Travels and Engagements

So the wife and I found a car that we were interested in buying a couple of weeks ago on Craigslist. Its a hard to find car, 2003 Infiniti M45: black interior, black exterior, fully loaded, low miles. So we started to move forward with our purchase and worked out a figure to purchase the car at. The only PROBLEM is that the car was in Portland, OR and we live Salt Lake City, UT. I've flown out to purchase cars before, but have yet to have a smooth transaction and transportation of the purchased car. I decided to give it another shot and I bought the plan ticket, arranged pick up of the new (to me) Infiniti.

I flew out Friday, 5.28.10 at 8:45am, smooth check through security, got to the gate quick, boarding ran like a well oiled machine. After take-off flying over the Great Salt Lake we hit the worst turbulence that I've experienced in my life and I had flash backs of the flight attendant saying, "the bottom seat cushion can be used as a flotation device..." I noticed that the lake was much smaller than I thought and that it was segmented off in natural colored sections, turquoise sections, and magenta colored sections, weird. I'm assuming this is for salt mining? Shut the sun out of my 5x7 windowsince the flight was early in the morning that I was still tired and as the turbulence subsided, the sleep arrived. I woke up about 10 minutes before landing to a gloomy sky and more turbulence. Worst landing ever (but I hear the plane bouncing on landing at PDX is common), but the gate seemed like it was straight ahead after we touched down so I was off the plan it 10 minutes.

Went to meet the Jeff (private car seller) and the pick up area and laid my eyes on my new car! It ran better than he stated and I made the purchase! Hooked up my GPS and radar detector and started my way back to Utah. The area around Portland was really green and a great change from the Utah scenic routes. I was warned by lots of people that Oregon cops are quick to write a ticket, but I never ran into any problems. I passed into Idaho and was about 40 miles outside of Boise, ID when the car sputtered and went dead while cruising at 80MPH around 7pm on Friday. I pull to the side to evaluate whats going on and try to restart the car and nothing! So turned the car off, called the wife gave her the bad news. I turned the key to the on-mode without starting and amazingly the gas tank went from half tank to below 'E.' After the tow truck arrived (with gas) I went on to Boise and just booked a room at the Double Tree by the Boise River to recoop.

Made it home by 3pm on Saturday, 5.29.10 with the new car in time to still enjoy my Memorial Day weekend! Without any tickets, accidents, or hiccups; well other than running outta gas!