PORTLAND TO SPOKANE WITH OIL

We awoke Thursday morning just outside of Portland, OR with snow on our truck and falling from the sky. Craig made quick work of his pre trip inspection and we were off to Clackamas to drop off the bananas. We arrived early, as usual, and were unloaded and the empty call entered into the computer before our appointment time had even arrived. We only sat for a few minutes before we were told to drop our empty trailer and bob tail to Troutdale, OR to pick up another empty trailer at one of the company's drop yards.As we made our way to Troutdale, the skies cleared up and the sunshine emerged, and by the time we were hooked up to our new empty trailer we had received our next dispatch. This would be the third time since being with TWT that we have picked up a non food item. Craig's very first dispatch was picking up lumber, and our next one was when we picked up all those empty oil barrels and some oil products in Portland. This would be a return trip to Portland, but to Chevron instead of Conoco to pick up a hodgepodge of oil products.Driving to the shipper was a look into why Portland is such a huge trading center. First you have the railways, and then the water ways with the many bridges to cross over, not to mention the downtown area right along the water. The area where we picked up was a buzz with tankers all lined up to be filled up with fuel. It was a non stop parade of them coming and going as we were parked in the dock getting loaded with just an oil spill short of 45,000 pounds of product.We then headed back to Troutdale to scale the load. The first round showed that we were heavy on the trailer tandems. We made the adjustment and I casually asked Craig if he was going to reweigh to make sure our calculations were correct. I had to laugh when he said, "I'll take that kind of insurance for a buck", and off we went to rescale. It scaled out perfectly and we were headed to Spokane for an 8am delivery Friday morning.We made it as far Hatton, WA before shutting down after a very long 13 hour day, and just under 100 miles to drive in the morning for our delivery. We had enjoyed our drive along Interstate 84 and the Columbia River and I even got a clear shot of Washington's Stonehenge. Presently we are sitting in the dock at El Jay Oil Company in Spokane while we get unloaded. From here we will head back to the yard to get some work done on the truck, from there it's anyone's guess as to where we will head next.