road trip gone wrong

Unbelievable turn of events.. here we are, on the road from northern Virginia to Lexington Kentucky, to attend a pastor’s conference, and we’re on our way, over the mountains of West Virginia, and it was a little too much for my ol’ 1990 Mitsubishi Mirage. It started with an explosion of smoke inside of the car, and out of the blue, our heat guage was pegged to red hot. We waited by the side of the road, nobody pulled over to help. Two of us decided to get water, we got some water (hopping over barbed wire, using scrap plastic bottles: who said trash was useless), slowly chugged down the road.. we see water leaking into the interior floorboard on the driver’s side.. we eventually get it to go about 10 miles further down the road to a mechanic in Olive Hill, and we happen(!) to get there before they close.. he bypassed the heating core.. we get a refill of antifreeze.. then we’re on the way.. and about 15 minutes down the road, the engine heat guage is dancing its way up.. it’s overheating, again.. we pull out off a rest stop.. we get more water, the radiator looked dry.. and we work our way to the next exit.. and a mechanic on a motorcycle walks by, helps us bypass the heat sensors for the radiator fans- which were not running.. so it looks like we’re okay, right? Well….. not out of the woods yet, we barely make it to Lexington, get registered for our conference, while we give time for the car to cool.. and then eventually get to the motel, and we’re still looking for the root cause of all these terrible symptoms. God sovereignly put some right people along the way, to keep us going, but we’re not out of the woods yet..