BS: Road Trip Moments

Subject: BS: Road Trip Moments
From: GUEST,Nick E
Date: 13 May 11 - 08:03 PM

We have all taken a road trip or two. Road trips are a journey and a break from our routine even in our wilder days. On those road trips there are often moments in our lives we will never forget. This thread asks what moments got stuck in your head? Please tell us!

I'll start....

On a whirlwind trip to a wedding, I chanced to travel through Death Valley where the temp was 109 degrees. We had a few beers during the trip so I asked the driver to pull the car over so I could relieve myself.
As I stood with my my Johnson in my hand in that heat in Death Freaking Valley the driver, my good friend, slowly pulled out of the pull-off, leaving me feeling rather vulnerable.
Obviously he did not leave me there but I think it is pretty funny.

Subject: RE: BS: Road Trip Moments
From: gnu
Date: 13 May 11 - 10:02 PM

Great thread idea. I may see if I can twist some of my road trips in the backwoods so that they seem barely believable... may take a while. >;-)

Subject: RE: BS: Road Trip Moments
From: Bill D
Date: 13 May 11 - 11:51 PM

I drove the "Oh, my God road" from Central City, Colorado down to I-95.

Look it up... (to be fair, it was a pretty nice day, and we didn't meet any trucks.. )

Subject: RE: BS: Road Trip Moments
From: ChanteyLass
Date: 14 May 11 - 12:49 AM

My fiance and I were driving from MA (him) and RI (me) in a camper we'd built to get married in Reno in '73 with plans to continue to CA after the wedding. It wasn't an elopement. My dad was supposed to fly out to Reno to attend the wedding. I wanted no part of the usual weeding hoopla that would have been expected if I got married at home. Mom had died in '71; if she'd lived I probably would have gone along with the regular church wedding stuff. However, in Wamsutter, WY, we reached the top of a hill and I saw debris in the passing lane. I was driving, and I knew that there was a car getting ready to pass us. Our camper was built onto a pickup truck, so I was up high and could easily see the debris but worried (in the few seconds I had) that the other car might not. I also figured the truck's space between the truck's wheels were wide enough to go on either side of the debris but the car's might not be able to do that. I signaled and changed lanes. However, I hit the debris and the truck/camper did a 360 rollover with the driver's side hitting the pavement first. The driver's window shattered. The driver of the car came over to thank us before a rescue vehicle arrived to take us to a hospital in Rawlins, Wyoming. In the rescue vehicle I kept silently reciting multiplication tables and spelling words. I was an elementary school teacher and was afraid I had brain damage and would be unable to work. (A friend later said if I had brain damage, I might not have known if my calculations and spellings were wrong. Maybe I did have brain damage, because I didn't think of that at the time!) The doctor who stitched me up in surgery had had experience in 'Nam, so he knew how to stitch someone together. I got over 1,000 stitches in my head and a few on my left upper back and wrist. My fiance needed about 4 stitches, but he stuck by me in the hospital. When I was brought from recovery to a regular room, one of the staffers said, "You'll be in a room with a 13-year-old colored (his word) girl who was also in an car accident." I've always wondered if he said that in case I was prejudiced. (I remember an episode of All in the Family with Archie Bunker in the hospital spouting all kinds of racist remarks. Then someone opened the curtain between the two beds and he realized his roommate was African-American.) My fiance and I ended up getting married by a justice of the peace in the Pawtucket, RI, City Hall. About 12 years later he fell in love with someone else, but in the meantime we had a wonderful son.

Subject: RE: BS: Road Trip Moments
From: katlaughing
Date: 14 May 11 - 10:50 AM

ChanteyLass, knowing Rawlins and Wyoming, and having worked for human rights there, it's mostly likely he used that word because it was the norm at the time. Even now, it can be heard, esp. among the older populations. Good, though, you had a knowledgeable surgeon and apparently no brain damage.:-)

BillD, that's nothing compared the Western Slope's Million Dollar Highway!**bg**

Subject: RE: BS: Road Trip Moments
From: Bill D
Date: 14 May 11 - 10:59 AM

Kat... when I was a wee sprout, (as in 60+ years ago)I was a passenger on the Million Dollar Highway in a 1935 Chevy. My mother told stories of that...and of 'Battle Mountain' in Winter in 1939, where she skidded and spun around 3 times with ME in a bassinet beside her....ending with one wheel hanging over a few hundred feet of nothing!

I think I like stories better that I don't remember.

Subject: RE: BS: Road Trip Moments
From: Janie
Date: 14 May 11 - 02:54 PM

During our craft show years, we headed to the Florida Keys every January loaded to the gills with enough inventory for 4-5 craft shows and week nights at Sunset Pier in Key West.               We drove a Ford F-250 4wd with a heavily beefed up suspension, an oversized custom-built topper, the heaviest-duty tires available to handle the weight, and pulled a travel trailer.

One particularly star-crossed trip really stands out.

Part I.

The day before departure, Will had new tires put on the truck, as well as a new spare.   Tube tires.   He made 3 trips back to the tire place that day.   Pinched tube=flat tire.   Metal filings from rimming left between tube and tire=flat tire.   Air stem improperly lined up and twisted=flat tire.   Got up the next morning to hitch the trailer.   Another flat tire.   After getting it fixed, drove around our local area for several hours to try to make sure the tire problems were finally resolved. By early evening decided all was well at last and headed south on I-77.   Planned to drive as far as Charlotte, NC that night - normally about 4 hours.    More than 24 hours and 4 flat tires later, we had made it through Charlotte to Rock Hill, SC, where we had our 5th flat tire.   It was about midnight.   A state trooper stopped, and when he heard our tire tale of woe took us into Rock Hill where he scared up a little wiry fellow in a small pick-up who specialized in on-road tire repair for 18 wheelers.   That little fellow, (quite a character,) took us back to our stranded vehicle, removed the wheel from the truck, removed the tire from the wheel, replaced the tube and got us on our way again.   All by flashlight (held by Will,) and with simple hand tools.   The only power tool he had was the air compressor he used to re-inflate the tube.   We set out again, holding our breath, so to speak, but it was clear sailing to Miami from that point on.

Coming into Miami, we hear a metallic clunk, pull over, and discover the suspension was not beefed up enough.   Broken leaf spring.   Spent a sweltering night in Miami in the travel trailer, parked on the street outside of the place that was going to fix it the next day, in a very rough part of town.



Part II.

We stay in Miami to do the Coconut Grove festival, then head on down to Sugarloaf Key to set up base camp and to have a few days to play before the next show.   We had just bought the sailing rig for our Folboat.   The campground was within portage distance from one end of Sugarloaf Sound, a very protected, very shallow little sound which seemed like a good place to learn to sail the kayak.   If we capsized (which we did several times,) it was shallow enough that we could stand to right and bail the boat and get back in without too much trouble.   Our biggest fear was of breaking the mast on the shallow bottom.

Now, I had never sailed anything at all, and Will had not sailed anything but a sunfish at camp one summer when he was 15. The wind was with us, light - it doesn't take much wind to sail a kayak - and we had a great time sailing down the length of the sound.   We initially had a great time trying to sail back.   The wind began to pick-up a little, and we gradually realized we were no longer making any headway as we tacked back and forth across the sound.   It picked up a little more, and we were now losing ground.    Lesson learned - those two little side-boards that are part of the sailing rig are not sufficient to allow a beamy, 14', flat-bottomed canvas boat to sail upwind except in the gentlest of breezes.   The light was beginning to fade, so we put ashore.   We decided to hide the boat in the mangroves, hike the 5 miles back to camp and fetch the truck to haul the kayak back.   US 1 was only a few hundred yards away, and there was a dirt track running up to it not too far from where we hid the kayak.

It was about 9:00 pm by the time we got back to the boat with the truck.   The mangrove flat between the highway and the sound was dry, and almost as hard as pavement.   In our ignorance, we thought it was solid ground.   One often sees cars and jeeps go off-road onto the flats. However, we weren't in a car or jeep. We were in that big, honking, overloaded F250.

Turns out that hard surface is a 6-9 inch crust overtop of bottomless muck.   Boat loaded, we start to drive out. The rear wheels abruptly break through that hard crust, and we are instantly up to the rear axle in mangrove muck.

Now, being from West Virginia, being herbalists and wildcrafters who spent a lot of time on old logging tracks or going off-road in the mountains, we knew about getting stuck in mud.   That is why we always travelled with a come-along, yards of webbing and rope, 3 hydraulic jacks, and an interesting assortment of boards and blocks of wood in various shapes and thicknesses. No tree trunks in sight, so forget the winch in this situation. Time to jack and block.   The more we jacked, the deeper the jack and blocks sunk. About midnight, we started our 2nd 5 mile hike back to campground to await daylight and inspiration.

This was back before the Keys had become a "destination."   The campground on Sugarloaf was fairly large, but there weren't but 4 occupied campsites, ours included.    One site was occupied by a retired couple. The man, who I'll call the General, overheard Will and I talking about our predicament on his way to the campground office. He walked over to offer to help.   He pointed across to his campsite to a shiny new purple jeep with an electric winch attached to the front.   Will thanked him, but explained he was pretty sure our truck was too heavy.   The General was insistent that he try, so we piled into his jeep and headed back to the truck.   He hooked the truck to his winch, turned it on, and we watched as the winch pulled the jeep toward the truck.   The General headed back to the campground to call a tow truck for us, then came back. We had become his project for the day. The tow truck took a look at the situation and said he couldn't help - was afraid his truck would end up in the same predicament as ours.   The General was not pleased.   Called the tow truck driver a sissy.   Will and I decided to unload the truck and then try to jack and block again. Then maybe the jeep could winch us out.

The General wants to help. The General is also drinking - nipping from a little silver flask. It ain't 10:00 am yet, but this is the Florida Keys.   His eyes pop when we open the back of the truck. Remember I said the topper was oversized and custom-built?   It was a cab-over topper, built higher than usual and partitioned into 3 levels.   There was a plywood "floor" built at the height of the truck walls, and another one at cab height.   We had done only one show, so all three levels were still packed tight. The General says he'll be back, and drives off.   We figure we have seen the last of him.    We finish the tedious job of off-loading the entire contents of the truck onto tarps spread on the ground, then pull out the jacks again.   We realize the truck has sunk more overnight, and the transmission casing is perilously close to becoming mired. We had retrieved more boards and blocks from the trailer, and we set to work to see what we can do.

To our surprise, the General reappears an hour or so later, a bit more drunk, but he has rallied the troups.   Behind him are two more cars carrying 7 people, the entire male population of the campground, most of them young construction workers down for fishing and serious beer guzzling.   Picks, shovels, more boards and blocks appear.   Beer tabs get popped. Much digging, debating, trying of this and that.   Up on the highway, a car pulls over, and two more young men stop and hike down to see if they can help. A semi driver does the same, and then another one.   Before too long, there are 5 cars and two tractor-trailors pulled over, their occupants all come to see what is going on and to offer help.   For 3 hours they dig, jack, block, drink and cuss.   The jacks keep sinking, though not quite as fast.   Several attempts are made to pull the truck with the jeep winch, sometimes with jacks in place and everyone standing well clear, and sometimes with jacks removed and as many pushing as can find purchase. We are all covered in muck flung up by spinning tires. The winch is tried one last time, to no avail.   Will and I look at each other, and accept we are going to have to actually abandon the truck. We don't even want to think about what that means.   We thank everyone for their tremendous generosity of time and effort, assure them we will figure out something, and shake hands all around.   

His nose glowing red, his eyes bleary and bloodshot, the General suddenly stands up a bit straighter and loudly says we have to try one last time.   Will shakes his head, but the General insists, and the troups rally.    Someone suggests that as many as can get in the jeep to add more weight. Sounds harebrained (or drunk brained) to Will and I who, aside from the truck drivers are the only sober people on site by now, but we concede, merely to placate the old man and the crowd.   Nothing has changed and there is no reason to hope, but this diverse group of men have invested a lot in this challenge and we have nothing more to lose.

The General points at a handful of guys and orders them into the jeep.   He orders Will into the truck cab, and arranges the rest of us to his liking at various points behind and on the sides of the truck.   "Don't do nuthin' 'til I blow the horn. Then start screaming and pushing as loud and as hard as you can.   Will, you an' me gonna floor the gas pedals at the same time. Don't worry about too much torque, worryin' about it hasn't helped any so far. We gonna get this sucker out of here!"    He marches to the jeep and climbs behind the wheel. "One! Two! Three!" HOONNNKKKK!!!!!!!!!!!!!

Engines rev.   Warriors scream.   Tires spin.   Muck flies.   Suddenly, the truck lurches up and forward, literally popping up out of the muck like a cork.   Will drives forward to higher ground then stops.    Briefly, we all just stare,   stunned. Then a huge cheer goes up.   Something akin to magic has just happened.

Part III

The rest of our stay was pretty uneventful.   We worked hard when we had to and played hard when we could.   The end of February we packed up to head back to West Virginia.   As always, the last day was busy with packing and sorting, taking inventory so we knew exactly what we needed to do when we got home to get ready for the next round of craft shows, etc.   We finally finished and settled at the picnic table to eat supper and enjoy our last evening.   I happened to glance over at the truck, and could barely believe what I saw - a flat tire.

Subject: RE: BS: Road Trip Moments
From: Mrrzy
Date: 14 May 11 - 03:01 PM

I was driving cross-country with a friend, from Maryland to California, and we knew that some other friends were driving from Calif to MD, and with no plans to do so, we ran into each other the day before we (the Western-heading pair) got to the Grand Canyon! It was amazing.

We were traveling in Africa once, in an American car, and we got rear-ended by a taxi, and not only did the door fall off the taxi and the driver fall out into the road, but the headlights of the taxi popped out and the front fender dropped off. We had not even a dent. It was like a comic strip...

Subject: RE: BS: Road Trip Moments
From: ChanteyLass
Date: 14 May 11 - 03:25 PM

Janie, you had a run of bad luck and a sea trip as well as a water trip!

Mrrzy, what were the taxi driver's injuries? Did he have passengers? I gather everyone in your car was okay.

Subject: RE: BS: Road Trip Moments
From: GUEST,Eliza
Date: 14 May 11 - 04:57 PM

I was travelling alone in Senegal, in a taxi, along a track full of potholes and craters, deep in 'the bush' in Casamance, when suddenly a large troupe of monkeys shot out in front of us. The driver braked and swerved, and we hit a baobab tree. Luckily neither I nor the driver was hurt, but the taxi had a large dent in the front. The taxi, like most African taxis, was full of sand and the 'seats' were motheaten and quite dirty, but I always loved my journeys in them. The drivers were usually lovely, and looked after me so well. I gave this driver quite a bit of money to repair his vehicle, but I saw it again much later, the dent was still there. I expect he used the cash to but food for his family! I never again saw monkeys on my journeys, just that once.

Subject: RE: BS: Road Trip Moments
From: GUEST,Eliza
Date: 14 May 11 - 04:58 PM

to BUY food for his family!

Subject: RE: BS: Road Trip Moments
From: gnu
Date: 14 May 11 - 05:57 PM

Eliza... gee... I was gonna tell of "road trips" in the backwoods of Kent County, New Brunswick but they would pale to yours. Tell us more?

Ummmm... why would you give the taxi driver $ to fix his taxi?

Subject: RE: BS: Road Trip Moments
From: GUEST,Eliza
Date: 15 May 11 - 07:10 AM

Hi there gnu! I often went to Senegal via Gambia, as Banjul airport is quite near the Senegal border, and you can get to Casamance across country from there. Casamance is a region I like very much, very unspoiled. I stayed in a 'campement', a hut thing, with a well and no electricity. I always chose a taximan from among the hordes outside Banjul airport to take me the four hour journey along the rough tracks in the bush, to Abene. Once in my 'campement', I hired a taximan from the nearby village to take me out to Ziginchor, Djouloulou, Kafontine etc. I usually had the same Abene man for the whole of my stay, then he would drive me back to Banjul. It was on a trip to Djouloulou that the monkeys shot out in front of us. The Senegal folk are very poor, and the taxi was this man's livelihood. I felt duty bound really to pay him to get it fixed. He was a Djola, a sweet tribe of rather elfin-type looks, with little beards on the end of their chins. I have always given all I could to help the Africans I met along the way in West Africa. In spite of my anxious friends' terrors that I'd get raped, kidnapped, robbed or murdered, I had nothing but kindness, help, friendliness and courtesy from the folk I met. I was often near to tears, as everything there was so lovely. My Ivorian husband scoffs, as he knows only too well the hell that Africa can be for the inhabitants, but I'll always cherish my memories of those travels alone, I'd never felt so happy.

Subject: RE: BS: Road Trip Moments
From: Stu
Date: 15 May 11 - 09:35 AM

Last year, after a week digging dinosaurs in the sweltering heat of the Hell Creek formation Mrs Sugarfoot Jack and I hired a car and set out from Rapid City, SD to Yellowstone where we were staying a few days in the cabins by the lake.

On day two of the drive, after leaving Buffalo on the 4th July (biscuits and gravy for brekkers - yum!) we set out over the Bighorns. We then dropped into the Bighorn Basin at Ten Sleep and continued on Route 16 for Cody. Halfway across the plains we turned the radio on and it automatically chose a Classic Rock station. The next song on was Born in the USA, the one after was Running Down a Dream. We're fans of The Boss and Tom Petty, and it was such a brilliant feeling to be tooling down the highway heading for adventure listening to two of our all-time faves.

Subject: RE: BS: Road Trip Moments
From: GUEST,number 6
Date: 15 May 11 - 10:31 AM

I drove through Boston city central 3 times, and all 3 times at rush hour ... talk about a momentous road trip through Hell !

biLL

Subject: RE: BS: Road Trip Moments
From: Bill D
Date: 15 May 11 - 11:40 AM

Oh, Janie....Janie...Janie....

That story is beyond belief. All you needed was Bobert to 'help' the General!

Subject: RE: BS: Road Trip Moments
From: Charmion
Date: 15 May 11 - 03:58 PM

Not dramatic or even pathetic, and in fact just a moment out of a road trip ...

Edmund and I were heading down the Blue Ridge Parkway on our first long road trip together, in my old (1986) VW diesel Golf. The car had no air-conditioning, or indeed any of the other amenities most people consider essential to long-distance road travel, so the windows were wide open.

On a certain stretch of the road, I gradually came to realize that the short trees on the other side of the barrier were not short, but the very tippy-top of very tall trees. Then, looking into the outside rear-view mirror, I saw a large brown raptor-type bird apparently following the car. I slowed down, unable to keep my eyes on the road (the twisty, not very wide road), as the bald eagle flew past us at window height less than six feet away.

Subject: RE: BS: Road Trip Moments
From: gnu
Date: 15 May 11 - 06:22 PM

Soooo... it's 99 km from the Back Road to Popple Depot. And back it's the same. Buddy is loaded and I see him lose a smoke out of the passenger window on the rough road. I slam on the brakes and say we gotta go back and find that smoke so it doesn't start a fire. He asks, "What about the other two? And, when we go back for them, what about Trent? Should we look for him too?"

Now, Trent was supposed to be sleeping it off in the camper on the back of the truck but apparently buddy thought it would be funny to leave him at Popple Depot propped up against a pine tree for the skeeters ta eat him.

Fookin Bluenosers and Capers eh?

I stopped lookin after Trent right after I saved him from tryin ta get the top half of a borrowed expensive fly rod out of the river after his cast sent it into 4 feet of 6mph water on spring melt. I actually had to grab his shirt tail and tell him NO! He still is pissed off about the cost of the rod. But that's a good thing on accounta he is still alive.

Dunno if that counts as a road trip, but, if so, I got three days of "city boy" tales on that one long weekend.

Subject: RE: BS: Road Trip Moments
From: Janie
Date: 15 May 11 - 11:08 PM

Camping out on the Content Keys, one March. A Prothonotary Warbler, utterly spent from the long spring migratory flight over the Gulf from the Yucatan or further south landed on the ridge pole of our tent, and ate dried fruit from my hand.

Subject: RE: BS: Road Trip Moments
From: Janie
Date: 15 May 11 - 11:08 PM

Definitely counts, gnu!

Subject: RE: BS: Road Trip Moments
From: GUEST,mg
Date: 15 May 11 - 11:37 PM

I don't hjave anything interesting, but there have been several incidents lately of people dying after using GPS to take these shortcuts through mountains. HOpe no one is tempted. mg

Subject: RE: BS: Road Trip Moments
From: Charmion
Date: 16 May 11 - 10:22 AM

Edmund and I always hit the road with at least a big road atlas and a collection of Google Maps notes, which -- correctly compiled -- turn out remarkably like what Army truckers call a route card. We also help ourselves liberally to the excellent road maps handed out free of charge at state, provincial and municipal tourism offices and visitors' centres.

We frequently take a wrong turn and sometimes get slightly mislaid (never lost), but never for more than an hour. But of course we actually learned how to read maps when we were young, and we practise that skill consistently. Google Maps is a very nice adjunct to a road map but not a replacement because the directions don't include waymarks. You can make any road trip in North America safely without Google Maps directions, but doing it without a proper road map is more frazzle than it's worth.

I have no intention of buying a GPS for the car, and I don't see myself even tempted to change my mind until a device comes along that includes topographical information and distinguishes various grades of road. (That's how people get into trouble; the GPS can't tell the difference between a tertiary road and a temporary or seasonal trail.) The typical motorist's GPS of today is really just one more expensive thing to twiddle with in the car, and attract thieves to the car if the driver doesn't have the common sense to dismount and hide it when s/he parks the vehicle and walks away.

Subject: RE: BS: Road Trip Moments
From: gnu
Date: 16 May 11 - 03:12 PM

BTW... Bluenosers are Nova Scotians and Capers are Cape Bretoners. And "city boys" are them what can't even be taken in the backwoods of New Brunswick without adult supervision.

There's a spot (many) I like to fish on that stretch a lumeber road. At Johnson Brook, they realigned the road and put in a new culvert to replace an old wooden bridge. Now, in late summer and early fall, when it's been dry weather for a few weeks, the deepest holes on a brook are at the bridges on accounta us engineers make em deep to slow the water and avoid scour of the abutments. On a hot sunny day trout lay in them holes in the shade.

Now, when the water is warm and there's plenty for the trout to eat, them trout won't bite. You can hit them on the nose with a big juicy worm and they will move away. But, if ya were brought up by my old man, ya know how to make em bite.

So, the Bluenoser is loaded again... it's noon. The Caper ate the breakfast I cooked and puked his guts out and refused a beer for the dog that bit him and spent most of the morning eating aspirin and trying to sleep. But, he couldn't on accounta I kept telling the Bluenoser stories and jokes and he'd laugh so loud it startled the Caper awake.

We stop at Johnson Brook and I take the Bluenoser down to the pool (hole) under the bridge and show him the trout. About 200 and some about 16" long. He fishes for about twenty minutes and can't get a bite even when he hits them on the nose with the worm.

So, I say I can make em bite the worm. He tells me I am full of it. I made a wager... if I catch some trout he has to quit drinking until after supper, do the driving and not leave Trent behind ever again.

I went back to the truck and got out the secret weapon. An 8 pound sledge hammer. I went back down and told the Bluenoser to swing it as hard as he could against the timbers and to keep doing that every ten seconds. After the third smack I hooked a 14" trout. Then a bunch more, including two 16" trout.

He asked me how I knew that would work. I answered, "Nice day if it don't rain." He was perplexed. Fookin city boy eh? Engineer too... well, an industrial engineer... maybe that explains it.

Not much of a "road trip" story but I like it.

Subject: RE: BS: Road Trip Moments
From: Dorothy Parshall
Date: 16 May 11 - 03:58 PM

I doubt anything can beat Janie's ordeal by mud!

In late May 1977, five of us set off from Montreal for a Quaker safari across Canada - not ALL of it, just a lot of it. Goal: to visit almost every isolated Friend and meeting or worship group between Montreal and Argenta, B.C. There was a schedule; appointments were in order; potlucks and hospitality arranged. And four new tires on the truck - a half ton with a plywood camper - homemade with a cleverly arranged innards designed and built by ME.

Having driven some north in Saskatchewan to visit a family up there, we were on our way down to Regina for a potluck on 7 June. My 14 year old son was thoroughly fed up with how long it took us to get on the road so he decided to walk for a while. We would pick him up along the way. We stopped at a store for some lunch stuff - like ice cream and blueberries. Some time later, we conferred about the fact that we had not yet found Taun. A very disgruntled mother said, "If he can't be where we can see him, he can make his own way to Regina!" (I hear motherly screams. It was only a few hours away and this IS Canada, in 1977.)

Sometime later, the two of us who were in the back of the truck with the two dogs, heard a noise. Wondering what it was, I also wondered how fast Gord was driving. As I wrapped my arms around a humungous sleeping bag to look through the window into the cab - only 50 mph - I felt a roll to the side and when I looked up -???- moments later? I was looking at the beautiful blue sky of SK, wondering why that wheel was up there. The sleeping bag was between my chest and the back of the truck; a firm foam pillow was between my back and the 2X4 that fractured my vertebrae. And instead of coming down totally on us, it had come down on a huge speaker of my son's ( Oh mom, could you bring...) that fell out of my cunningly designed storage.

The truck was totaled, Ruth had a broken nose, Gord had to put 100 stitches in his T-shirt, Bruce had bruised thighs and I had two fractured vertebrae, about 4 inches apart. Since it was my truck and these folks were my responsibility, I felt extremely grateful. We had gone off the road, upside down and backwards, in a place where the road and the ground were contiguous, no boulders, no cliffs, no ravines, no traffic, just soft prairie. Truckers stopped and radio-ed for help, lifted the back of the truck off us, and puled me out on the roof saying, "DON"T move me. Everything works now and I want to keep it that way." The Great Pyrenees cleaned up the ice cream and whatever other food she could get. The smaller dog was shell shocked. Her truck was gone!

The gang stayed in a camp ground, a Friend we had visited in Winnipeg visited me in the hospital during a bus stopover on her way to the NW territory, the folks up north sent flowers and a Friend in Regina came up with his Suburban and mattress to take me down there for recuperation. A week later, we continued in a station wagon,- named Faith because, "it takes a lot of faith to drive an 11 year old car over the Rockies" - purchased with a loan from Regina Friends, got in a couple more visits, attended the HS grad of my 17 year old son, in Argenta, and caught all the folks on the way east that we had had to miss.

The 14 year old? He hitched a ride with a farmer and was riding along in the old pick up truck when he saw - "That's our truck over there!" The police brought the remainder into the hospital and my son was REALLY glad to see me. So was Troy when we got to Argenta.

And that is why I have a soft spot for Yorkton and the beautiful blue skies of SK.

Subject: RE: BS: Road Trip Moments
From: gnu
Date: 16 May 11 - 08:45 PM

Good Lord Dot! Frightening!

Subject: RE: BS: Road Trip Moments
From: ChanteyLass
Date: 16 May 11 - 11:00 PM

Dorothy! Ouch!

Subject: RE: BS: Road Trip Moments
From: Janie
Date: 16 May 11 - 11:33 PM

Dorothy, you ended up in the hospital, while I merely ended up slimy with mud!

But what really stands out in both our tales is the kindness of strangers. During those years of traveling up and down the East Coast doing craft shows, going deep into the mountains to gather herbs, or dig sassafras and slippery elm root bark, we had many adventures and misadventures. The memories that most stay with me are those of strangers who stopped and helped, or put us up when we got stranded by broken boats or vehicles, or who otherwise went the extra mile for two people and a couple of dogs they knew not at all and would never see again.

Subject: RE: BS: Road Trip Moments
From: Charmion
Date: 17 May 11 - 09:06 AM

Setting out from Fredericton, New Brunswick, bound for Ontario during the winter of 1983-'84, I was driving a diesel-fuelled 1980 Volkswagen Rabbit, a vehicle best described as a diesel engine mounted in an orange crate. Domestic diesel cars were rare in Canada back then, especially in the Maritime provinces, and I usually had to line up for fuel with the delivery trucks and 18-wheelers at the *big* island.

On the Trans-Canada Highway, halfway between Fredsville and Woodstock, I stopped at an Irving station to tank up -- my car, as usual, looking like a Chihuahua between Great Danes. That aspect of my business done, I headed in to the diner for a late breakfast. At the big round table by the window (the only table, in fact), I sat down between the truckers with my single fried egg and McCain's hash browns. Slurping their coffee and shovelling toast and bacon into their maws, they levelled an assessing glare at me.

After a prolonged silence broken only by the champing of large jaws, the biggest, hairiest of the lot swallowed and said, "Hey honey; what are ya haulin' today?"

Subject: RE: BS: Road Trip Moments
From: Dorothy Parshall
Date: 17 May 11 - 12:02 PM

The kindness of strangers is very important! The most important thing to me at the time was that we were all OK. R and G had tightened their seat belts - for a change. Taun was not with us do no one was in that terrible middle spot where the back window frame had bent into the cab like a huge knife. It was like the hundred million miracles happened that day. We were chastened but not beaten. It gave some of us great pause to consider our existence. And 34 years later, we are each still healthy and living productive lives. My back is beginning to recognize the damage done then but not too much - as long as I keep active. "They" told me it would bother me the rest of my life. "They" were wrong - as "they" so often are!

Wonderful how people rise to the occasion when help is needed!

Subject: RE: BS: Road Trip Moments
From: Dorothy Parshall
Date: 17 May 11 - 12:11 PM

Actually, that sort of event does give one a new perspective. A few years later I was driving an 11 year old Volvo to eastern New Brunswick. Ny the time I reached my destination it was down to 35 mph. A friend looked at it and fixed the universal joint. "What would have happened?" "Well, the drive shaft could have come up through the floor into you." Ouch!

As I drove back westward, the rattle in a wheel became quite offensive. So much so that I did not drive back to the Canadian Tire a mile or so back but stopped at an immediate service station. The man took off the hub cap and turned white. "Your wheel almost fell off!" "Well, once you've had a truck land on top of you. nothing else seems too bad." He repaired it and I made it back to Montreal without further ado.

Subject: RE: BS: Road Trip Moments
From: gnu
Date: 17 May 11 - 03:30 PM

I was comin outta Fredericton and hit the four lane and cranked it. Spotted a Yella Stripe ahead and slowed down to 110kph. Stayed behind him all the way to Moncton (100+ km). Exited and cranked it to 140kph and I could feel a "wobble" a "float" to the side... windy I guessed but I noticed the trees weren't shakin. Arrived home, pit stop, went out to the truck to go get milk, backed up 8 feet and the right front wheel buckled sideways. Called a tow truck.

At the garage, the mechanic had to beat the opposing wheel to the side as the idle arm had let go. When he did that, the idler arm on that side fell on the floor. Gone! Both of them! 4 years old!!!! The new arms they put on were twice as heavy!

Good thing God sent that Yella Stripe so I wouldn't speed home that day. Too bad God can't do something about the bastards at Ford. 1998 F150 built Ford Tough... yeah, right!

Subject: RE: BS: Road Trip Moments
From: Mrrzy
Date: 17 May 11 - 06:08 PM

No injuries, unless you count Daddy pulling something laughing so hard...

(Guest)Eliza, yes indeed, WAWA (West Africa Wins Again!) happens...

Subject: RE: BS: Road Trip Moments
From: Charmion
Date: 17 May 11 - 06:10 PM

My second car, the only non-VW I ever owned, was a Datsun F10 -- remember those? I drove it through my third and fourth undergraduate years in Kingston, Ontario. Bad car, very bad car.

I unexpectedly inherited a bit of money in 1983 and used it to buy a better set of wheels. The Datsun was truly clapped out, rusted as only a 1970s Ontario-drive Datsun could get, and I knew its destination had to be the junkyard.

On the appointed day, the junkyard guy gave me $150 for it because at least it still ran. As he handed me the cheque, there was an odd crunching noise -- and there was the car, sort of down on its elbow. The passenger-side wheel had come off, some essential component of the underpinnings having finally given way.

The junkyard guy tried to take the cheque back, but I was too fast for him.

Subject: RE: BS: Road Trip Moments
From: gnu
Date: 17 May 11 - 06:27 PM

Datsun F?... can't recall...

My buddy and I were driving to Fredericton and, on a loooong curve, the headlights went out at about 100mph. He road the curve out in darkness and got on the straightaway and got it on the shoulder. Falshlight and a fuse replacement and we made it to F'ton but it was tight asshole when the lights went out.

That sucker would do 105mph. And, if he pushed the accelerator to the floor the cable would stick. Once, the Yella Stripes chased him and he did that... the cop came up to the car and screamed for him to shut it down. He opened the hood and the cop flicked the cable and told him he was lucky and to get it fixed... and walked away. Nice trick.

Subject: RE: BS: Road Trip Moments
From: Dorothy Parshall
Date: 17 May 11 - 08:42 PM

Gnu, we must have related vehicles. I was heading from Halifax to Montreal when the lights went out, somewhere east of Fredericton. Slept, sort of, in the overloaded car 'til morning. Got the battery charged and limped into F where the generator was replaced. Let's see, that was the 1965 Valiant, I think, around 1970 - only five years old. Replaced the muffler every summer, tripping around the hills/dirt roads of NS. Got lost a couple times and wondered if I would ever see a human again - with two young boys in the car. Those were the days, my friend, We thought would never end.... Are there still fun places like that?

Subject: RE: BS: Road Trip Moments
From: Charmion
Date: 18 May 11 - 12:53 PM

Yes. Try driving around northern Ontario, northern Manitoba, northern Quebec ...

Just get on the Trans-Canada Highway, stay on it until you're somewhere in the middle of the land mass, and then turn north.

Keep going.

Subject: RE: BS: Road Trip Moments
From: gnu
Date: 18 May 11 - 02:24 PM

Yes Charmion... when you see those signs "No Services Next XXX km" it gives one pause.

Subject: RE: BS: Road Trip Moments
From: Dorothy Parshall
Date: 18 May 11 - 10:26 PM

Does it ever! And I have been up there too, Charmion! The most boring trip is the 180 miles from Long Lac to whatever it was (forget). Like being on a treadmill for three hours! Thankful not to break down up there!

Subject: RE: BS: Road Trip Moments
From: Joe_F
Date: 19 May 11 - 11:38 PM

In the late '60s I was with a bunch of people in a VW microbus on the way from Long Island to New Paltz for a day of rockclimbing. It was drizzling, and the driver took a curve too fast on the approach to the Throggs Neck Bridge. The bus went off the road on the right, making a 270° yaw followed by a 270° roll, and ended up blocking two lanes of the highway on the side opposite to the one it had rolled toward. We rattled around inside, but all managed to climb out. A driver came around the curve, saw us, and braked, and the car behind rear-ended him. When I saw that, I ran around the curve, stood on the shoulder, and waved my arms. It later turned out that I had made an excellent danger sign in that I was bleeding profusely from a scratch on my scalp. We tilted the bus the remaining 90° back onto its wheels, and drove it off. Fortunately there was a hospital at the next exit, and we spent the rest of the day reading the Sunday Times & waiting to be examined, while more serious cases were wheeled past us (there are a lot of accidents on drizzly days). I saw one man walk out the door with his head extensively bandaged, pull a necktie out of his pocket & start to put it on, notice that it was soaked with blood, and put it back in his pocket. Eventually it was determined that none of us was badly hurt. A doctor stitched my scalp while lecturing an intern (no anesthesia needed, and scalp is highly vascular so you don't have to worry much about dirt).

In 1971 I was driving in my white Volvo, the Speeding Blintz, from Eau Claire, WI to Denver on the last leg of my trip to join a commune there. Toward evening I picked up a hitchhiker, a young man who was also headed for Denver. When the gas gauge got down to 1/4 I started looking for a gas station -- ordinarily a prudent time to start looking, but not on I80 in the wilds of Nebraska at night. Station after station was closed. Eventually we ran out of gas. I remembered the little cylinder of fuel for my camp stove, and emptied that in. It got us a little farther. I knew from the signs that there was a big truck stop a few miles ahead that would probably be open all night, so I started off on foot with my headlamp on my head, leaving the hitchhiker in the car. I tried to hitch a ride, but the little traffic on the road at that time of night was mostly trucks, and none of them stopped. Eventually a car stopped & picked me up. It was my car. Someone going the other way, possibly an angel but probably only a saint, had seen the car, guessed what had happened, made a loop to the truck stop, bought a gallon of gas, and delivered it to the hitchhiker without even introducing himself. So we made it to Denver about 3 a.m., and the hitchhiker put me up at his place so I wouldn't have to wake up the commune at that hour. He was clearly gay, and it would make the story perfect if I could say I got laid, but no.

God looks after fools.

Subject: RE: BS: Road Trip Moments
From: ChanteyLass
Date: 20 May 11 - 09:39 PM

Whoa! I don't consider myself a good driver, and I hate doing it. Stories like these make me hate it even more! Glad all of you have survived to tell about your misadventures. I'm also enjoying reading about the good times some of you have had.

Subject: RE: BS: Road Trip Moments
From: Janie
Date: 20 May 11 - 11:24 PM

The first time I saw sea otters - Point Lobos. 1987.


The first time I saw Bald Eagles in the wild - many of them. January 2, 2008 just above Port Deposit on the Susquehanna River, right below the dam.

On our belated honeymoon, scrambling up a hill off the track to find some privacy in the busy Muir Woods to make love under the redwoods - the only time I have ever seen redwoods - the light filtering through as in a cathedral.

Subject: RE: BS: Road Trip Moments
From: Bonzo3legs
Date: 21 May 11 - 08:43 AM

Standing on the old Route 66 for 5 minutes near Williams!!