Re: [alfa] road trip!

["Gregory S. Youngblood" <greg@xxxxxxxxxxxxxx>]

On Sun, 19 Oct 2003, Daegrigg (Don) wrote:

> Check into renting a U-Haul truck and trailer if you have the time to do the
> driving.

Another possibility would be to rent a pickup/SUV for a weekend or weekly
rate (with a trailer hitch and unlimited mileage) and then go to U-Haul
and rent a tow-dolly. If you can rent a full size SUV (suburban,
excursion, etc.) you could probably rent a car transport. The point is to
rent the trailer for local use where you live (read your rental agreements
to make sure there is no problem going out of state). UHaul gets really
expensive on the one-way rentals and on their mileage for local rentals.
If you can get a only a trailer frm them, it might be cheaper.

Of course, this assumes several things: (1) if you use a tow-dolly, the
car will not have problems being dragged (in other words, good tires,
bearings, etc. tranny in neutral or driveshaft removed); (2) you can get a
pickup or SUV big enough to get the transport and/or tow the dolly safely;
(3) you are comfortable driving a truck/trailer combo.

Just a thought. It's a trick I used several years ago when I needed to
pick up a free mainframe. I had a truck already, so I just rented a U-Haul
trailer for "local" use, drove 3 states over with some stuff for a friend,
picked up my load, and drove home. My trailer rental, even for about 4 or
5 days, plus excess gas for one-way of the trip, still added up to about a
quarter of the one-way rental to rent the trailer where the mainframe was.

Another thought about renting trucks (if you need to). Some Ford dealers
used to rent Excursions. When the first came out there was a waiting list.
Dealers often rent a variety of cars, though their fleets are extremely
small, and smaller dealers are less likely to do this. Doesn't hurt to
check. Don't know if Enterprise's full size pickups, SUVs, or vans have
trailer hitches or not. Then, of course, there's the other usual suspects
-- Hertz, National, Dollar, Alamo, etc, whatever is local for you.

Greg
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