Well it turns out even though we had two trailers stashed at the shipper beforehand they still took four hours to get one loaded and the paperwork taken care of. I finally shoved off at 10 AM and ran back over to Joplin to use the scales at our terminal to make sure I had the weight distributed legally.
I decided to take a more direct route through Kansas than what CFI suggested. The first hour or so was fairly congested and slow but after that it sped up to a respectable 65. Once I got to Wichita I turned on to an interstate and made even better time.
My fuel use today was horrendous due to the heavy load and a severe headwind. I'll know tomorrow when I fuel but I may be around 4 MPG for the day, well under my 6.1 average.
Damn hot too: over 103 degrees in Kansas as I was moving down the interstate, and even after 6 PM it is still over 100 degrees.
I stopped in Colby, KS, about 220 miles away from the consignee. They have weird hours for unloading (5 AM to 7 AM local) and it will be a very tight run to make it in on time, given that I can't start running again until 3 AM central time and will have to fuel between here and there.
UPDATE: I got a call from a load planner at CFI headquarters asking if I can make it to the Phelps Dodge mine up in the Rockies west of Denver by 10 AM local time. Unfortunately, since I don't know if my current load can actually be delivered tomorrow (it isn't supposed to deliver until Thursday) I couldn't commit to it. I went to this mine late last winter and it is wayyyyy the heck up there... something like 12,500 feet or so.
