I had to relocate in a real hurry from Boston, MA to San Francisco, CA in 2007. This Blog was started to share my experiences for the cross-country drive and an East-Coasters impressions of San Francisco.
Today is the day of the long-haul; a very flat, boring haul.I know I can’t make it to Salt Lake City.I have to call ben and tell him I’m putting him off for another day.I’ll just have the truck pointed west, cover as many miles as I can and likely make it to SLC by Thursday night.
One surprising thing about Kansas; it’s perceived as flat and featureless.The eastern half of the state is surprisingly hilly and scenic.As I roll west, the landscape gradually becomes drier and I start spotting tumbleweeds sprinting across the highway in high winds.
Night falls.Kansas develops into something else after a while: its BIG.I’m glancing at my atlas and as the afternoons fatigue turns into the evenings exhaustion, I depressingly track my slow progress between the dots on the map that represent highway exits/towns/cities.
As the night starts to wear on me, that same stupid thought crosses my mind: you’ve only covered two states today.“You have got to make it to Colorado before calling it a day.”
One bit of excitement came from listening to the local news station: not only was I racing a storm system, but there are tornado warnings being issues for 5 counties, including the ones I’m driving through.
At this point the snow starts to come down.As if the marathon-drives weren’t enough, I’m catching another bank of the snowstorms that are dumping on the entire country.
I pull over just 15 miles inside Colorado. The only postcard of Burlington, Colorado is a picture of a Merry-go-round. The sight I was pleased to see was the BIG $10 steak and $1.50 Draughts of Fat Tire Beer at the restaurant next to the hotel.
It’s still snowing in the morning. I haven’t seen more that 500 feet away from my truck at any point on the trip so far. The Hotel offers a basic breakfast of fruit, pastries or biscuits with Sausage Gravy. Little did I know this would be a staple of my breakfasts until I got to SLC.
This is the place I woke up to after my first day. This is actually a stock photo. Everything was covered in snow under dark gray skies.
I was already developing a 'camping' bio-clock. The sunlight woke me up in the morning. I had all day to Drive and I'd get tired at night, exhausted from ten or twelve-straight hours of paying attention to the road, snow covered roads, snow-covered roads with more speedtraps than I'd see in a year in MA.
The forecast is still looking rather rough; Des Moines, Iowa is getting two feet of snow, the upper plains are really getting nailed with tough weather. A week earlier, my colleague Bob Richardson gave me some hard-earned advice about the countries mid-section: Divert south and take Rt. 70 across the plains instead of Rt. 80; you’ll avoid a lot of weather. It was looking like he was right. I divert to Rt. 70, which will take me through St, Louis, MO, and then across Kansas and Colorado en route to Salt Lake City, this seems a lot easier vs. taking Rt. 80 across Iowa, Nebraska and Wyoming to Salt Lake City.
Once I pass by Cleveland I start entering territory I have never covered before in my life.
An opportunity occurs to me: I have a prospect in St. Louis that I’ve been trying to get someone in front of to talk to. If I can get there tonight, I can meet with them tonight over dinner or tomorrow morning.
I had no idea archways were so popular in the mid-west. Leaving ohio, I cross into Indiana. There are farms, cornfields, cows, farms, cornfields, cows…. There is no perceptible change in anything from crossing into Illinois from Indiana. The only part of Illinois I’ve seen before was Chicago.
I knew the rest of the state was cornfields, now I get to experience the rest of the state for a good portion of todays drive.
I resolve to finish up in St. Louis. So I've touched four states today.
The morning greeted me with snow at 6:30 AM. Checking a forecast for an entire quadrant of the country takes a little creative thinking. You have to not only think about what is happening when and where across a much bigger section of the weather map, but the fact that you are a moving target across whole weather system complicates things even worse. The forecast said the moving weather system would keep snowing all across the northeast for the next 36 hours. I can’t catch a break; the drive was not going to be an easy one.
It’s about 15 hours of driving to get to Chicago. Kristen and Jeff are looking forward to hosting me tonight. The snow may get in the way of that.
I actually hit the road at 8:30 AM and get on the Mass Pike. That closing scene in the movie ‘Good Will Hunting’ when you see Att Damon’s car getting to the end of the Mass Pike, starting his drive to California to chase that actress, I think it was Minnie Driver?
Anyhow, I have to stop for gas in Upstate NY, just short of Syracuse. There are some pressing things going on in the office that I have to take care of, so I stop at a Barnes & Noble in Syracuse. 5 phone calls, 20+ emails and 90 minutes later I get back on the road.
The forecast is not looking good and it’s pretty certain I’m not seeing Chicago tonight, at least, not before 2AM.
Around 7PM its getting dark, it’s still snowing and the fatigue is starting to wear on me. As I pass through Buffalo, I think to myself that this will likely be the last chance for a very long time that I’ll be able to have real Buffalo Wings in Buffalo.
After Buffalo I try to find a shopping mall to pick up a new Lonely Planet: USA so I can find places to stay that are cooler than Motel 6 or the Best Western. I fail miserably; wasting time running around snow-covered strip malls what have no bookstores to speak of. Just driving to places where you see bright shiny lights is no guarantee of finding what you need in Upstate NY.
After dinner it occurs to me that I’ve only covered two states so far today. That’s rather pathetic. I resolve to put a couple more states behind me so I can feel better about the progress I’m making. This is actually rather easy; PA has a panhandle separating NY State from Ohio. Just another two hours of driving will put me across the panhandle and into Northeast Ohio. It’s not a huge deal in the scheme of things, but it feels like a much bigger accomplishment to me, at least.
As I cross into Ohio, all I can think about is scanning those ‘Gas Food Lodging’ signs for a hotel chain that I recognize. This first major town has a Clarion and a Holiday Inn Express. At this point, the fatigue and a sense of grubbiness is really setting in. I pull over at the Holiday Inn Express, check in and sleep like the dead until morning.
