Family Bus

I never mentioned this on the blog before, but at Christmas James' family came to Sonora. We borrowed our friend's bus to take a trip up the hill to the snow. We had a great time visiting with everyone during the trip. Afterwords, James and I talked about trying to find a vehicle that our whole family could fit in. Now that we have two kids and James and Michelle have one, it was hard to go anywhere without taking two or three cars. We joked about getting a bus like the one we had just taken to the snow.

This week I caught wind of an auction the county was having for old vehicles. On the list was a few old transit buses. I was able to prearrange a meeting to look over the buses before the auction on Saturday (my only perk of being a county employee.) Three of the buses were in excellent condition. The county was having to replace them earlier than planned because of California's emission standards. It didn't take much convincing to get James and Mike on board to the idea of splitting the purchase of one of the buses.

Saturday morning Mike and I showed up at the auction ready to start the bidding process. We staked out the one we liked the best and was hoping no one else wanted it. Turned out someone else did want it so I participated in my first auction bidding war. After a few going back and forth bids, the Cummings, Evans and Nixons became proud owners of a used 2001 transit bus.

Here's the front the bus. We have decided to keep it at the Cummings' house for storage because they have the most room.

The county painted over the logo they have on the side of their buses, leaving us space to put in something clever. If only we were clever enough to come up with slogan or logo.

The bus came with an automated wheelchair lift. We are hoping to take it out and sell it on Ebay or Craigslist to help offset the cost of the bus. Is there a market for used wheelchair lifts?

There are 13 seats on the bus, plus the driver's seat. The seat belts will allow us to properly secure the children's car seats. We also will use it to take visiting family members and friends to the lake, snow, or any other local landmarks.

The bus only has 181,000 miles on it, which is very low for this type of vehicle. Thankfully, the county keeps their fleet well maintained and had just put in a new transmission into this bus.

The Evans are visiting Sonora soon, allowing us to take our bus on it's maiden voyage. Here's to many good times to come.


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