Ever wonder what it's like to take a month-long road trip? How about doing something responsible like driving smack through a massive winter storm? How about doing it with a car not equipped with winter tires nor driving without any experience in the extreme cold? Nathalie and I did this (plus more) in late December. Here's what we learned and what we can share.
The Plan
Our route took us from my parents' place in Brentwood, TN, across the Midwest to the western edges of the Prairie in the foot hills of South Dakota. It took us three days to make the 1,300 mi/2,100 Km
drive (thanks in big part to the weather), with the end goal of meeting an old friend for new year's.
From there, Nathalie and I continued through the vast expanse that is eastern Wyoming and onward to Denver, Colorado, to spend a few weeks exploring some of the best ski resorts in the country. As this was a huge excursion, I'm going to leave the latter phases of the trip for a another post. In the meantime, here are my 'take-aways' from my first drive out west.
America Don't F*%k Around When It Comes To Distance
I guess as an American, I took for granted how big the US really is. I grew up on the east coast, which, compared to the lands on the far side of the Mississippi river, is geographically close and heavily populated. As a simple example, if we were to have driven northeast instead of northwest, we would've reach Montreal, Canada via Washington, DC; Baltimore, MD; Philadelphia, PA; and New York City in the same time frame. This part of the US represents some 20% of the population with over 50 million people living within the northeast corridor. In comparison, the only major cities we crossed were St. Louis, MO and Kansas City; both of which are within three hours of each other and hold a combined population of just over 5 million.
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| This counts as a major rest stop in the Rural Midwest |
During our drive, there would be times where we wouldn't see another car on the road for 10-15 minutes (this was especially true when we were in South Dakota). Getting off the interstate sometimes meant that the only sign of civilization was the lone gas station surrounded by barren corn fields. Even during my time in Southeast Asia, I never experienced such vast emptiness. It's incredible to think that even as the Earth has never been more populated that there are still massive swaths of land that are practically uninhabited.
To drive the point home, we soon realized that out in the west, it's common place to drive an hour just to run a mundane errand. Our friend that we were visiting drives 45 minutes each day to go to work. His fiancee does the same. In Tennessee, that's still not unheard of. However, here in Belgium, driving 45 minutes seems like a huge ordeal. Given, you can cross a quarter of the country in that time, I've learned that it's all relative, and more importantly, to not put my plans on hold because I have to spend an hour driving somewhere (gasp!).
Driving Through a Massive Winter Storm is a Great Way to Improve Your Driving (and Question Your Sanity)
Nathalie and I had practically no constraints as to when we needed to leave. With that in mind, we decided that driving head-first into a massive winter storm bearing down on our trajectory would've been the perfect time to hit the road. Given, the weather pattern changed from what was forecast, but we took three days to do what normally should've been a two-day drive.
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| Not really the view you want to wake up to when you have a full day of driving ahead of you. |
Desperate, we frantically looked at our options to get back on the road. After researching alternative routes on our phone, we slithered our way through back roads until we could get back on the interstate. After another four hours of driving, we made it to our hotel in northwestern, Missouri. Exhausted, we went to bed, expecting to hit the road early the next morning. Oh how that was wishful thinking.
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| Snow Storm |
After debating whether or not to leave over breakfast, we decided that buying a set of chains and attempting to drive as far as South Dakota would be better than spending another night in St. Joseph, MO. Stubborn in our resolve, we bought our chains and hit the open icy road. With only a sporadic few trucks and other equally daring insane cautious drivers, we spent the next eight hours crawling along I-29 at a brisk 40 Mph/65 Km/h.
Between the snow drifts, low visibility and iced-over shoulders, we somehow managed to keep the car on the road. While the first 30 minutes were probably the most focused I've ever been at the wheel (think no music, no talking, and a gallon of coffee), I found my rhythm and became at ease with the road conditions. We made it to Sioux Falls, SD early that evening, where we treated ourselves to pizza and whiskey as a reward for not flipping the car into a snowbank.
The last leg of the drive was uneventful as the storm had largely passed by the next morning. Really, the only factor we had to deal with was the extremely cold temperatures outside, with the air temperature around 5F/-15C and the wind chill around -15F/-26C.
Between this epic ordeal and the driving we did up in the Rockies, I can confidently say that our snow driving skills have gotten much better (given, we didn't encounter a ground blizzard, but that's whole different can of frozen worms all together). And even though I would rather not have to do it again, I'm glad to know that I can drive in strong wintry weather if I need to.
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| The Open South Dakota Sky |
Overall, while it wasn't the trip we had expected to go on, it definitely turned out to be a memorable one. The vast expanse oft the United States once again humbled me. I received a lesson in long-distance, extreme weather driving and saw a part of the country that I had never before experienced. It was the last big trip of 2015 for me, and as the end cap to a year filled with traveling, it certainly stayed true to the adventurous theme running through it.
Up next: Deadwood, Wyoming and the Frontier!
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