Westward Ho!  On the Road Part 1

Travelogue to Colorado

Polley and I enjoy visiting Colorado.  Montana and Wyoming and North Dakota are also beautiful, but the state that spawned John Denver’s Rocky Mountain High has become our favorite.  Colorado has the advantage of being wild without being desolate.  In Montana if one river or stream is not productive for fly fishing, I have to drive 200 miles to the next river or stream.  In Colorado the choices, prime fly fishing venues, along with supermarkets, restaurants, and liquor stores are closer together.  Drive up a remote mountain pass as we did through Kebler’s Pass outside of Crested Butte and you are likely to stumble upon a very populated resort like Lake Irwin, an alpine waterway with paddle surfers and water skiiers.  It looked so inviting that, were we not lost in Kebler’s Pass due to less than ideal signage and a jogger who nefariously gave us incorrect information, I considered spending a day at Lake Irwin.  Next trip….perhaps on the way home.

People are surprised that we drive to the West.  Flying would be faster, but airlines charge for extra bags.  Fly fishing waders, wading staff, fly rod, boots, tackle, and twenty reserve fly boxes (carrying flies to meet every possible hatch situation; Polley has the same attitude toward packing clothes, anticipating every possible weather situation and social event, including the remote chance that we would join the Queen of England for tea), along with a rental car, makes flying a less attractive option.. The major reason why we choose to drive is that it allows us to visit our daughter Meredith and her husband Ronak in St. Louis, as well as Polley’s sister Martha in Columbia, Missouri and her children.  Add in an uncle and friends in Kansas City and a cousin in Colorado and we have not only a fly fishing trip but a family pilgrimage.

Another major factor in committing at least six days of our lives to cruising along Interstate 70 is Polley’s love of driving.  She is from St. Louis, and Midwesterners view distance differently from us easterners.  Iowa basketball fans are known for driving in the middle of winter one hundred miles to a high school game.  In the East, driving one hundred miles could take one through four states.  More on that later.

Preparing for a long trip is itself a project.  Mail and newspaper subscriptions must be halted, neighbors alerted.  My responsibility includes getting the car ready.  Since it was against my father’s self-honed religion to buy a new car, as a kid it was my job to anticipate the inevitable breakdown we would suffer on our camping and fishing trips. I retain that mindset.  I buy a new car at about the same interval as Haley’s Comet visits the earth.  In 1980, we planned a family trip to Yellowstone, and I had just 3 months earlier purchased a brand new, white Oldsmobile Cutlass Cruiser station wagon.  Remember station wagons?  The new car smell still permeated that Olds with the fake wood paneling.  The day before our embarkation, I made a speech to my four children, a la General Patton only without the profanity and riding crop although the tone was the same.  “We [meaning me] want to keep this new car as clean as possible, so, kids, there will be NO eating in this car.  We will stop along the road for lunch and snacks.  NO, I repeat, NO eating!!”  My children were expert travelers, and we loved taking them places, but they were children.  By the time we were a little ways past Harrisburg I was throwing Cheetos over my shoulder into the back seat.  On that trip I believe the Prime Movers of the Universe punished me for my automobile arrogance and ignorance.  I-70 was not completed around Columbus, Ohio, and I had to concentrate on the traffic, which was heavy, and on the detour signs.  My children chose this moment to initiate a fight in the “backest,” (our back seat and the farther back luggage area—seat belts?).

Repeated admonitions by Polley and me resulted in short term peace treaties.  I finally lost it.  “If you kids don’t stop fighting, I am going to pull over and stop the car!!!!”  Polley looked at me as if I had undergone a frontal lobotomy.  I looked in the rear view mirror and saw my children collectively shrug.  What kind of a threat was that?  If we don’t go anywhere, then you don’t go anywhere either.  Of course, my threat rose from the deep recesses of my childhood, and the words were those of my farther.  My ultimate punishment on that trip was imposed thirty miles from St. Louis, thirty miles from family and rest and thirty miles from a cold Budweiser on the last stretch of I-70 in Illinois.  Orange Construction Sign (the dreaded bane of any road warrior):“Fresh tar laid on road.  Drive slowly.”

I spent the next three days in my inlaws’ driveway trying to remove specks of black tar from my brand new Cutlass Cruiser.

On our latest trip to Colorado, we rose early as we usually do.  On the way west the sun is at your back in the early part of the day, and in your face in the afternoon when you begin to tire of driving.  In less than two hours we are past Harrisburg, heading for the mountain tunnels on the Pennsylvania Turnpike.  Pennsylvanians, including me, forget how scenic and just plain beautiful their state is. I was told that in western PA, the turnpike follows a railroad line, curvy and twisting.  You have to be careful.  Humming along at 65 or 70 miles per hour in the left lane you can round a turn and almost kiss a slow passing truck if you are not careful.  At New Stanton we leave the turnkpike and continue on 70 through Washington, PA.  These fifty miles slow us down, the narrow lanes and heavy traffic and little or no shoulders make the turnpike look like a speedway.  Six hours after waking up at 6 AM we hit our neighboring state, West Virginia where our big decision is whether or not to take the 470 Bypass around wheeling.  We usually do, although taking regular 70 through the city does not seem to take more time.

“Wild and wonderful” West Virginia is traversed in the blink of an eye.  As most people know, in 1861 the residents of the western counties of Virginia, led by Francis Pierpont, set up  a separate government (which they called the “restored government”) and broke away from their fellow Virginians who advocated slavery and states’ rights over the preservation of the Union. West Virginia became a state in 1863.  Who would have thunk the difference one hundred and fifty years made?

Upon entering Ohio, for us, the Midwest commences.  I know that western Pennsylvanians and West Virginians often identify themselves culturally as Midwesterners, but, in truth, they are almost-Midwesterners, influenced by their western neighbors but still retaining one foot in an eastern perspective.  Ohio is all Midwest.

We cross 220 miles of the state seemingly quickly. St. Clairsville, Columbus, Dayton fly by. Rufus Pitman led some pioneers to establish Marietta, Ohio as the first permanent settlement in the Northwest Territory in 1788.  I imagine they took a great deal longer than we did.  Since we are, and will be, on the road for a long time, it should be noted that Cleveland, Ohio sported the first traffic light in 1914.  Sometimes I think it might be nice to make a slight diversion and see that historic traffic light.   Next trip…..perhaps on the way home.

Polley and I smile broadly as we enter Indiana.  Our inner happiness is augmented by memory.  We met in graduate school in Indiana University, fifty miles south of Nap Town (Indianapolis).   Bloomington, Indiana will always recall in our combined memories those days of our youth when every inhaled breath filled our bodies with energy and our souls with promise.

We also know that the day of driving is almost ended, and we must decide whether to find a motel in Richmond, one on the other side of Indianapolis or an inn in Terra Haute on the border of Illinois.  We choose Terra Haute for two reasons:  the more distance we travel on the first day, the less mileage we have to cover the second day which means more time in St. Louis with Meredith.  So we push ourselves. The second reason is that Terra Haute has a really good Steak and Shake.

As we drive through Indy we notice highway 37 South toward Bloomington, and we are tempted to make a diversion and visit old haunts and recapture those youthful feelings, but we want to see our daughter.  Next trip….perhaps on the way home.

Sated by Steak and Shake’s burgers and fries, we collapse in the motel in Terra Haute, 12 hours of driving and 750 miles under our belt.  We drift off dreaming of new adventures…..like enduring Illinois.