Total Miles: 5426 miles
Across the United States - and back
Tickets: 0
Mishaps: 0
Puckers: 0
We left Mountain View at a reasonable time, 9:30 on a Saturday. The weather maps across the country looked dire. I-80 in Iowa had been closed. Snow was dumping in the mountain passes in the Sierra Nevadas. Three feet of snow had fallen near Denver. So we did what any rational traveler (if you call "driving across the country in the dead of winter" rational): we went south. The alternate route itself would take a little longer according to Googlemaps, but we would make up for it in missing weather delays. We were right! For the most part, anyway.
South on I-5 was an exact copy of what we had when we went to San Diego for Thanksgiving. But four hours later when we reached Bakersfield we took a swing to the east that would last us for the next 39 hours. We were now on I-40, a road system that closely follows the historic Route 66. We passed by roadsigns for Kingman, Barstow, San Bernadino... (just click on the previous link for the original Nat King Cole song!) A quick stop for some hot food past Bakersfield got us on our way. We would take turns driving, switching seats every time we filled up the tank. This worked out to be about 5 1/2 hours each and 300 miles (click here for a geeky spreadsheet). Not too bad. Dan started this trip so at Bakersfield I took over. We passed through some great mountains and Dan slept. To be fair, we each made a conscious effort to sleep when it wasn't our turn to drive. We had equipped the Navigator's seat with one standard pillow, one neck pillow, two blankets, ear plugs and an eye cover. The seat reclined back quite far and sleep was rather comfortable.
While the "navigator" slept, the driver had his own amenities: a GPS that gave a countdown to the next location (which is eerily accurate), books on tape (well, books on CD), an iPod full of music and many unreliable radio stations. The back seat was full of food and drinks and if nothing else, there was the scenery to take in.
There isn't much to say about this stretch of road in the desert southwest. It's fairly flat, somewhat straight and there's not a lot of civilization through here. We switched drivers again in Grants, NM and again in Amarillo, TX. The highlight of this portion of the trip was when I drove into Albuquerque: the moon was just rising in the east, a fat quarter moon weighing heavily over some vague horizon. The brilliant lights of the city (17 exits!!!) lit up the valley below me as I worked my way down a shallow range. I took no pictures, so you'll just have to imagine it.
Poor Dan had the duty of driving us, in the rude hours of the middle of the night, through the bleakness of the rest of Texas and most of Oklahoma. I woke up in time to take over in Tulsa, OK. At least I had some gently rolling hills to give my eyes something to look at during my shift. Thus far, the roads had been dry and clear. The weather was cold but clear and the wind gusts strong out of the west. I never once saw a slack flag for the entire trip, with even the largest swatches of cloth standing at attention in the breeze. In Tulsa we stopped at a grocery store and stocked up on some tasty tidbits to eat in the car. It was mid-morning on Sunday, maybe 10 am, and it had warmed up to a balmy 22F. I drove the next shift through the rest of Oklahoma and through 2/3rds of Missouri. I always thought that Missouri was a pretty state, but this time of year it was hard to find anything really "pretty" about it. The farms were fallow, the trees were bare and the grasses were dead. I recommend seeing Missouri in the late spring time if you have a choice. Dan took over as the sun was begining its second descent in our rear window. The temperature dropped accordingly, being only 11F at our last gas stop.
I slept soundly while Dan drove us across the Hell that is Indiana. I don't know why I don't like these southern Great Lake States. Perhaps they're too flat, too populated yet too desolate at the same time. Regardless, I didn't miss much by sleeping through the early hours of nighttime.
Finally, the last leg of our east-bound journey! I woke up in time to take over for the quick jaunt through the rest of Indiana, north through Ohio to the edge of Lake Erie and then follow the shoreline to Erie, PA. Easy-peasey! Dan slept soundly as I motored along. There was some interchange fun around Columbus, OH and then straight north to Cleveland. And that's when the snow began. At first it was light and didn't stick. Then it started to stick to the sides of the road. Next was a thin layer on the road itself. Keep in mind that 1) this wasn't my car 2) I hadn't driven in snow for (gasp!) 13 years and 3) I had been in the car for the last 38+ hours. So I took it easy. Traffic at this hour (around midnight local time) was thin so I had few tracks to follow and not a lot of help nearby if I needed it. But this wasn't too bad. Slow and steady wins the race. Then I took the exit for I-90.
Before we left California, the front page of weather.com had as its leading story "Snowstorm Hits Great Lake Area" which should have warned me. But I lived in Erie for 25 years: I knew what those "snowstorms" were really like. I laughed in the face of weather.com! And then I actually drove through the snowstorm and reconsidered my laughter. The winds were fierce, coming off an as-of-yet unfrozen lake, full of moisture that froze into small, light crystals and blew across the road. Passing semis kicked up so much snow I couldn't see for what seemed like an eternity. The road surface was fully of slightly mushy snow. The "four season tires" on Dan's Honda Civic gave me very little confidence and I sincerely wanted the comfort of driving my '71 VW Beetle through this. At least I knew what that car was capable of.
I dropped my speed down to 10 ~ 20mph, matching the pace of the semis in front and behind of me. Other drivers had given up on trying to pass and were content to stay in the one visible lane and putter along. I watched the exits as we passed them: they were all snow covered and for the most part, indistinguishable from the white fields on either side. Even if I did want to get off the highway, could I? By now Dan had woken up and was sharing my concern. We crossed the Ohio/Pennsylvania border and I knew that we were almost home. It would have been about 45 minutes on a warm, sunny day. But today? I didn't even know if I could get there. Now keep in mind that I'll drive through anything. I've taken my motorcycles out on snowy roads and through hail and sleet storms. I drove my beetle through a snowstorm that closed my college for only the second time in a fifty plus year history. I took out the family car despite the city declaring a snow emergency and shared the road with snowmobiles. Driving a four-wheeled car in a little bit of white stuff shouldn't have caused me to blink. But blink I did. I didn't like this at all and I was done with it. A couple of tire tracks marked the way to a well-lit exit and I made my way up the ramp, fortunately timing the light at the top so I didn't have to stop on the slope. I pulled into the gas station where we contemplated our options. Finally, after talking to a couple of people and taking their comments into consideration, we decided to stop for the night. It was about 4:30 am locally when we got a room at a motel on the other side of the highway. We slept for six hours.
The next morning it was still snowing, but according the weather reports (I was paying attention this time!) there was a lull in the morning before another storm moved in that afternoon. It was already 11:30 so we hurridly packed up and brushed off the car. I could see traffic moving steadily along the interstate so I figured that we'd be ok. It was, again, slow going (I think I averaged 20mph) but we finally made it to Erie. I shunned the more direct route to my parents' house because the exit hadn't been plowed and looked to have about 6" of snow on it. Instead we took I-79 into the city and found it to be clear. True to the "lake effect", the snow accumalated not so much along the lake itself, but instead on the ridge a few miles inland from the lake - exactly where they built the highway. Someone should be fired for that bonehead plan.
Time passed and it was time to move on. We had another family to visit! On Saturday we packed up the car (and "borrowed" a snow brush!) to head north. Dan's family lives near Toronto, Ontario and we had a short, 3 1/2 hour drive in front of us. Child's play! The weather had warmed up considerably, to the point of melting the foot of snow on the lawns and exposing green grass. I packed the car while wearing a t-shirt, it was so warm out. Oh, the fickleness of weather! It rained most of the drive through Pennsylvania and New York, the lake just out of sight on our left. We crossed the border with little fanfare. The winds were blowing again and a thick fog had risen as we crossed over the Peace Bridge and into Canada. A little more driving through Ontario and then we were at our second port of call: Whitby, ON.
More family fun ensued, as well as Dan coming down with a very nasty sinus cold that made him miserable. But we visited and saw the sights and ate. Ah yes, moms are universal in their desire to put as much food as possible in front of others.
I was really struck by the difference in new home construction between Ontario and just about every place I've been to in the US. In the US, I can almost guarantee that a newly constructed house will be timber framed with as little ornamentation as possible. Stick them close together - but not too close - pretending that each family has a "yard" to call their own. But I found an entirely new pattern here. In what I saw, new construction was brick and covered in details. Gingerbread decorations in the eaves, high pitched roofs, turrets, stone cornices, houses packed closer together to promote higher density living but with lots of green space between rows...I wish I had taken better pictures. Overall, what I got from Canada was a sense of pride and permanence. They built things as if they were planning on sticking around for a while and wanted their structures to last. Conversely, the feeling I get in the States is that people build as quickly and cheaply as possible and don't give a damn about what will happen 5 or 10 years down the road.
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Time flies when you're having fun, and it was already time to head back home. It was Thursday morning on New Year's Day. We would attempt to do the same drive-style as we did on our way east, but we were going to be daring and drive straight across the country on I-80 instead of dipping south. We had checked the weather reports and they all looked fairly clear. We started out with high winds (of course) but clear skies. This was good, as it had snowed quite a bit while we were in Ontario and I wasn't sure what the road conditions might be like when it was time to leave.
A quick stop at the border to get Dan's paperwork in order (those darn aliens!) and then it was on through Michigan! I was actually surprised at how nice Michigan looked. There were a lot of trees and farmland and it probably helped that we avoided Detroit like the plague. I saw a large number of Canadian Geese flying overhead and some of the American home developments that I dispise so much. Michigan passed behind us and now we were in Illinois and then Iowa.
Dan was awake and keeping me company as we started to climb into the Nevada mountains. The sky was blue with big clouds, but I could see in the distance that this fair weather wasn't to last. And it didn't. As we gained elevation the clouds got more threatening until finally they started to spit rain, then sleet, and finally snow onto the windshield. The wipers pushed it off as fast as it landed and when we pulled into Wells, Nevada for our fuel stop we wondered if we'd have to wait out the storm here. So close, yet so far!
I spoke with an unfeeling gas station attendant who was content in his monosyballic "doom and gloom" answers, assuring us that we'd meet certain death if we ventured westward in a storm such as this, what with the passes to crest and the continuing storm. Uncertain of this man's credibility, we went across the street to inquire futher. I was assured by a young attendant that the worse of the storm had passed and that the snowplows (of which we'd seen two of already) were very good at keeping the roads clear. I left the decision of whether or not to continue up to Dan, as it was his turn to drive. He decided that we'd go for it. We knew that we had a couple of more passes to clear before we could drop down out of the mountains and into the relative safety of the Winnemucca "lowlands". But our alternatives weren't very appealing: stay over night in Wells, NV (pop. 1,346!) or backtrack two hours to Salt Lake City and then detour south all the way to Bakersfield and come back up the central California valley. I agreed with Dan on pressing onward.
