Dead cars, craigslist scams & distances

We headed to Florida for the month of December, our first destination with our new RV setup! Our Class C RV now pulled our Olds on a tow dolly, so we'd have a ride for around town and such when we arrive. Just park 'the house' & use the car for errands & sightseeing wherever we are.  

The van & RV leaving in our new travel arrangement 

Last week were on the way to the new Star Wars movie, the 12:30pm show (IMAX & 3D!!!) in Lakeland Florida.
We were halfway there when the car died.

It was the engine and the noises were not good ... called a tow truck & took it to the shop in Wauchula FL that I picked off the internet.  I knew it was more than I could deal with in an RV park.

I went on-line and, because the movie had not started, the ticket money was refunded. A bright spot to the day!

The van loading on the tow truck 

Turned out the engine was shot.. around $2000 for a crate motor, around $1400 for the labor. Plus we'd need far more time than we had to spend in this part of Florida to get the job done.

It was a 17 year old vehicle so it was not real surprising,  but this sort of thing is always a disappointment.

We started shopping for a used vehicle. Looking for the newest, lowest mileage we could find within our budget. I like craigslist.

Search criteria -
There had to be a picture, 2001 or newer (we are replacing a 2000 model), less than 100,000 miles (or 125,000 miles or 150,000 miles, changing the amount is easy), more than $15 (that gets rid of the dealers who put $1 on the price block) and $3000 for the max price. Then I typed the word "sunroof" in the search block & let'er rip!


All kinds of cars with sunroofs that meet the rest of our criteria.  All of them a goodly distance from the great central location we found for a month-long Florida stay.

We are about 5 miles from the grocery store in town, that's bikeable but a good distance from all the population centers selling cars! Too far for my bike.

So we drove the RV to look at cars.  It drives nice, it's comfortable, but using it for a car search from here was just a bit spendy at the gas pump.

We drove to look at several cars that weren't there, "We just sold that one today."  I did have an offer on a nice one in an eBay warehouse in Billings Montana, a gmail address, pictures on Instagram and they said they'd ship it!

This is the first time my new bride & I have shopped for a car.  Turns out our ideas of "acceptable" are just a tad different. :-)

The next trip to look at a car will be combined with a day trip to the beach! Having your house at the beach with you is a good thing and a really nice way to rationalize the gas money!



Through all this I realized how much I counted on my cell phone, I even thought how much harder this all would have been without it.

Merry Christmas everyone!