TURNPIKES...I'D SEEN THEM IN THE MOVIES, but...OMG!

Here is an event, which was a real learning experience for me:

 I travel a lot, lately, with my new invention, tradeshows, etc. But, I had always stayed in the West. We have what we call FREEWAYS for traveling from place to place. And, they really are FREE! You don't pay any money to use these highways to get where you need to go. A few weeks ago, I needed to travel to Kansas from San Diego. I knew it would be a very long week ahead, and one of my daughters, Ginny, traveled with me on this business trip. (Keep in mind, she had never been East, either.) So, here's two very "Western" ladies traveling East to Kansas, expecting the smoothest part of this excursion to be the driving.

Originally, we had decided to take Ginny's Malibu (MISTAKE #1) because the ride would be more comfortable and her trunk was big enough to pick up our prototype from the company in Kansas. Ginny can't drive a stick shift, like my 4x4 S-10 Chevy Blazer, so we could switch turns driving by taking her Malibu, too. So, we headed East from Alpine, (San Diego area) at around 1:30 p.m., towards the desert on the Freeway. Everything seems to be going fine. It's really hot outside, with temperatures in the lower 100's. The Malibu's airconditioning works great. We're climbing the mountains with ease. THEN... I don't think we got more than 20 miles up the freeway before Ginny's car started sounding a buzzer. She didn't know what it was, so  I looked over and noticed that her temperature gauge was pegging in the RED HOT zone. (Crap) I yelled "Pull over, NOW, Ginny. You're overheated, big time!." She was passing a semi at that moment, which caused us to just miss an off ramp with a gas station. When she stopped, we could see the off ramp right next to us. So, now were pulled over on the shoulder, with a very hot engine. After an hour, and several attempts to try to get to the next off ramp, two miles up the freeway, it became apparent that there was really something wrong with the Malibu's engine. A highway patrol officer stopped and gave us a push to the nearest off ramp. I called my husband and told him to bring antifreeze, more water, and my rig to our location, so we could switch out vehicles and proceed with this trip. We waited another hour, thinking my husband would show up at any moment. I swear, it must have been over 110° that day, and it was nearly 3 p.m. now. We were hot and getting anxious.

My husband finally calls my cell and asks "Where are you guys? I can't find you." I asked where he was, and he told me he just saw a sign which said "To Beaches." ... BEACHES! WHAT!? I couldn't believe it! I told him we were headed to the DESERT! Why was he heading WEST to the BEACHES?!!!! Kansas is EAST. Why would we travel to the beaches to reach Kansas?

So now he had to turn around, and back-track an hour before finally reaching our stranded location. When he arrived, we switched out the vehicles. He seemed optimistic that he'd get the Malibu home okay, and urged us to get started, as it was getting late. So, we didn't really get started on our trip til 5 p.m. or later.

Driving my rig meant that I would have to do ALL the driving, now, because Ginny can't drive a stick shift. But, that was okay. I drive a lot and actually like long trips. And, I know my rig will make the trip just fine.

We conquered the rest of the mountains and through California's desert, made Phoenix by 10 p.m., crossed Arizona, and stopped in Gallup, New Mexico just before sun up, to rest a few hours. Our goal was to reach Albuquerque. We were just an hour shy of it, but I had to stop. We started again just before noon, and loved the New Mexico landscape. Nearing Texas, we hit a bit of weather with fierce winds and sheets of heavy rain. We had to slow to a crawl on the freeway because the rain was so hard we couldn't see. Ginny was beginning to fear tornadoes as we entered Texas. I didn't think that was a concern, but you can never tell with nature. We crossed Texas and into Oklahoma.

Ugh! By now the humidity was probably 95% and we were miserable if we turned off the air conditioning, or had to stop for gas. Half way through Oklahoma it was getting dark. Ginny noticed my hair looked like I had stuck my finger in a live socket. She had never seen my hair that frizzy before and was laughing hysterically at my hair. I was so miserable with the rain and humidity that I didn't care what I looked like. (Later, when I saw it myself, in a mirror, I had to laugh, too. It was pretty funny.)

We came to a spot where we had to get on a Toll road, or a type of Turnpike road. This is where neither of us had any idea of how those things work. We had seen them in movies and knew we were going to have to pay to use them. But, HOW to pay, WHEN to pay, and WHY pay so often, made absolutely no sense to us at all. It was late, dark, and raining. I entered the first Toll booth. Nobody was there! I fumbled for change, because I had no idea of how much was needed. Ginny saw a sign which said the toll for two axle was $1.15. We scraped up enough change to match that, threw it in this cage-like basket and we got a green light to go. Okay, that wasn't so bad. About 2 miles down the road, another "Stop and pay toll." (WHAT? AGAIN?) We had about 180 miles to travel on this thing and if every 2 miles we had to pay toll, well, that would be EXPENSIVE! Ginny noticed a sign before the toll booth which had two lanes on the left side, passing the toll booth, for "Pike pass" subscribers, only. She suggested I move to those lanes if we come upon another toll booth. I argued, I knew I wasn't a Pike Pass subscriber and that I couldn't do that. She insisted that it was crazy to pay all these tolls and it would cost a mini fortune to use the toll roads. I didn't know how to get around them, and I didn't want to chance getting lost in the middle of the night. (For all I knew, we could end up in some dinky little town with no open gas station. Or worse, end up on the side of the road, out of gas, in the middle of nowhere.) We decided I needed to get off the next exit, gas up and get lots of change to pay all the expected tolls. Ginny was very irritated by now and we both realized how fortunate we were to have FREEWAYS in the West. As I approached the next exit...yup, another "Pay toll." We paid the amount stated on the sign, again, got off, gassed up, got tons of change, and headed back onto the turnpike. And again, "Pay Toll." Paid again, got on, got lost, had to turn around, PAY TOLL again to get off, turned around,PAID TOLL again to get on. We traveled about 10 miles and hit another "Pay Toll," paid again, then missed an exit to another connecting turnpike, took the next off ramp, Paid Toll, turned around, Paid Toll again, to get back on, took the right exit, Paid Toll again, and spent the entire night doing this. We had never been more upset, tired, and disgusted with anything more awful than this TOLL experience during our little excursion to this point. (except, maybe the humidity and weather.) We finally made it to Kansas by sunrise. We were rejoicing to get rid of that TOLL crap, but knew we had to face it again on our way back to the West. We made it to our Kansas destination by mid morning, checked into a hotel and simply "crashed."

PART TWO, to be posted next....