Carnival Chaos

Today the Carnival Spirit was in Whittier again. That ship is almost done its summer voyages in Alaska. Today however was a weird day as far as that went. I was assigned to take some of the crew from the ship to the airport, and later to take dock employees to Whittier. I left Anchorage at 4:00am, and got to the tunnel a while before it opened. Actually, the opening was delayed because of maintenance. I was only in Whittier for a few minutes. The crew boarded very quickly and several people loaded their luggage, and we were ready to leave in less than five minutes. I was surprised at how fast it all happened. On the way back things were weird. It was a truly strange trip. First of all, on the Seward Highway, I crushed a rabbit, and when I got into town I also made contact with a cat, which was probably the family pet to someone. The cat probably did not like that kind of contact. That was my first double kill trip. In fact, those were my third and fourth this week, and I've never had more than one in a week.

Apparently that was not quite enough excitement for one trip. One thing about large vehicles is that they take significantly longer to stop. Most yellow lights do not give you enough space to stop, so you run an alarming amount of red lights. That is where the air horn becomes very useful! That happened twice between Minnesota Drive and the airport, which is only about five minutes. It seems that killing two animals and running two lights, in an hour, would be enough excitement.

It was not over yet. I went downtown, so I would be nearby for my next departure, from the Hilton. Once I parked the coach, I went to pick up trash and generally tidy things up for the next group. I discovered as I walked back that someone had, as we call it, left a presentation. I discovered a nice puddle of vomit on a seat and the floor beneath it. It had been just over an hour since I had left Whittier, and that was the end of the trip. Some way to end! Well, I got out the biohazardous waste cleanup kit, and, trying to hold down nearly a pound of M&M's I had eaten to stay awake, scooped up all the vomit, disinfected the whole area, and myself several times, and then returned the coach to the yard for a much more thorough cleaning. It had to go out of service until it can be completely sanatized.

I got a new coach and went about my assigned duties. The rest of the day was a little less rediculious! I drove the afternoon crew down to the dock in Whittier, and then brought a few of the morning crew back. One of the morning crew was Merry. That was just weird. I'm not sure what to think of her anymore, but that is a different and unrelated story. I drove her and some of her associates back into town, and then did an airport shuttle. Everything went just fine, until I got back to the yard.

When I returned to the yard, I realized I was fortunate to not have had a major fire. As I was doing my port trip inspection, I discovered that the seal over the wheel hub had come off on one of my rear wheels. With the seal missing, all the oil in the hub had come out. I am pretty sure it came out on the highway, because there were black dots splattered all over the back of the left side and the rear end of the coach. I guess that is where the oil went, probably while I was going 60 mph. With no oil and an enormious vehicle on that and seven other wheels, there is a pretty good chance the bearing will overheat and set the remaining oil residue on fire. Fortunately, that did not happen! I reported that to the mechanic, put that coach out of service, and went home in Kate's 1966 Mercedes! Of all the vehicles I came in contact with today, the Mercedes worked the best!