We were expecting a Woodie Guthrie experience as we drove down "that ribbon of highway," but were a little unprepared for how pretty this country is.
People who call everything between the coasts "fly-over country" deserve to miss it.
We took I-80 east along the great immigration trails, and considered ourselves backwards pioneers. Meh, we've been called worse.
We started in Wyoming (mostly because we couldn't start anywhere else) and found that a long wet spring had left the landscape cool and green.
So cool that we had to wear sweaters until the last day. Wyoming's sky was big and dramatic,
but the landscape was still mostly empty. Except for trains and trucks. And snow fences.
We saw a rainbow touch down in Rawlins, an unlikely place for a rainbow, but our whole trip was like that.
We figured that once we got past Cheyenne, it was downhill all the way to Philadelphia. It was mildly disturbing that we saw so many big yellow trucks pulling cars on trailers coming the OTHER way. What do they know that we don't?
Of course, we still had to navigate Nebraska, which started dark, since we drove late the first night to make up for the flat tire delay. We had an exciting night getting to Lexington (motto: "a great place to stop on the way to somewhere else.") When we turned on the radio because we were feeling some windy gusts, we got dire predictions of impending tornadoes in Crook, Ralph, and Djibouti counties. At least that's what I thought they called them. "Seek shelter now," they said, "because in the dark you can't see them coming." We had no ideas where the radio stations were (we were picking up from about a 500-mile radius), and had no idea what county we were in anyway. So we drove on. And ate sunflower seeds to stay awake. Thanks, Brett.
It was interesting that at each state line we could sense a change in the landscape. At the Nebraska border, it got dark.
So that was a change.
But the next day we noticed we had gone from the nothing of Wyoming to corn fields of Nebraska, which are sort of like something.
Also Nebraska has lots of museums. Examples: Nebraska Prairie Museum (where they keep old prairies), The Prairieman Museum, The Strategic Air Command Museum, The Cherryland Museum, the Old Danish Settler's Museum. And many more!
We didn't stop at any. Would you?
In Iowa, we passed a road sign for the Council Bluffs Airport, which made us wonder why the pioneers didn't just fly to Utah, Oregon and California, what with a major airport so close.
In Illinois (motto: our potholes are truly epic), the trees got bigger, but so did the traffic.
We left in a hurry. Actual picture of Illinois pothole:
But not before we were introduced to our best friend for the next 1000 miles: the toll booth.
It is true that technically you can get from place to place without getting on a tollroad (aka turnpikes, wherever THAT word comes from...), but you might expect a less direct route.
Indiana was just like Illinois, but without the traffic, the people, the cities, the potholes or the noise. Ohio was very pretty, and the views we had of the Cuyahoga River Valley were nothing less than spectacular. Of course, I forgot to take a picture.
Our last night was in Pittsburgh, at the end of a 100-yard long hallway, down which we portaged nearly the whole expedition.
Finally, the day of reckoning was upon us. We drove into town at midday, 16-ft long moving truck with trailer, right through the middle of downtown so we could drop off the car trailer. Intense. Actually simulated picture of our Penske truck, in simulated Philadelphia traffic:
Then we snuck out to the country--WAAAAYYY out into the country--to stay with Dale and Mitzi Busath, former neighbors of ours in Riverton, and current owners of a driveway long enough to fit the truck for a couple of nights. A couple of days at their house seemed so...so...normal.
The short of a long story is this: we live in a pretty great country, and you really ought to see it. We didn't really get Woodie Guthrie, or Jack Kerouac, or Steinbeck and Charlie, or even Charles Kuralt, but this land is really your land.
Summary statistics for those who are geeks like me:
Miles: 2287
Hours driven: about 42 (averaging about 54.5 mph)
Gallons of gas: 228.7 (I didn't believe it either, but the receipts do not lie)
Average 10 mpg
Average price of gas: $3.52
High gas: Joliet, IL, and Valley Forge, PA--$3.799
Low gas: Wyoming--$3.399
Total tolls paid: about $100 (lost some of the receipts)
PA was most expensive, and least convenient--they insisted on cash-only at the toll booths.
