Reaching the continental divide in Glacier National Park, we pulled off the road to view the mountain goats climbing on the rocks. When we returned to our Ford Escort, we turned the key and nothing happened. A progression of helpful bystanders stopped by to try their techniques–wire wiggling and sprays and that kind of thing–to no avail. (It was the timing belt we found out later.) Then a couple volunteered to tow us down the mountain to the nearest gas station. The man pulled out a six foot tow rope and tied it to our frame. My husband gripped the steering wheel which without the automatic steering was the driving equivalent of moving a piano. Our friendly rescuers took off and increased their speed until they were pulling us down the mountain curves at sixty miles an hour, which we can say since we were close enough to look through the rear window of their small pickup and read their speedometer. When we reached the gas station, our rescuer popped out of his car and said, “Did you see that bear at the side of the road?” We had seen nothing. There was a bar at the gas station and we immediately downed several beers each while waiting for a tow truck.
Hey Tom & Ray,
Ever been in the Sahara Desert with a Marine, a Japanese lady, two kids, and a bunch of Tunisian Bird Cages in the back of a late '50?s Plymouth Fury Station Wagon … with a flat tire? Yeah, that?s where I found myself (one of the two kids) as a young girl in the early 60?s on one of our many family road trips … this one from Tripoli, Libya to Tunis, Tunisia.
Mom (she?s the Japanese lady) decided it would be a fun trip and she really wanted one of the beautifully intricate wire Tunisian bird cages … she liked the bird cages so much she offered to bring some back for friends. So Dad (he?s the Marine) figured we might as well make a road trip out of it … cool Roman ruins along the way, awesome zoo in Tunis, North African American Cemetery and Memorial … you know just the regular stops along the highway.
The trip to Tunis was pretty uneventful, but the trip home … well, that?s when my brother (he?s the other one of the two kids) decides to open his big mouth. We were going along just fine, you know playing word games, counting one- humped camels vs. two-humped camels, regular kid stuff … when my brother notices we?re now driving over this huge expanse of desert … sand everywhere. He says, to this day I just can?t believe he said it out loud to OUR DAD, (he?s a Marine, what was my brother thinking!!!) ?Dad, what if we got a flat tire?? and right then … we did! Not one of those ka-thunk, ka-brump, ka-brump kind of flat tires … no it was one of those Ka-BAMMMM, brump, brump kind of blowout flat tires. As you can imagine that sound was quickly followed by a series of expletives said with the gusto only a Marine can produce.
The expletives continued as my dad moved … removed … countless bird cages from the back of the station wagon in order to find and assemble the jack. As my dad began working to put on the spare it became very quiet … where my dad is concerned, this is not a good sign, it means things are getting worse … yep … the jack was in the sand and kept sinking … he had to remove the jack and try to get the wheel moved on to the highway enough so that the jack was on solid ground. Needless to say … I?m here today, so the tire did get fixed and my family and the bird cages made it back home to Tripoli where our parakeet, Taffy, got his new ornate home.
The sounds of the tire blowout and my dad?s voice are forever in my memory and if you wonder why my memory of this is sooooo vivid or if it actually happened … well, my mother felt she needed to be useful, and she couldn?t help with changing the tire … so she grabbed my dad?s 8mm movie camera and proceeded to film all of this as a ?family road trip memory? … the reason I don?t know quite know how my dad got the jack onto the highway is because at that point in the film, I can see his hand reach for the lens of the camera and it goes black … or maybe the camera just ran out film 
The campus ministry that I interned for last year went on a road trip to Mexico, and to save money, we decided to drive all the way there. To save even more money, we asked to borrow a church van (from my local church, no less). The road trip was to a dangerous area, so some people were a little wary to begin with. Then, several hours into the trip (which departed from Athens, Georgia), the van begins to vibrate very hard. Then, about 5 minutes outside of Vicksburg, Mississippi, the tire blows. Well, the three guys on the trip get out and we check on everything, and I notice a greenish liquid on the ground. I say I think it’s antifreeze, but a guy with a much bigger mouth suggests it came from the blown tire. Well, after about an hour and a half, our tire is fixed and we’re on our way again, until about 7 minutes, when the van overheats and we pull off to the side of the interstate yet again. None of us being very good with cars, we didn’t know if it would be usuable (turns out it wasn’t). We finally get a tow truck out there another hour later, and the police officer calls his local church to come pick us up and take us to a local hotel. The entire evening was spent deciding if we could even make it out to Mexico. We finally ended up with another van (brought to us in the middle of the night by a staff member and a few students in the middle of the night) and continue the trip, but not without having 4 people drop off the trip and quite a bit of fretting later. The trip was great, and the way back was fine, but it was definitely a very big struggle on the way there.
Paris, London, Rome, Jerome. Jerome?
Jerome, AZ. Population 400. Considering what else Arizona has to offer, could there be any compelling reason for an Easterner to detour to Jerome?
I’d been hiking in the Canyon de Chelly and Grand Canyon with a traveling companion dedicated to trailing ancient Anasazi sites and photographing vanishing America when he suggested that Jerome, a defunct mining town, be our next stop.
Once a city with a population of 15,000, Jerome had faded into a gaunt ghost town after its copper mine closed in 1953. Since I’d resisted a muleback journey to the bottom of the Grand Canyon’s south rim, didn’t I owe my traveling companion one little mining town, accessible by automobile?
Pulling out the AAA maps at a gas station cum truck stop town called Williams, we could see that Jerome lay a direct inchlet south of Williams. The route, however, lacked connecting roads. The only option was to backtrack to the major highway, follow it to a good secondary road considerably east of our destination, then take another good secondary road into Jerome.
“Let’s try the scenic route,” urged my companion in frontier tones.
I was accustomed to long “scenic” hours crossing the dry desert on Apache and Navajo land, happy on the open territory of sage and wild horses. I was also accustomed to reading maps, and this one showed triple-stacked slashes, the lowest of AAA’s seven road designations.
Reading aloud from the map, I announced the road surface indicators, which went from “paved” to “gravel” to “earth.” We were headed for earth. Not too casually, I added that people out here named places “Death Valley” and “Dead Horse Ranch” and “Nothing.”
Paved road gave way to dirt, bumps became ruts, and then ahead – suddenly and out of nothing and nowhere – we beheld a vast and breathtaking otherworldly landscape with the fiery coloration of Sedona and the geology of a car ad.
Hoping that two-thirds of the triple-stacked slash marks were behind us, we figured we’d simply skirt this barren red rock terrain and arrive neatly and shortly in Jerome.
No word was spoken as the car made its way forward. And upward. Upward? We were not skirting anything. We were climbing these red jutting rocks at an alarming angle. When I dared to look away from the road for a split second, I realized my teeth were clamped together, possibly never to part again, and my hands were soaked with sweat.
A taste for ghost towns and old mining camps had me hostage to to fortune miles above sea level and rising steadily on a road that was disappearing before my eyes, turning from dry, sunburnt surface to crumbling stones as the car inched forward, sliding perilously close to the edge, and a drop directly to sea level.
I wanted to scream, so heavy was the burden of tension and so wild the fiery beauty below – miles and miles of jagged red stone cut into the earth and sky.
No road signs. No omens. Just a definitive sunset on the most defined landscape of my life. And let’s remember, having just “hiked deep into the Canyon de Chelly and the Grand Canyon,” I wasn’t easily impressed.
Around every hairpin curve was a steeper angle and no sign of the summit. It was dawning on me that this trek up the mountain was a mere half of the journey. Could Jerome possibly be at the top of this mountain, some mesa with a miracle mine inside? Surely not, my schooled mind reported. We were, therefore, doomed to slide down the mountain as well. In the encroaching dark.
Wiping my palms on the pathetic vulnerability of my bare legs, legs prepared only for a swift ride to Jerome on Highways 40, 17, and 89A, I found my voice and squeaked out a few syllables. The formed the words, “I want to walk.”
It was unthinkable, surely, to walk the rest of the way up the endless mountain in the waning light and to walk down – no doubt with indigenous poison snakes for company – half the night in darkness for the paltry reward of a kaput mining town.
Never ask me how I got out of the car and, in that Martian landscape, walked up a red mountain into thin air. Just know that eventually, humbly, I got back into the car.
When we could no longer see red rock above us and only a precipitous thousand-foot drop below, we came to a bizarre square cut through the peak. Our assault on the monolith had brought us to the summit – sans flag and sans satellite coverage.
A final fierce ray of the sun struck the car, and then, everything went gray. Night was falling, but the fact that there had been just enough road surface on one side was necessary and sufficient reason to believe in just enough road on this side of the mountain.
Coming now out of terror mode, I imagined simple folks, miles away, sitting on their summer porches in the dying light, rocking and laughing into their iced tea about the dummies with their headlights on, way up there in the mountain above Jerome on the road that isn’t a road, heh-heh.
Down, down, down and still down until, at our feet, was the copper mine. Here at last were signs --facing the other direction, to be sure – encapsulating the history of Phelps Dodge and the copper mine. We got out of the car, walked around the mine adit, and got back in the car to see the town of Jerome, expecting a matching ghost town where my friend could amass his vanishing Americana.
No sooner did we arrive in the part of Jerome with a street and living things than we encountered life imitating art. Running towards the car was a TV camera crew. Had we been the first to “take the mountain” by car?
Sort of. Apparently, we were the last evening visitors to arrive in a little Western ghost town recently reborn as a quaint little Western shopping mall with 1890’s storefronts, a restored town hall, and a flesh-and-blood mayor.The crew was making a TV special on quaint reborn Western mining towns.
As a child growing up in Philadelphia, I had asked – as my fondest wish for my 11th birthday, for a subscription to a magazine called “Arizona Highways.” It made me a lifelong devotee of the saguaro and anything even remotely connected with the Southwest.
Therefore, I stifled my urge to snarl publicly at the Arizona Highway Department for failing to post a sign warning, “You are about to enter the twilight zone of Arizona, where for the next few hours you will be suspended not only in air but in disbelief.”
What did I think of Jerome, the crew asked. “Well,” said I, both understating and overstating, “after an exhilaring ascent and descent, I was glad to be in a place with T-shirt and earring shops, telephones, ice cream parlors, vanishing Americana gas stations, and the solace that I myself had not vanished from the earth in getting here.” I was, I told the interviewer, prepared to buy a T-shirt to remind me of the place, lest I forget.
Dear Click and Clack,
A few years back, when my husband and I was first married, We decided to take my brand new beautiful 11 year old daughter on vacation with us every year. We live in Kansas and our daughter lives in Arkansas. My husband and I are truckdrivers and didn’t get to see her very often, we wanted her to be able to have wonderful memories of vacations with her Father. We decided to take her on a cruise. We decided on a cruise that left out of Galvastan, Tx. To save money we drove to Arkansas and picked her up and drove to Galvastan. I have a friend that lives in Hillsboro, Tx. so we decided to take a little detour out of the way to visit him. After visiting for about an hour, we left in order to get to Galvastan in time to get a Motel and get a good nights rest before we left on our cruise. We had to cut accross a 2-lane highway to get to I-45 and head south to Galvastan. We had no cell phone tower during this time. After traveling down I-45 for about an hour, our cell phone rings and it is my friend. He says “I have your pocketbook.” not believing this could be true I look all around and sure enough I don’t have my pocketbook. You know the one with our tickets, cash, birth certificates to board with, and credit cards. I look over at my husband and he is looking at me as though I am the worst creature on earth. My friend agrees to meet us halfway back to return the pocketbook to me. By now it is time to eat supper [or dinner as city folks say] and my friend wouldn’t take any money for gas to bring my pocketbook to me so we felt that we at least owed him a meal. When we was finaly on our way again my loving husband, must now make up for lost time, Lets just say, I didn’t know that our suburan could go that fast. I knew not to say anything or I wouldn’t have a head left, so I dug my fingernails into the seat and kept my mouth shut. We reached Galvaston aroung 11:00 p.m. by now all of the motels was full. How was I to know that Thousands of people would be there to board all the cruise ships the next day. We had to head back to Houston to get a motel,[about 45 miles back]. We found a motel that still had a vacancy. We rang the buzzer and the manager met us at the window, with bars on it, and gave us a very high price, by this time we didn’t care we just paid it. Then he told us we would have to pay a deposit on the sheets and towels, and we would get that back in the morning. We drove around to the parking lot and lets just say the people of the night was walking all around. The locks on our suburban are broke and we cannot lock the doors so I say “Honey, do you think we should take our suit cases in”. He glared at me and said “If you want to carry them up that flight of stairs go ahead I’m going to bed”. I pretended to lock all the doors and followed him to the room. The mattress on the bed was about 2 inches thick, and the pillows was about an inch thick. The sheets looked about 30 years old, and the towels we put the deposit on had no fluff at all left on them. I spent a restless night tossing and turning worring whether or not we would have any thing left in our car the next morning. As a matter of fact, if we would even have our Car there. The next morning everything was there, we got our deposit back on those lovely towels and made it to the cruise ship in time. Though we took our beautiful daughter on other cruises, we never, ever drove to the ports again. We decided it was much better to fork out the money to fly and to alway make motel reservations for the night before boarding and the night of the return from the cruise.
This story goes back to when I was a freshman in college. I am the type of person who really enjoys traveling at night, for some strange reason the sun just wears me out. My car at this time was a 94 Dodge Intrepid ES, you know the emerald green one that everyone had. My friends and I decided to load up 2 vehicles and drive to the national basketball tourneyment at about 9:30 pm. Myself and 3 others in my car and a van load of 5 girls in a mercury van. We got on the road at about 10:15pm and drove from Iowa to Missouri.
Now before i get further into this story i need to tell you a bit more about myself. I am 6’7" and at that time i had long curly hair. To stay awake we took a 12 pack of Wild Cherry Pepsi and to keep the hair out of my eyes i put on a sweatband. Were going down I29 at roughly 3 am and we come up on Platte City. I am in the lead and we are going about 86 mph, so i am speeding. Everyone in the car is sleeping and im sitting back slamming wc pepsis to stay awake. I cross over a bridge and out of nowhere cherrys are going off and im getting pulled over by not 1, but 2 cops. I woke everyone up in the car and told them i was getting pulled over, but it will be ok because i wasnt doing anything too crazy.
The cop approaches my door and asked me to step out of the vehicle. I had just recently had knee ACL surgery so i was a little slow moving and my hair was sticking straight up because of my sweatband. He tells me to make my way to the back of the car and im slow moving because of the knee and we get to the back puts my hands behind my back and arrests me.
I am completely dumbfounded at this point and he tells me that i am under arrest for excessive speeding and i was going 106 mph. He shoved me in the back of his squad car, which by the way i had to lay in because i am too tall and my knee couldnt bend that far yet. we had to drive 12 miles back to the station where they frisked me, fingerprinted me, and took my picture. I sat in what they called “The Pit” until my friends could come up with 250 dollars bail.
I got bailed out and walked right back to my car and drove off. Knowing i wasnt going 106 and couldnt make it for court because it was 5 hours away, i got a lawyer to take care of it.
I walked away from this with 1 year of probation, 8 hours of driving school, and 30 hours of community service. I actually got a check back from the county for 279.00 so i got more than i paid to get bailed out. This is STILL the only time i have ever been arrested or been to jail.
This is the BEST!!!
On our first anniversary, my husband decided to take me camping for the first time in my live in the Smoky Mts. We lived in WI. Well my dad lived in Charlotte NC at that time and we decided to stop in to visit him, since we’d be in the area, so to speak. And off we went. The first leg of the journey went just fine! Great roadtrip!!
We got to dad’s on a Thursday and by Friday , well there was nothing to do and it was blazing HOT! Dad does not come up with the best ideas… but said, hey let’s go to the beach, I know a great beach! Great - what could go wrong… (Husband Dick doesn’t like water having almost drowned at boyscout camp, but was a trooper). So off we went.
After 2 hours and crossing into SOUTH Carolina, we’re wondering just how far away the beach is. Looking at the map,well the water looks close. Its years before cell phones, so when we stop for some lunch, we find we’re going to Myrtle Beach. This beach was a 4 hour drive from dad’s house, in a sweltering car and we had an unairconditioned van. Dad and grandma (his mom) were in his AC car. Well is was too late in the day to turn around and we were more than halfway there, so on we went. Once we got there at 4PM, dad decided that we should probably find a place to stay over, so grandma and I sat on the beach and Dick and dad went off to find lodging for the night - 1 night, in a weekend resort destination! Not Available!
Now, Dick is dropped off at the beack and dad is announcing, he’ll go find lodging just out of town, somewhere…And be right back so you guys, stay here where I’ll find you. So, we frolick in the water, Dick gets stung by a small jellyfish, we ran out of stuff in our small cooler, we got a van with no AC and …grandma.
We are hungry, tired, and hours later - no dad, no food. At this time there were no fast food spots readily available. And we were waiting for DAD who was going to be RIGHT BACK!! Now after 2 hours, grandma is having a fit, makes Dick go and call the police and hospital, sure he’s dead somewhere…
Dad comes cruising on back at 11PM!!! Sure, he’d found a place for us - outside of CHARLESTON, had SHOWERED and EATEN SUPPER and comes back like all…Hey What’s Up? Dick, bless his heart was not cursing, but grandma was… Dad wanted togo “out”, grab some night life, what could we possibily be upset about, hey Dick, what’s with your leg??
Well, we said we were outta there, went to the motel (another 1 1/2 hr away at least) and no we never made vacation plans with dad again. Dick and I, we’re still married - 32 years, the Smokies were great!
My mom and dad didn’t have lots of money for vacations. So living in Cincinnati, OH they always took my sister and I to some place in Kentucky, usually Harrisburg or Boonesboro, sometimes to Mammoth Cave. My mom didn’t believe in using suitcases as they mussed the clothes, so she packed our clothes in washbaskets and that’s what we took. My mom loved to iron and loved ironed clothes, hence the washbaskets. Well, for at least three years in a row, we would head out in the car and about 50 to 60 miles from home, my Mom would look over at my Dad and said “Oh Harold, I can’t remember if I unplugged the iron.” And of course, she would have just ironed before we left,so that she could put the ironed clothes in the washbasket, and so we’d turn around, go home and find the iron unplugged.
The fourth year, out we head. About an hour into the trip, Mom looks at Dad and says “Oh Harold…” She can’t finish, because my sister and I in unison say “I can’t remember if I unplugged the iron.” My Dad very calmly and quietly looks at my Mom, looks back at my sister and I and reaching down under the seat pulls out the iron saying “I am sure it is unplugged.”
We didn’t take many more vacations as a family but I clearly remember the iron was never again an issue.
It?s a bitter cold New England winter night and we are out of milk?reluctantly, I agree to drive to the convenience store. When I get into our Nissan 2000SX, something smells strange?It smells like antifreeze. After starting the engine, I inspect the gages closely looking for any problems. While sitting there? out of the corner of my eye?I think I see the trunk move in the rear view mirror. I turn around and see nothing out of the ordinary?So I conclude the subzero temperature is playing tricks on me? and I go on my way.
About 10 minutes into my trip?
I?m traveling down the highway going 45?when all of a sudden the trunk of my car pops open. I pull over to the side of the road and the moment the car stops?the back end drops violently. Much to my dismay? A man jumps out of my trunk?And In my side mirror, I see him charging around the side of my car.
I think to myself OH, MY GOD. I?M GOING TO DIE.
Next thing I know, the guy is pounding on my window, screaming obscenities and yelling for me to get out of HIS car. Now I must admit?the situation was so bizarre?for a brief second?I did check to see if I was in my own car.
At this point, most sane people would have fled the situation?but after reassuring myself that I was the rightful owner of the car?I decide to roll down the window and argue with the guy. After exchanging unpleasantries for a few minutes?the guy takes a step back and says, ?Whoa, man, this is not my car.?
The young man is obviously incredibly intoxicated and he appears to be harmless. I decide that I can?t leave him stranded on the side of highway, so offer to give him a ride back to town. While driving, he explains that earlier he was at a union party and apparently had too much to drink.
I never determined if his buddies mistakenly dumped him into a stranger?s car or if they intended to leave him in his own car. But at least the mystery of the odd antifreeze smell had been solved?It was alcohol.
Fortunately, I had not noticed the trunk was open and closed it before leaving or there could have been a very different outcome to the story.
Most of these Road Trip from Hell tales are very amusing.
Unfortunately a lot of them were posted without any paragraph breaks, thus making them very difficult to read. On some of the longer ones, I gave up after 8 sentences or so, as it was just too much of an effort to read–especially for those of us with “old eyes”.
If you really want your stories to be read, it would be much better to break them into fairly short paragraphs.
Back in 1985 I was 27, just graduated nursing school and living in Baltimore, MD. My husband was offered a job in California. Being strapped for cash it was decided that he would fly out and get established while I sold the dilapidated Datsun, the house and would drive out to join him at a later date.
On November 1st our 1975 Chevy Wagon, packed with our 2 & 4 year old children, the dog and hauling a rented trailer, pulled out of Baltimore.
The first leg of the trip to Tennesee wasn’t bad. Other than a few thunderstorms and some old friends advising me to stop and go home the future looked bright!
We travelled through Arkansas, a state where the wonders of asphalt had not been introduced. I beleive that the shock absorbers were left in any number of potholes, and I was definately in need of an alignment!
Did I mention that I took the Southern Route due to the warmer climate? I now stopped to visit friends in Oklahoma and to pick up some winter coats for the kids. I also purchase a 5 pound tin of Gummy Worms to coax the children into the car. (By this time they would cry if I even walked toward the car). After several bouts of bickering and whining and tired of doling out Gummy Worms I tossed the tin into the back seat saying “Here, eat the whold damned thing!”
All was quiet for quite awhile. Somewhere between Amarillo and Albequerque a sound eminated from the back. I pulled off the highway to find the dog spewing multicolored strings of fetid gore on the carpet in the rear. I unpacked the back of the wagon, tore the carpeting out and as I was repacking I hear another belching splatting sound. The children are now wretching and crying and to my horror I see that they had followed my instructions and eaten every last Gummy Worm. Another hour or so cleaning the kids as best I could, we drove windows open to the nearest motel.
The next morning was beautiful and with renewed hope I decided to take a side trip to see the Grand Canyon. (Yes, I think my mind was well on its way to gone by now!)
When I reached the scenic area it started to snow. Rangers started telling people to leave the area, bad weather was coming. By the time we reached the main road, ice and poor visibility had me looking for shelter. We found a vacancy at the third motel I tried in Kingman AZ. I took the 2 yr old daughter and dog to the room. (NO dogs allowed)It was hailing by the time I got to my 4 yr old son and the suitcase. I put my key in the door and it would not turn. I tried again and to my horror the key broke off. Once again I traversed the icy stairs with my son in tow. The desk clerk told me I would have to pay to have the door opened, (As if I had a choice!) The maintainance man could not get the broken key out so he removed the door knob with a screwdriver and hammer. The two yr. old and the dog are both howling by now. With the door knob now off the door still will not open. The security latch has somehow engaged. At this point I am threatening to put the man through the window if he doesn’t get the door open. Fortunately, a trucker in the next room comes out with a hanger slips it in the hole and frees the latch. I finally get the kids calmed down and asleep. I cry myself to sleep and dream that night of murdering my husband.
The next morning a man points out a big puddle beneath the car. The mechanic after hearing my travel plan advises me to take a bus or call someone to come get me. He explains tht I have a desert and alot of hills to get through yet. I refused to be beaten at this point. The only advice he can give now is to buy a case of oil and stop frequently to top it off.
The Mojave is a beautiful place, I am sure. I only know from the home movie I took standing outside the car, looking in on two screaming children. I narrated the shot with the words, “This may be the last time you see these two children.”
On to Barstow. HILLS… the man said HILLS! And where did all this wind come from? Have they never heard of guard rails out here??? I was sure that we would be pulled off the mountainsides by the carreening trailer behind us.
Reaching route 99, my hands are permanently affixed to the stearing wheel but I no longer hear the children, nor does the fetid smell bother me any more!
I can see my destination as we pull into Visalia, CA. Black smoke boiling from the car as I pull into the driveway. My husband takes one look at me, and grabs the children for protection. A friend takes me by the hand, gives me a valium, a glass of wine and leads me to the jacuzzi. Welcome to California
PS The kids, dog and husband all lived but alas the Chevy had to be put down!
I started out with my wife and two small children on a 400 mile trip from Buffalo, New York to East Orange, New Jersey. I was visiting my Uncles Family. The trip went fine. We decided to stay at a motel since it was later in the evening. We got up the next morning to finish the trip took the luggage to the car piled the family in and arrived at my uncles safe and sound. We were getting ready for bed that night and I went down to the car to get the suitcases and there were no suitcases. Guess where they were, yep at the Motel which was an hour away. So I had to drive the hour to retrieve them. We spent the week there and had a wonderful time. We started home and after awhile my oil light started to flicker then it stayed on. I was able to get to a gas station and parked by the door went in to ask the attendant what was going on. He came out and asked me to move the car since it was getting oil over the sidewalk. He told me to trash the car and take a bus home. Then he said that he could sell me a case of 50 weight oil and I could try and push it home. I took the 50 weight oil and started out. I put the oil in the trunk and every 50 miles put oil in the car. Remember this is with a wife and two small children who by this time are getting a little cranky. I kept on doing this and after one of the stops I must have left the key in the trunk lock because when I got out I didn’t have the key. So I had to get the kids out of the back seat take the back seat out pull the cardboard out and crawled through the metal cross pieces got the luggage, which I didn’t forget, got to the oil and was able to get it to the back seat. By this time the children were really not in a good mood neither was my wife. Well we started out again, we were on a four lane highway and I stopped put the oil in and the car wouldn’t start. I kept on trying and trying and was sure the battery was going to go dead. A state trooper stopped and just as he got to the car it started. We finally got home 16 hours later to do 400 miles. Exhausted with a car that had a rear main bearing that was no good as well as the clutch that was gone. Needless to say I didn’t keep this car much longer.
My road trip from hell started in July of 1973 after my grandfather got permission from his doctor to take a vacation?his first after losing both legs to diabetes. And it was to be the first long trip taken in his 1968 Buick Electra since it had been retro-fitted with hand-operated gas and brake controls.
My new husband and I volunteered to do the driving for Nana and Poppy at the urging of everyone in my family who reasoned that since my husband?Lou?had worked his way through college as an orderly, he would be equipped to cope with any unforeseen medical problems.
Our problems began when my grandparents didn?t move at breakneck speed the morning we were supposed to travel from New Jersey to Williamsburg, Virginia. It was hot and muggy, and without benefit of an early start, we hit every traffic tie-up that a Friday afternoon in the summer had to offer. Somewhere in Virginia, we also hit torrential rains, and when the defogger in the car could not keep up with the rain and humidity, Lou took a wrong turn and we wound up on a country road flooded with about six inches of water. Nana?who couldn?t swim?immediately panicked, now also fearful that Poppy?s new legs might drag him down. She insisted that we turn the air conditioner off lest we run out of gas and have to swim for our lives. Meanwhile, I was not happy that Lou had gotten us lost, and Poppy was concerned that his beloved Buick would be flooded and the new controls rendered useless. Lou was not happy because he had three unhappy?and vocal?passengers.
Once we got back on a relatively dry highway, Nana insisted that we keep the air conditioner off even though it was close to 100 degrees, and I?m sure it was 100% humidity. We finally arrived in Williamsburg five hours past our originally targeted arrival time. But the gods were with us, and a bellman at our motel, seeing how dazed, dewy, and bedraggled we were, quickly took us to our rooms and said he would bring the luggage in. Just as Lou and I collapsed on the bed of our blissfully air-conditioned room, we heard a blood-curdling scream?and looked at each other in horror, and yelled ?THE LEGS!!?
Poppy, ever one to be prepared, not only packed a spare tire, but two spare legs?to which he had nailed on socks and affixed shoes?and packed them in the trunk with our luggage.
Lou?s medical training did come in handy as he revived the bellman and we walked him back to the reception desk?and then unpacked the car ourselves.
I?d like to say that we had a lovely trip?but the colonial Williamsburg experience (i.e., without air conditioning) is best experienced any time other than July. And after pushing Poppy?s wheelchair over the authentic pebbled walkways of Williamsburg, Lou was looking forward to our side trip to Washington?s Smithsonian and its smooth floors.
The ride from Williamsburg to Washington was completely uneventful and it was very easy to push Poppy?s wheelchair through the museum. But by the time we were ready to leave, it was raining, so Lou (the newlywed) eagerly volunteered to retrieve the car, which was parked a mere two blocks away.
A half hour passed. Then an hour. I was sure I had been widowed, and Poppy was sure something had happened to his car.
Poppy was right.
In 1973, there was no universally recognized ?handicapped? decal and the DC police didn?t know that the little green square in the upper right corner of a New Jersey license plate entitled our car to park in a handicap-designated space. And they also didn?t know that when the hand controls were installed, the steering wheel lock had been disconnected, so that when the police lifted the Buick by its rear and began to tow it, the truck went one way and the car veered off in another direction, hitting a policeman on a motorcycle.
Lou spent the better part of the hour filling out accident reports and ?incident forms? for the shaken up policeman and removing motorcycle particles that were imbedded in the hood of the car. When he returned, I was relieved while Poppy was upset that his beloved Buick, although drivable, was damaged.
We drove home in relative silence, punctuated by Poppy?s mutterings, Lou?s repeated promise to pay the deductible, Nana?s belated requests to keep the air conditioner on high, and my belief that someday, this might make a good story.
The taxi driver said “the worse the honeymoon, the better the marriage.” We had just arrived in Winnemuca Nevada days after our wedding in Idaho and stranded on the eave of 1986.
My new husband and I were graduate students in Monterey, California, and determined to wed before our graduations in the spring. The wedding was to be a simple one, close to Christmas of 1985, at my parent’s restaurant in the Idaho mountains. My husband asked a friend from Gilroy, California to stand at the wedding, since he had none of his family in Turkey able to attend. Our friend said yes, he would come. With his American wife we rode the 900+ miles to Boise in their relatively new 1982 Audi 5000. It was comfortable and fun flying down those two lane ribbons of asphalt that look as though they were shot across the Nevada desert by some huge arrow.
Did I mention that the winter of 85-86 was colder and harsher than many we had recently experienced? The wedding went well enough and we were enjoying the visit. But evidently our friends did not. They told us shortly after the ceremony that they would be flying home. We could pack their car with the wedding gifts and drive it home later. We think they were mostly confused about why we left the warmth of California to marry in cold and fridged Idaho.
So a couple of days later we loaded the Audi on a cold, foggy morning with our toasters, towels and cup trees and headed south to return the car and enjoy New Years Eve in Gilroy. About 200 miles into the trip, however, in a small town called McDermott, Nevada, the car lost power and stopped in front of a gas station. Yay, it had a garage. We asked the weathered old man in the shop to take a look and without responding he opened the hood. He pondered it a while and said,“this is a fuel injection engine, I don’t know anything about them.” So we called AAA and waited for a lift to Winnemuca to a AAA-rated shop that could work on the Audi. Unfortunately, there had been an ice storm on I-70 and the only tow truck in the region had to clean up the interstate before he could come get us for the 90 mile tow. Eight hours later we were finally in Winnemuca and the next garage said they could replace fuel injectors.
We still had a sense of adventure and happily ordered a taxi to our hotel. It was at this point the driver, a woman who was said to be partially blind, gave us the indication that our honeymoon was going down the tubes. We ignored the omen, took in dinner at the casinos and tucked in for the night.
The next morning we were still buoyant as newlyweds can be and decided not to listen to anymore curses from the taxi driver. Better to walk the few blocks to the shop after a hearty breakfast at the casino buffet. We had just set out when a local police patrol car came up beside us, rolled down his window and said “do you own a metallic blue Audi 5000?” Yes, we replied, why…? “Hop in,” was all he said.
During the short trip to the shop he simply said there had been a mishap. When we arrived at the muddy field that served as a parking lot we found a local father and son with a Dodge pickup and an elderly couple with grandkids in a sedan, all anxiously waiting for our arrival. It didn’t look good. Both their vehicles showed signs of bodily harm. The police officer slipped away.
What we learned from the gentlemen with the pickup deflated all our youthful buoyancy. When the Audi was fixed, the cowboys who winter over as grease monkeys in that town, decided to take the car out for a test drive. That was good, we needed to know the car would run. What wasn’t good was that the mechanics had decided to begin celebrating New Years Eve at 7 am. Fueled with whiskey, they left the shop, gunned our Audi in the mud and side swiped the two other cars on the way out. Worse yet, we three angry sets of customers could not get the manager to come out and talk. He was locked in his office and was staying there. We needed insurance information at the least; an out-of-town lawyer at the worst.
What does a young bride do when she is watching her dreams turn into nightmares? She calls her Dad. I got on the phone, told my Dad in Boise the situation and he, in turn, called the character in the office. Whatever he said must have done the trick because my next conversation with my Dad brought forth the insurance numbers we needed. I returned to the parking lot and passed the information around. We all had minor body damage and as long as the cars were drivable, we were all more than happy to get out of town to deal with the claims later.
Back on the road, it was around 9pm when we approached Gilroy. It appeared we would even make it back in time to celebrate New Years Eve with our friends. There was a great feeling of relief that we were able to drive the car back to our friend, but we were embarrassed that it was damaged. As we passed a car wash we decided to pull in. At the very least we could clean it up, it had been over Donner Pass that day and looked like heck even when we tried to ignore the damage from the shop. We soaped the car up with that dayglo pink soap that some self wash places furnish. It was looking good. But then we ran out of coins. Opps, must have dropped too many in the slot machines in Nevada while waiting for the repairs. When we finally arrived at our friend’s, the car was covered in dayglo pink foam. What a way to try to hide the scratches on their once perfect car.
By the way, we are still married. A week or so after the trip we agreed the honeymoon in Nevada was a bust. We had a do over the following summer with a long tour of Aegean Turkey.
The Curse of the Mummy
A couple of years ago a colleague at the Brooklyn Museum drove me to North Shore University Hospital where one of the mummies in our collection was to be CT scanned under the supervision of museum conservators. We were a part of a convoy led by the truck with the mummy,in which a New York Times reporter was a passenger. We were on the Long Island Expressway on the hottest day of the summer when the air-conditioner died, windows went up and down and other bewildering electrical oddities occurred in rapid succession. The car was losing power, but we managed to glide in to the hospital parking lot, just as it died and later had to be towed. My colleague went in the tow truck. I had to hitch a ride back to Brooklyn with the conservators when the CT scanning on the mummy was completed.
Hello there,
Love your show, you?ll find me in a parking lot listening to your show in my car every Saturday as I don?t get any reception at my home.
I guess I really don?t have any real road-trip from hell stories, but when considering all the things that happened to me during my road-trips, it?s pretty amusing that I?ve survived to tell the story. And if you survive to tell a story, everything is kind of funny in the end.
I was 20 when I got my first car, used 86 Toyota MR2, drove up from San Diego, CA to Eugene, Oregon to see my friends, and then drove up to Canada for the hell of it. On the way up to Oregon, just passed Mt. Shasta, the clutch on the car failed. It could only engage the gear while engine was off. So the rest of the way up to my friends? house, I just shoved the gear in the 2nd, then turn on the engine, knock knock knock, and once it got sort of going, I just forced it into the higher gear and hoped for the best. This is how I learned that if you match the rev, you can shift up or down without clutch! I actually made it up there, had the car looked at at a local shop in Eugene, it was something like a leak in the hydraulic system (it had hydraulic operated clutch pedal of some sort). We had a grand time, and a week later I was driving back down, when just passed Sacrament, CA, the head gasket blew. I had enormous smoke coming out of the back of the car like I was running a BBQ shop in the back of my little car. I just sort of kind of ignored it, and just kept adding 2qts of oil at every gas stop, and made it back to San Diego. I was so impressed with Toyota?s engineering that I wrote a thank you letter to Toyota headquarter. As a matter of fact, a friend had a Toyota Tercel that didn?t get its oil changed for about 20,000 and was still running. Anyhow, I totaled the MR2 in spectacular fashion, but that?s another story altogether.
A year later or so, I was driving around Pacific Highway 1 up Northern California in my 89 VW GTI (used, of course) on the way back to San Diego. It was late at night, and it started to rain pretty badly. I always laughed about the caution sign for the falling rocks, but I was converted that night. There were so many rocks on the road, I was doing maybe 25mph trying to avoid them. I was so focused on the road ahead I didn?t even see it coming, a falling rock ? not that big, maybe the size of my head, and I have pretty small head ? came down and hit right in the middle of the sunroof. Fortunately, because of rain, the sunroof was closed, but I had to stop and take a look at it, only to find a huge dent in there. Stupid of me, I just had to see if I could open the thing, so I did and of course, you guessed it, it only opened about 3 inches and refused to close up again. Rain was still coming down hard, and figured I?d get soaked whether standing still or moving, so I drove a few hours getting wet. I thought that was real silly getting wet inside of supposedly secure enclosure, but that wasn?t the end of it.
It was 92 or 93, I relocated to Eugene, OR, and I had this 84 Alfa Romeo Spider then. Some emergency concerning a friend of mine, I had to take a drive up to Seattle, WA in a very rainy October night. The convertible top was in rough shape, but never really leaked that much, but that night, it was a different story. It felt like I had a personal Niagara Fall inside of my car. Everything inside of the car was soaked wet, including my butt and my boots! I finally got so fed up that I stopped on the side of the road and just opened the damn top. And guess what? At 65mph I got way less rain inside than with the top up!! I felt I made a real scientific discovery that night.
I sold that Alfa, missed it a lot, but not suitable for Northwest weather, and traded in for 88 VW Jetta GLI. My sister was visiting one time, we took a drive out to Crater Lake. On the way back to Eugene, there?s this beautiful location where she wanted to stop and take a picture, or maybe it was me who wanted to take a picture. She was pretty seriously into photography back then, or it was me who was into photography, some things are better not remembered in details especially when you really want to blame someone else for the disaster. So I parked my car on the side of the road, and she was or I was talking pictures, and maybe after half an hour, we hopped in the car and ready to get going again, only to find out the soft shoulder sucked the car half way down the rims. I tried everything I could to get out, only to make it worse. An old trick, I made my sister stand on the road, and caught the first 18-wheeler passing by. The driver was super nice, he chained the car and dragged it right out of the ditch for us. I was hitting on this girl back then, and I knew the Jetta had a tendency of refusing to go into the first gear for some reason. Usually what I had to do was to just turn off the engine and coast a little, and then turn it back on and gear shifts normally. I still don?t know why it did that. One summer night, I took this girl out for a little drive up Oregon coast. It was pretty late, and we found a little nice place to take a walk. After a little walk around the beach, we hopped back in the car, reversed it out of the parking, and I tried to engage the 1st gear, and it didn?t go in. I knew what to do, but I had a better idea, I just pretended that there?s nothing I could do, and we spent a night in the car. I had that Jetta for a while. When she moved down to San Francisco, we drove together in that thing. A few months later, I was on my way down to visit her, just passed OR/CA boarder, driver side rear brake started smoking. I didn?t notice it for a while till another driver pointed out to me. I didn?t see the point, so I removed the caliper from the bracket and duct-taped hell out of it out of the way of the tire and everything, and drove down to San Francisco with 3 brakes, where I sold that Jetta to a friend of my girlfriend for a really nice tripod for a camera.
The next ride was 72 VW Bus that I picked up really cheap. Heater was a crap as everybody knows, so I hooked up a few batteries and transformer and I had a space heater plugged in. For 4 years I owned that thing, I washed it only twice. The second time reminded me why I shouldn?t, because it was getting paler and paler as if it was painted with water-based paint. I already broke up with that girl and I had a new girlfriend then. We were driving to Seattle because she was moving up there, and that?s when, on I-5 at 65mph, we had this huge clunking noise behind us, and it was gone. We parked it on the side and looked under the car, and realized I just lost the main heater pipe that run length from the engine compartment to the front of the car. I never paid attention, but I guess it was really rusty! I had a stainless steel pipe welded in place later, which had some interesting side effect that I didn?t really notice till much later. I was driving out, relocating myself to Kentucky for a job. The bus was packed to the brim with everything I owned (everything that didn?t fit was disowned). It was during the heat wave, there were people dying in Texas from the heat, and I was driving through Utah, Colorado (cross the Rocky Mountains), Kansas, all the way to Kentucky. The first thing that I noticed was the heat, enormous heat coming from the vent in the car! I guess there wasn?t enough rust holes in the main heater pipe and it wasn?t cold enough to cool the heated air that it was blowing through the vent into the cabin. Not a big deal, I just duct taped the vents and off I went. The heat that was coming in to the cabin should have been dissipated somehow if the vents in the heat exchanger was working properly, which obviously it wasn?t, which I guess created excessive heat around the engine area, which over heated the starter motor. By the time I was pumping gas for the second time, the starter motor was completely shot. So rest of the way, I had to make sure that it was parked on some kind of slope, which is really difficult to find in Kansas. I made it though, and drove that bus till I lost the 1st and the 3rd gear, sold it to one of those used car dealers on the side of the main strip in Lexington, KY. The guy was nice, he gave me $300 for it.
I was working full time on the real job for the first time in my life then, and bought myself a VW?s new Bug. My girlfriend flew from Seattle, and we were going to take a road-trip back to Seattle together. The trip was fun, no fighting (though there was a minor incident involving her then brother-in-law, who was and probably still is an absolute jerk), we both thought maybe this was it, make or break and we made it, maybe we might think about the future together, that was kind of what we were thinking when we reached Seattle, only till the night before I was driving back out. I had many friends over around that area back then, and we all got together, some even drove up from Eugene to see me. So we had a huge party and my girlfriend retired for a night around 1am. It was maybe around 4 am that I snacked into the bed, totally drunk and smelling like a brewery, and the last thing I sort of recall was my girlfriend kicking me and pushing me out of the bed. She didn?t talk to me as I drove out, and that was that! I moved to Massachusetts with my Bug, and a few years later I traded the car for my best friend?s entire Tom Waits catalogue. The car is till with her to this day.
Then there was 87 Volvo 240 station wagon, god I loved that car. It was so solid and my buddy put sports suspension kit all around, so it handled beautifully, bought it from him for $900, with 240,000miles on it. I ended up selling it back to him recently for $400 with 350,000 with a bad drive shaft bearing. I was a teaching assistant at a workshop in North Carolina, and I had all the tools packed in the car. Right before the trip, I spent a week working on the car, new timing belt, new brakes, all that jazz. It was in Virginia, I was doing maybe 75mph on the highway, I came up to this gigantic hole in the middle of the highway, it was big enough to swallowed the entire front end of the car. I didn?t even see it coming. I hit it hard, but managed to drive on, but right after that, I noticed the car wasn?t driving right. It had major misfire, and the car just didn?t want to go any more. I was really puzzled, and after a couple of hours of trying to figure out what it was (and cut my finger pretty badly in the process), ended up calling AAA, I was out of idea what else to do. A tow truck came after 5 hours of wait, but the driver was really cool, he said he knew a really good Volvo mechanics in town. I wish I could remember the name of the shop, I sent them the thank you note later. The shop was a kick. It really was nothing more than somebody?s back yard with about 50 stray cats just sitting on various Volvos in various stages of decay. They were just about to close the shop, but took my car in, found out one of them (only two guys there, the owner and Volvo fanatic and the other guy who?s also a Volvo fanatic) was from Providence, RI, so we chatted a lot about Northeast. What happened to the car was, the shock from hitting that pothole caused the timing belt to jump a cog, causing the misfire. Never heard of it, but I guess it happens once in a while. Though they were ready to close for a day, they worked on to figure it out and put me back on the road. They gave me a blessing and a brochure for their Christian organization, which in that occasion, I gladly accepted, you don?t argue with good Samaritans. They were great guys. Two week workshop was great, except I got a serious infection from the cut that I got while trying to figure out the issue with the car, and had to see a doctor about it. I had a short-lived minor affair with a nurse down at the doctor?s office, but that?s another story. On the way back, I stopped by to spend some time with my best friend, who was going through separation at the time. I was the best man at their wedding, and was also a good friend of his now ex-wife. So one night, three of us were chatting rather uncomfortably, and she was telling me about the wine glasses we were drinking a fabulous red wind from, saying that they were wedding present, and they only have 3 left now, other 5 had been broken on various drunk occasions. It was a beautiful long stemmed item. Then my buddy said come and look at his wood shop, and we went down with our wine glasses. My buddy and I, we set wine glasses on the table saw (not to do!) and chatting about tools and stuff, I turned around to pick up something, and next thing you know, wine and pieces of glass all over the table saw. I still feel that was the last nail in the coffin of their marriage. On the drive back up north, I just kept on thinking about that wine glass, and I couldn?t help but laughing, thinking that was just about the funniest thing ever!
Now I?m getting ready for another road trip, this time in my 97 Volvo 850 station wagon. I?m sure there?ll be some sort of disaster, but like the folks say, if you live to tell a story, everything is funny at the end. You just can?t have enough road trip!!
All of the family,(13 of us), were camped at one of the Ventura, Ca beachside camping grounds. My sister had come from Bakersfield with the Dodge A100 Sport Van with the family 21 ft trailer. She was heading back Sunday so I inspected the van and trailer and found no problems. A couple of hours later I get a call saying she is stuck in Castaic Junction and would I come to help. It seems that when the van crossed a railroad crossing, the van began to shake violently. She pulled over; checked the tires and the hitch; and tried to continue driving. But even with the gas pedal floored the van would only go 45 mph and get below 30 on minor hills. Now the road from Ventura to Castaic is the Santa Paula highway, a two lane winding road that follows the river valley. This being in southern California other drivers are not tolerant of slow drivers. So even though she pulled over to let cars by when she could, a lot of fingers of appreciation were displayed.
When she got to Castaic Junction there was a place where she could get to a phone. All the gas stations were fuel only. She called AAA and the truck came out and said they could not tow because of the trailer plus the distance to tow to an available repair facility would be costly. The driver did opine that he thought the problem was with the U joints. So next she called me to come to the rescue.
I didn’t think the problem was with the U joint because I had inspected them that afternoon. But to forstall problems, I hunted down the one parts store in Ventura which was open and got a new spider. When I arrived at her location, I inspected the U joints and declared them okey. As I drove the van I realized that there was no power. With the air cleaner off, I could see that the throttle plates only opened 1/3 of the way. Then I noticed that the engine (the engine is beside the drivers seat in a dog house) was sitting lower in its enclosure. On further inspection, I found the left motor mount was broken and the engine was hanging down. So I jacked up the engine until the two halves of the mount were approximated; cut part of my bicycle security chain to length; wrapped the chain around the steel of the mount; and bolted the ends together. Now the engine sat right and the throttle could be fully openned. On test driving the jury rig held.
I told my sister that she could continue home; drive gently when down shifting; and try not to get into a situation where she would need reverse. Anyway she made it home over the Ridge Route of I-5 (4000+ foot climb and descent); stowed the trailer; and parked the van in the carport. The next morning when she tried backing out to go to the repair shop, the van gave a loud bang; locked up; and had to be towed to the facility for the engine mount replacement.
Knowing how to tug the heartstrings of his Italian mother, my son called from college one evening lamenting the fact that he had not had a decent meal in nearly 3 months. After getting off the phone, nearly in tears, my wife insisted that we drive the 350 miles from Connecticut to Washington, DC in order to deliver a large tray of homemade ziti for him and his friends to devour.
So, that weekend we packed up the car, mother-in-law and all, and drove down to Washington. On the way home, we discovered that because of local rioting (on account of a University of Maryland basketball victory), the road that took us to the highway was partially blocked by a police cruiser. There was one officer running around frantically attempting to direct traffic from several different directions and cross streets. As he was at the other side of the street, I took the liberty of driving through the intersection (after looking both ways of course) to make my way towards the highway, and get out of the madness! As I proceeded through the intersection at about 5 miles per hour, the officer jumped in front of my car, screamed for me to stop and pointed his gun directly at our windshield! After a lengthy 25 minute lecture, and an $800 ticket later, we were back on our way home in silence. As I finally began mumbling about the ticket, the ziti trip from hell, and the audacity of an officer pointing a gun at my family, I paused just long enough to hear my mother-in-law exclaim from the back seat, “What? What gun? I didn?t see any gun”. I hope my son enjoyed his ziti??..
Hi Guys:
When I was in College in Philadelphia area in 1972, a friend of mine convinced me to join four others for a trip to Mardi Gras. I was dumb enough to say yes and gathered $100, packed a pillow case, and we all poured into a VW Beetle bus that had seen better days. We crowded into the bus with six cases of beer (for those who were not driving) luggage and some pillows, with a total of about $600. We headed south. Outside of Washington DC, in Virgina somewhere if I recall, The VW blew a water pump. For whatever reason we were travelling on a back road and were now in the woods, in the dark, with a broken down van. Three of us decided to hitch hike to the nearest gas station or phone to get help. The other two stayed with the van. After a long time on the dark rural road, a car finally pulled over and the three of us got in the back seat. The strong smell of whiskey coming from the driver and his friend was about as strong as their southern accent as we drove off. Once they learned we were from the “North” they asked us some racial questions to make certain we did not like, let us say, non-whites. It was scary and of course we agreed with whatever they said After about ten minutes on the road, the driver pulled into a dirt road that was darker than the “highway” we left behind. We are now heading into the woods on a narrow dirt road. By now, I am elbowing my two friends on each side of me to try to get them to open the doors to get us out of this car as soon as it stops. The driver stopped the car and I see the the front passenger reaching in the glove compartment. I knew I had it. I could already imagine the gun pointing at us “Northern boys” and getting shot and buried in some shallow grave. I really elbowed my friends now who still didn’t move. As it turned out, he pulled out a bottle of whiskey and asked us if we wanted a drink. We all politely said no, and waited for what seemed like an hour, before our driver was done talking to us and backed out of the dirt road. He did take us to a gas station. Although the VW bus was fixed for about $200, I had enough excitement and asked to be dropped off at the nearest train station. By the time I reached the 30th Street Station in Philadelphia, I had $20 left and headed back to campus. I never have gone to Mardi Gras and have never took another ride in a VW Beetle Van either.
Roger Innes
Bar Harbor, ME
This may stretch the definition of road trip, but here goes anyway. I spent my summer vacation between my senior year of high school and freshman year of college as a trash collector in a small town in Washington state. The trash hauling company was a real shoestring operation, and maintenance on the garbage truck had been long deferred. For instance, the passenger side door would flop open whenever the truck took a right turn, which tended to keep me awake, as I was usually sitting in the passenger seat of the truck rather than riding on the back because of the relatively long distances between our stops.
Anyway, it was a hot summer day and we were about halfway through our route, when we stopped at a small grocery store to get some soft drinks. This store was so small that the parking lot consisted of about 5 spaces directly in front of the main entrance. The garbage truck took up about 2 1/2 of these spaces. The store proprietor was annoyed (to say the least) that a filthy, smelly, hydraulic oil dripping garbage truck with a cloud of flies buzzing around it was parked in front of his establishment. Also, since the state of Washington allowed burn barrels back in those days, our overalls and any exposed skin was covered in soot, and just walking around in the store was no doubt contaminating it and scaring off customers. So we get our sodas and the store keeper shoos us out the door and we get back into the truck and hit the starter switch. The only sound it makes is a metallic click.
After a few refreshing sips from our sodas, we decide that maybe hitting the starter with a rock or something might help. The truck was a tilt cab, so he had to tilt the cab forward in order to expose the engine (which came from a Lincoln, by the way.) So, while I’m whacking away on the starter with a rock, I hear a thud from the front of the truck, and walk around to the front of the vehicle and discover that the windshield has fallen out onto the pavement, and being made of safety glass has broken into thousands of tiny pieces. Luckily though, we were able to pick the windshield up in one piece because a coating on the glass kept all of the pieces together, and since it was a garbage truck, we just threw it in back with the rest of the trash.
We did finally get the truck to start – I forget if the banging on the starter worked, or if we had to hotwire it. It might have been just a faulty ignition switch relay that we were able to jumper around. I finished the route with my feet dangling out of the hole where the windshield used to be, and of course hanging onto that passenger door to keep it from flopping open.