Car additions, ready to be packed for the long journey....

So, today, and most of the weekend, is preparing the stuff that I will be taking to Alaska in the car.  I want to have it totally packed by Tuesday so that anything I might need on the road will not accidentally get put into the moving van.

I had purchased cross bars for the rails on the top of Miss Gaddy.. my Caddy...so I could mount a car top carrier to handle some of the extra things I may need to carry with me.  I also purchased a carrier that is not too big but will add 14 cubic feet of storage space for things.  

When Rob was here, he looked everything over and we did a test fit to make sure I had what we needed and that it worked with my car, so that if I needed to ship things back, there was time.  But the rails fit and the carrier did not interfere with the radio antenna and would be easily accessible on the road.

So, this morning, Danny Lantz came up from Maryland and together he and I figured out how the rails went on... I lost the instructions.  So we got the rails on, then the carrier and then we tweaked and tweaked and tweaked to have it just right.  I will have to keep checking every time I use the car and throughout the trip to make sure that everything remains nice and tight.

So here is Miss Gaddy with her new hat on.  I think she looks lovely.  We will add her new tail (tire carrier with a full size spare)  the day we hit the road.  The hatch does not open with the tire carrier locked into place, but if we move the holder out just an inch, the hatch is accessible so all is well.