RENAMED!! The adventures of Chase and his 2006 Yukon XL Denali!! Follow along on my travels!

Mom and I grabbed our rental car and headed from middle Tennessee to Washington DC Saturday to spend a week helping her older brother, my uncle who lives here. He’s a learning handicapped adult and super kooky but probably one of my favorite relatives. He and I constantly annoy each other and yell at each other but it’s out of love. Lol. Anyways he has to move from an apartment that he’s been in over 10 years due to the building manager not properly caring for the building. His apartment has major issues. But because he qualifies for assistance through his SSI moving is a process and paperwork and approvals and such. It’s been an interesting few days. My mom is good at helping through this process. But she’s driving me nuts. The 12 hour drive was just…ooi… lol. Not exactly a comfortable ride in a newish Nissan Altima. Nothing wrong with the car itself just not my big comfy Denali that I’m used to haha. Spending two weeks in a rental makes me realize how much the Denali spoils me with comfort.

Getting to see Buc-ee’s in real life was fun though. Good experience. Good food. Friendly people. Cheap fuel prices were nice. Stopped into the first one about 9am-ish and hadn’t had coffee yet. Was super thrilled to find decent coffee along with flavor options and oat milk since can’t have real dairy. Most places don’t go out of their way to do stuff like this and frustrates me that I can’t buy coffee stuff and support the business. But was super happy to see Buc-ee’s offering something for everyone and being able to support them. I even picked up a Buc-ee’s insulated coffee cup even though I don’t need anymore lol. Hopefully it fits in the Denali cupholder….

Cool stories Chase. You are a busy man. Enjoyed the read.

Fosscore said:

Cool stories Chase. You are a busy man. Enjoyed the read.

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I wouldn’t know what to do if I weren’t busy lol.

adventurenali92 said:

I wouldn’t know what to do if I weren’t busy lol.

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Truth. Here as well!

I wondered where in middle TN. I went to first grade in Culleoka when my family moved from Rowland Heights CA in the 70s. I grew up in Lynnville, a few miles south of Culleoka. My dad still lives in Lynnville and most of the rest of my family is in Columbia. Small world

willinnashville said:

I wondered where in middle TN. I went to first grade in Culleoka when my family moved from Rowland Heights CA in the 70s. I grew up in Lynnville, a few miles south of Culleoka. My dad still lives in Lynnville and most of the rest of my family is in Columbia. Small world

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Small world indeed! When they first moved out there, they rented a house right between Spring Hill and Columbia. Then bought their house in culleoka about a year later. Beautiful piece of property and a beautiful house. I love visiting Columbia anytime I’m here. I love going into muletown coffee roasters. Coffee is so good there. And the people are really friendly. Super cool town.

Took Sunday afternoon with my mom and uncle to see the offshoot of the Smithsonian air and space museum out in Virginia at the Steven F Udzar-Hazy center. I’m a bit annoyed as my mom specifically asked me what I wanted to do for fun while we are here and the only thing i said was “I wanna see the air and space wing at the Smithsonian”…. And my uncle was like “well there’s two…. The one out in Virginia is bigger” and I said yeah that’s cool and all but I really wanna see the main museum just because its near the national mall and the monuments and I’d like to cruise around that area because I haven’t seen it in real life yet. And I still got over ruled and we went out to Virginia…. It was cool and I enjoyed seeing the shuttle discovery, Concorde, Enola gay, a Lockheed constellation, and the original prototype Boeing 367-80. It wasn’t anywhere near as interactive as I’d hoped. And we didn’t get to do any of the extras they offered. Really wanted to do a flight simulator but that didn’t happen. Not the Smithsonian experience I was hoping for.

It was cool that we ended up trailing a group that had paid for a guided tour, we ran into them as the guide was talking about the B-29 super fortress. And then as he moved to talk about Concorde, he finished up his Concorde spiel with his experience flying the Concorde only a handful of months before it got permanently retired in 2003, and showed some photos from the trip and the experience. That was pretty cool. Seeing the photos of the altitude and speed displays in the cabin. And showing occurred of the lounge at Heathrow that was specifically for the Concorde flights and that experience. Wish we coulda gone onboard the Concorde in the museum like some of the other flight museums offer.

The discovery shuttle was pretty cool to see in person. Pretty cool to see a unit that’s been to space 39 times up close and personal.

adventurenali92 said:

The discovery shuttle was pretty cool to see in person. Pretty cool to see a unit that’s been to space 39 times up close and personal.

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Those old planes were beautiful. Flying art.

Tonyrodz said:

Those old planes were beautiful. Flying art.

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Especially the constellation!

I was replying to another thread a few minutes ago and saw the very first photo I posted of my truck in the random media down at the bottom of the page! First time ever I’ve seen any of my photos in the random media portion lol. I feel special now….

She is pretty! If u get the rear outside pillar trim and paint to match it would really set it off.

LsHart said:

She is pretty! If u get the rear outside pillar trim and paint to match it would really set it off.

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That photo is 11 years old lol. From when I first bought the truck. And my rig is a he. His official name is Finn. Escalade roof racks, D pillar covers, and hatch/third brake light has been on the truck since a year into owning it lol. Check out the photos that I took a few weeks back parked in front of the Queen Mary and QM2 on the last post of page 169 for what he currently looks like.

Lol, love the he/she correction! Well tell him I'm sorry and he is magnificent!

LsHart said:

Lol, love the he/she correction! Well tell him I'm sorry and he is magnificent!

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A close friend of mine got a newer car a few years back in her early 20s and she wanted to name her new to her ride, and she named her new car Rae, because that was her favorite Star Wars character. And of course me being a big Star Wars fan thought it fit perfectly for her car. And then she’s all “does your Denali have a name?!” At that point I’d owned him a few years and hadn’t named him just knew it was definitely a he lol. Friend was just like “well of course he needs to be Finn….” I was like well he’s not my favorite character but sure…… so that’s how the Denali is male and Finn…
Another long time friend is a master mechanic and he was working for a jeep shop that I did tons of detail work for. They did some work on it for me one day while I traded some detail work, and family friend joked that “he needed all the air the shop possible to lift this heavy A-S-S road tank up on the lift…” so he’s unofficially nicknamed the road tank lol.

No dull moments. The later part of my DC trip helping my uncle get prepped to move was difficult. We were supposed to actually move him but VA paperwork and voucher approvals for his new apartment got delayed. Plus sadly his current apartment is infested with mold. Was difficult to stay with him there that week but we survived. Mom is back there again this week after flying home with me on the 25th of April. She’s actually finishing getting home moving him to his new place. I’m so glad he’s out of the nightmare building. They put him in an apartment two floors above right after we flew home to get him out of the problem apartment but we think that the whole building has mold issues. His health only mildly improved in the upstairs apartment and as soon as my mom and I got home we started clearing up. But the minute she got back to that building this week she started getting sick again. The only saving grace for me while I was there is that the building is a 10 minute jog from rock creek park so I went running through the park every morning and it was absolutely gorgeous! I loved that bit of the trip.

The view from the new apartment on the top floor though….. that’s a nice touch for my uncle.

Made it home relatively easily. Reminded that being blessed with a garage to leave the Denali in for two whole weeks on a trickle charger while I was gone…. Truck started right up the following morning after flying home to head to church.

A week after getting home mom and I took Saturday off to head down to my aunt and her husbands home in villa park, for Kentucky derby day. Aunts hubby has part owned thoroughbred races horses forever, and had a horse run in the derby back in 2003. Horse got hit by the winning horse unfortunately and didn’t place, but went on to take second in the Belmont stakes a few weeks later so that was pretty cool. Needless to say, derby day is always a big shindig for them and I actually got to carve out time in my schedule to spend the day with them this year for the party. And after two weeks of a nissan Altima rental car, hopping in the Denali for a day trip off the mountain was bliss lol.

Mint Julips, fancy hats, and horses makes for a funday.