I flew back to LA and began making plans to bring my new project home. With no place to keep it while under restoration, finding storage became my first priority. After an hour on the phone, I had located an RV storage lot about seven miles away that was fairly reasonable. It seems most storage facilities here in LA won't even consider storing a vehicle unless it's running and registered. My next consideration, how was I going to get it here. John had said he has a truck driver buddy that might have room on one of his trips to LA. But there was no telling whether that would be in a month or a year, so next I looked at having it transported by a commercial hauler. Dang they want a lot to haul a rig! Of course, I'd want at least what they were asking to do the same. So I came to the conclusion that I should just haul it myself. I decided to purchase a trailer as I could use it in my Set business to haul sets to the studios. OK, so now what am I going to haul it with? My Toyota 4x4 sure wasn't going to do the job, I needed a full sized truck. About six weeks later I found one for sale on the internet that I really liked the looks of for a reasonable price. A '95 3/4 ton Dodge RAM 4x4 with a V-10 and a 6" lift. Hmm... I'm starting to see a pattern here.
1995 Dodge RAM 2500 4x4
This truck was located in South Dakota. I hadn't been to that part of the country yet, so it seemed like a good time to check it out. In my own wacky way of thinking, it also put my Carryall on the way back to Los Angeles. At any rate it worked for me. The plan now was to fly to South Dakota, grab the RAM pickup, drive down to Fort Collins buy a trailer, install the engine in the Carryall, load up and roll on home. As a plan it seemed a good one, and eventually it was accomplished. The trip had to be postponed twice due to delays in getting the parts for the Carryall engine.
Somewhere in South Dakota
June 15th, 2000 I finally left for South Dakota. The next afternoon I was heading west toward the Black Hills in my new truck. That V-10 could really move out! It also wanted to be fed often! At any rate I really enjoyed the trip, I was expecting flat Kansas like landscape filled with corn fields, what I found was rolling hills with scattered clumps of trees. Very picturesque. The Black Hills were beautiful also. I hope to get back there someday when I have a bit more time.