i decided to really let her rip. for the first time, i was able to experience a sustained top speed run in the car. got her all the way up to 155 and held her there for several minutes which felt like forever. the car actually felt solid at 155 but the wind noise was very noticeable. anyway i made the 20 mile drive in about 10 mins..
unfortunatley, that kind of speed takes its toll on any tires, and the two front were absolutely obliterated by the time i got into town, thumping and separating. i stopped into one of those mom and pop used tire roadside places and got a set of Yokohamas for the front which took away the noise, the bump, and made for much more smoother driving. little did i know, although the tires i had on the car were good, they were ten years old and couldnt handle that kind of driving. not even close. had i known they were that old, i never would have attempted a run like that.
i got back to the island just before sunset, and joined my grandma and aunt for some drinks at 2C (the oceanfront unit) and went down to the surf to watch the sunset.
that night a big storm hit. next morning during a walk down the beach, there must have been thousands of crabs at the waters edge, of every different species, and far down the shore as one could see.
i think they were there due to the red tide and that they were looking for air. they were all very much alive so i grabbed some tongs and caught what i thought would be a great dinner! however, they were toxic so i threw them back..
unfortunatley, my tire nightmare was far from over. more on that tomorrow. stay tuned!!
well i had the rest of the story almost posted. hit submit and the computer froze. i made the mistake of hitting the back button and lost EVERYTHING. that took me 4 hours to write. screw it!
as i said this was a very important trip for me and im really glad i made it! anyway...
after throwing back the crabs around noon, i hit the pool for a bit but the weather began to turn so i decided to venture back into town for a bit. the weather is pretty intense down there. not as crazy as orlando but close.
i got about half way through town and started feeling the lumps again in my tires. i wasnt about to drive all the way back to punta gorda so i decided to stick to the Englewood/Pt Charlotte area to see what i could find. for whatever reason, this just wasnt the day for tire shopping.
across 3 different towns, every place was slammed till the next day, and even a few places said come back next week which i couldnt believe. finally pulled into a tire kingdom that could actually see me.
they put the car on a lift to check it out. turns out the tread on the rear tires had seperated, and showed me the problem. again, these were the two back tires i came down with, that i found out were 10 years old.
p225-6016.... i knew the number well, and after asking for them so many times, i was at a point of vomiting if i had to say it again. he assured me they had them in stock so we went inside to look at my options. i REALLY didnt want to use them and overpay for some meh tires for my LS, but i probably wasnt going to make it back to the island without a blowout. i chose a set and prepared my anus for $249.99 for two rear tires. well, a few mins later the guy came back out of the shop...
"well Mr Beaumont, i regret to inform you that we do not have your tire in stock."
****** ME RUNNING.
they told me they would check other locations in the area to see if they had some and they did, however i was going to have to drive to Venice to get them, 45 mins up the road. oh yey.. in the meantime they took the spare out and installed it on the side with the really bad tire, enough to hopefully get me to venice as it was OEM to the car, dry rotted and well used. by then i was burned out and just wanted to get the hell out of there, and decided to just head back to the island. the guys were honest and nice enough, and said i didnt owe them anything at all, but i still gave them a $20 for a case of beer after work or something.
one thing that was funny about not only the tire places, but for the whole trip, every place i stopped at kept saying "wow thats such a clean LS400" or "i haven't seen one this nice in years", to "when did they make this model ive never seen one before" throughout the entire journey, going there and on the way back, i never passed another LS400 which was almost insane to think about, untill i stopped in a walmart after a ferocious thunderstorm, where a lonely UCF10 was parked next to an LS430. ucf10s are rare in the wild these days, and this one was actually rarer, as it was one of the 1994 5th anniversary editions with the unique shade of white they only made that one year. of course, i had to stop and take a pic with it. aside from the stuck antenna, it was actually in pretty decent shape...
turns out the walmart i stopped in also had a tire center and they happened to have the tires i needed. name brand and much much cheaper..
at last my tire issue was solved. no more problems and smooth ride for the rest of the vacation. the next morning, we went to a beautiful church for sunday service, had lunch at a killer greasy spoon, and i headed home.
Fantastic trip adventure and sharing the memories of your family Many of the places we went as a family were set in my memories too. We recall them them fondly in our adult years and to re-visit those locations are happy times. I also miss mom and dad so the family vacation photos bring back to those fun times too. We hit up the similar spots dad liked.
Glad the LS came through for this journey! Many more to come...
well, she has proved herself as my deticated road trip car. plan on taking her on many more big trips. once i get my 95 going again, ill be going on trips with it too. those may be a little scary though. idk.
well, she has proved herself as my deticated road trip car. plan on taking her on many more big trips. once i get my 95 going again, ill be going on trips with it too. those may be a little scary though. idk.
I have plans to take my 96 ls (243k miles young) to Florida this fall from Colorado and back. Call me crazy, but I'm not worried it won't take me there and back.
We can figure that if that 1mil LS400 can do a loop of the US, many of ours should be up to it too. Is scary though, one doesn't know what may need service and who is going to perform that service while way far away in unfamiliar territory. Now and then I think of an Oregon and maybe Washington drive trip. So many great drives to experience. Most ours are in the 400 miles one way distance range.
We can figure that if that 1mil LS400 can do a loop of the US, many of ours should be up to it too. Is scary though, one doesn't know what may need service and who is going to perform that service while way far away in unfamiliar territory. Now and then I think of an Oregon and maybe Washington drive trip. So many great drives to experience. Most ours are in the 400 miles one way distance range.
What did Reagan say? Trust, but verify. I trust my LS but I'll have a full tool box, scanner and a jack stand in the trunk. Nice post from Steve- well put together.
08-28-18, 03:00 PM
First road trip in my 2000 Ls400.
Many of the places we went as a family were set in my memories too. We recall them them fondly in our adult years and to re-visit those locations are happy times. I also miss mom and dad so the family vacation photos bring back to those fun times too. We hit up the similar spots dad liked.
Is scary though, one doesn't know what may need service and who is going to perform that service while way far away in unfamiliar territory. Now and then I think of an Oregon and maybe Washington drive trip. So many great drives to experience. Most ours are in the 400 miles one way distance range.