Santa Nella, Calif., is the next OOIDA tour trailer stop

On Wednesday and Thursday, Oct. 26-27, Marty Ellis and the OOIDA tour trailer are scheduled to be at the TA Travel Center in Santa Nella, Calif.

The Santa Nella TA is at the junction of I-5 and Highway 33.

For the weekend, Ellis and the Spirit of the American Trucker trailer are scheduled to be in Wheeler Ridge, Calif. Ellis plans to split the time between the Wheeler Ridge TA on Oct. 29-30 and the Wheeler Ridge Petro on Halloween and Nov. 1.

The Santa Nella TA has parking for 216 tractor-trailers, according to the website. There is an IHOP restaurant there. In addition to the truck shop, driver’s lounge, game room and laundry, there are Amazon Lockers there and ministry services.

Across Highway 33 from the Santa Nella TA is a legendary restaurant, Pea Soup Andersen’s. You can’t miss the large windmill. The original restaurant was founded in 1924 in Buellton, Calif. The Santa Nella restaurant opened in 1976. The restaurant’s founders were born in Denmark. The current owner remembers eating at Pea Soup Anderson’s as a child with his grandparents.

They say they serve more than 2 million bowls of pea soup annually. The menu has more than pea soup to offer, though, including hearty breakfasts, soups and salads, burgers and sandwiches, and steak and fried chicken.

Santa Nella is on the western edge of California’s agriculturally rich Central Valley.

Concerns about unique electronic identifiers

Ellis regularly discusses on Friday what he hears from truckers he meets while touring the country on Land Line Now. On last Friday’s broadcast, Ellis said he was getting an earful from truck drivers about a federal proposal to require unique electronic identifiers on trucks.

“A lot of our guys are just up in arms. They’re hoping that it does not go through, but, as we’ve seen in the past, it seems like with all these regulations they are just putting their foot down and moving forward,” Ellis said.

There are concerns about broadcasting so much information, and drivers are wondering how much information being electronically sent is an invasion of privacy.

Beyond concerns for privacy, the electronic identifiers could seriously affect CSA scores, Ellis pointed out. Law enforcement authorities will start targeting trucks with any infraction that can be detected electronically and stop them for inspections. That means there will be fewer inspections of trucks without problems. Especially for small one- or two-truck operations, one bad inspection hurts, and it seems like there might be fewer opportunities to improve the CSA score with electronic monitoring.

Listen to the conversation on Land Line Now.

Stop by when you see The Spirit

If you see the OOIDA tour trailer, stop by and say hello. Ellis looks forward to visiting about the Association’s activities and current issues. There are copies of Land Line Magazine to pick up there. You can join or renew your membership for $10 off the regular price at The Spirit. Face masks are available at The Spirit for anyone with a commercial driver’s license.

After Santa Nella and Wheeler Ridge, Ellis plans to haul The Spirit to Ontario, Calif.

Here is the schedule for The Spirit. LL