Copy Link
Add to Bookmark
Report
Activist Times Inc. thereandback
On the Road 2001 - There and Back Again and Things in the Middle
by aaron kreider
Prologue
Here in lies the account of my second ever hitchhiking trip. My first trip,
in 1999, can be read online at
http://www.nd.edu/~akreider/essays/ontheroadzineversion.txt.
I live in South Bend, Indiana, but this trip started off in Kansas because
I was in Owen Sound, Ontario for a family reunion and then got a ride to
Kansas with relatives. My goal was to make it to Alpine, WY, a small town
on the Wyoming / Idaho border, a couple hours south of Yellowstone.
Actually, the final destination was on a forest road twenty miles east of
Alpine where Earth First! was holding its annual rendez-vous (July 7 - 16)
in the Tetons National Forest.
Part I : There
I took notes on the en-route trip, which were very helpful in remembering
details.
The real adventure started Sunday morning at 9am (July 8) when I got a ride
with relatives from Newton (Kansas) to Salina (arrived at 10:15am), which
is just on the I-70 interstate. The general plan was to hitch north on 81
to I-80, west on the interstate to Evanston, and then north on 89 to
Alpine. I got a Boeing hat from my uncle, which served me well given the
hot weather that was to come. I had boldly written "NORTH TO I-80" on my
sign. The gods were with me and within ten minutes I had a ride, albeit a
short one to Concordia. I was picked up by a woman in her thirties with a
young boy and girl who were on a long trip in a van without any AC. But so
long as I was making distance, that was fine.
All was going well and after thirty minutes of hitching in Concordia (or
more likely its north side) I was picked up by another woman also in her
thirties (with holes in her jeans) and without AC. Unfortunately she was
not going far at all and left me off in Belleville around noon. The last
and only other time I'd been in Kansas it was just this hot. Today the
thermometer was at 95 and the heat index at 105. The fact that it was noon
and there wasn't any shade where I hitched on the north side of town made
matters worse. Construction work is ongoing to turn 81 into a two-lane
road, but at Belleville it only had one lane going each way. I had a good
spot, with a decent area for cars to pull over and they could see me for a
good distance before they had to stop to pick me up, but after two hours I
wasn't getting any bites. I drank most of my water (I only had 1.6 l) and
then walked to the nearest gas station to refill and recover from the heat.
Walking was excruciating since I wasn't accustomed to my pack and I was
suffering from the heat. I got a bag of chips (figuring I was sweating out
the salt) and a 32oz Slice with lots of ice. I read the local newspaper at
the gas station, including an article about how 3/4 of the town was flooded
in 1951. I returned to hitchhike from 3pm-4pm which is about the hottest
time of the day. By this time I was sunburnt in spots since I hadn't lopped
on the sun tan lotion as much as I should have. At 4pm, I called it quits
as I was suffering from heat exhaustion and I headed to a travel
information place-store that was the nearest place to crash. There I got
some water and then crashed in the shade until 6pm. I was so exhausted that
I tried lying on the grass, but it was too hot to lie down so I just sat on
the bench and didn't do much. There were very few visitors to the store,
mostly older people too, and as I was very tired I didn't try to get a ride.
Finally, just resting there I got a ride offer from a talkative man in his
fifties whose wife worked at the store. He took me across the KS-NE border
to a truck stop even though he didn't have any reason to go that way. He
just wanted to help me out. Unfortunately, the truck stop was inactive
since highway 81 had been re-routed away from it and it only had two
trucks! So I was back to hitching on 81. Within an hour, around 7:30pm, I
got a ride to York (a.k.a. I-80) from a very talkative man who was hauling
materials for 81's road construction which we discussed in detail.
In York I visited the McDonald's bathroom, though I was so dehydrated that
even after drinking 2-3 liters I didn't really need to go. The spot right
at the on-ramp looked bad (no place to pull over), and I didn't want to
risk hitchhiking on the interstate for if hitching is illegal in the area,
it'd definitely be illegal on the interstate. So I hitched in front of a
Flying J truck stop by a light where trucks would have to stop if it was
red, with my sign saying "WEST" which is an important distinction since
half of the traffic leaving the stop would be going east (and in this case
more, since there were also roads going North and South).
There were many trucks. Maybe 45 per hour going west. Finally after sunset,
around 9:45pm I got a long ride from a Polish trucker in his late 30s /
early 40s who had been driving straight from Chicago without sleeping. He'd
immigrated in 1986. He was going to California. We stopped for a short time
in North Platte (still in Nebraska) where he spent a long time
professionally cleaning his windshield, only for the bugs to mess it up
again later. We listened to the radio and Bavarian polka music. He smoked a
cigarette about every 35 miles. I got some sleep over the course of a
couple hours though it was difficult since the truck wasn't air-ride
equipped and it vibrated terribly. I'd lay my head on the seat rest and it
could bounce up to six inches in the air. Later he gave me a pillow that
helped considerably. Also I'd get blasted with cold air whenever he opened
the window to smoke. We ended up for the night at a truck stop just inside
Wyoming, ten miles east of Cheyenne. We'd gained over 4000 feet of altitude
and were now around 5500 feet "up there". This ride made the day, since I
had beforehand I'd only been getting short rides. There he told me that
he'd sleep for five to six hours and encouraged me to try to find a ride in
the mean time.
So I visited the bathroom and brushed my teeth (etc). As it was 4am, it
wasn't a good time to get a ride so I sat in the mostly empty all-night
restaurant, eating my two orders of hash browns and first cup of coffee
that I'd drank this year. I took about an hour to do that and write some
notes on my trip so far.
I figured that some truckers get up around the crack of dawn, so I started
hitching around 5am outside the truck stop. It turns out that few of them
do, and that hitching around 7am or so would be a better time but as I
didn't have anywhere to sleep, I had nothing better to do than stand
outside in the cold and try and hitch. It had cooled during the night,
perhaps down to 60 and it was windy to boot, so I put on my rain pants over
my shorts to stay warm. This was a smallish truck stop, with perhaps thirty
trucks staying there overnight. For the next fourteen and half hours I
hitched either by the truck stop exit or on the interstate, only taking
occasional breaks. My previous driver had promised to pick me up if I
hadn't found a ride, but he either didn't see me hitching or didn't want to
pick me up. I suspect the prior, since I think I saw him take the back exit
and miss the place where I was standing. That was terribly disappointing. I
started off outside the truck stop, but after a couple hours of no luck, I
was less and less reluctant to hitch on the interstate. The interstate had
lots of traffic. Two lanes and around 240 vehicles per hour. It was
possible for many of them to stop, as there were considerable breaks in
traffic, though traffic generally piles up and comes in bunches where it is
hard for all but the last vehicle in the line to pull over. Another
unfortunate factor was that the speed limit was 75, at which point they
have less time to see a hitchhiker and pulling over is more difficult
(especially for large trucks). For this time and much of the trip, it was
hard to figure out whether to hitch on the interstate where there was more
traffic or at a truck stop where it was much easier for vehicles to stop.
I drank lots of water. It was probably only in the low 80s, but the sun
seemed warmer with there being less atmosphere due to the altitude. I ate a
pretzel, Pepsi, and tricolor popsicle from the store in the early afternoon
to supplement my snacking on the food that I'd brought with me. I dumpster
dived two 1-liter bottles to increase my water capacity to 3.6 liters.
Unfortunately, I had these 8 pounds of water on the top of my backpack,
which was not the best place for the weight.
It wasn't all hopeless, though it often seemed so, as I had a ride offer
going east (it's the thought that counts) and another just to Cheyenne
which I refused since travelling ten miles wouldn't help that much. As
evening came, I decided to walk along the interstate up a hill to see if I
could see Cheyenne in the distance or scout out a place where I could crash
and get some sleep that night since I was very tired. Needless to say at
this point in time I was pretty discouraged, not to mention mad at the over
a thousand drivers that could have given me a ride. On my last trip, I
generally got a ride in two hours, and the worst case wait was about four
or five. Cheyenne was actually far beyond the hill (not to mention my
limited capability to walk with my pack), but fortunately while walking I
got a ride at 7:30pm. I was very surprised to get it and showed it.
And it was another woman driver! This trip I got a lot more rides from
women than my last trip, when it was eight men and only one woman. She was
my first strange driver of the trip. She'd been driving from Michigan, and
was returning home. She was very talkative and tended to go off on
tangents. Thirty-three years old, had a boy friend who was divorced and
scared to marry her, had prior family and personal problems, couldn't have
kids, hitch-hiked until age 22, liked country, and may have recently been
"saved". She was driving a pickup truck with a friendly cute black dog
("Bear") in the back. She worked three months per year in construction on
power plants, earning over twenty thousand. We stopped in Laramie to get
gas, and she also got some beer which had me a little worried as she
proceeded to drink one or two of them while driving. After Cheyenne the
countryside got very beautiful, though as it was night it was harder to
see. For a couple hours we drove towards a very ominous looking
thunderstorm, with lots of lightning, but only got a little rain. This was
good since I eventually realized that my non-waterproof backpack with all
my gear was in the back of the truck with Bear. Fortunately, it only got
mildly wet.
I slept an hour or two in the pickup and got let out at Little America, 68
miles from the Utah border. Like Nebraska, Wyoming is a very wide state. At
the end of the ride, my driver offered me some money that I refused since I
didn't need any. It was a good ride as we went 300 miles and Little America
was a huge truck stop. It had perhaps 100 trucks and also a lot of car
traffic. At Little America, the first thing I saw was two hippies and their
dog hanging out in front of store. I enthusiastically assumed/figured that
they ought to be going to the EF! rendez-vous as well! Whenever I'm going
to or coming from large protests I like to try and find people who are
likewise involved, though I almost inevitably fail to do so. As it turned
out, they weren't going to the rendez-vous, though they at least knew what
EF! was and had just come back from the national Rainbow Gathering - which
I think they said was in Montana. Anyways, I hit the luxurious bathroom to
change clothes and put on pants for warmth. The bathroom was in excellent
shape (ex. fancy faucets) and the stalls were like closets, since the walls
went down to the floor and up to the ceiling. The unfortunate feature was
that they had automatic flush - so it would flush about four times while I
was changing clothes. Automatic flushing seems to me to be a very stupid idea.
Then I returned to the hippies. There was a young woman (20-22), "Willow",
who was very hippie and a young man (23-25) who had dreadlocks (dreadlocks
are more rastafarian than hippie). They had already raided the dumpster and
had got some premium cookies and dried fruit. They were driving with a
friend who had a car, but didn't have much of any money so they persuaded
the store staff to give them some coffee for free. They filled a thermo
with a mixture of tea, coffee, and hot chocolate. They half-heartedly tried
to beg money from people coming in the store, so they could buy some
chocolate, but failed. Kindred spirits, but like the hippies of the
sixties, they were somewhat lacking in political analysis and not so much
activists.
Around 2:30am we all decided to turn in. I went to the back of the truck
stop and rolled out my sleeping bag on some nice grass near a small group
of deer. It wasn't as cold as the previous night in Cheyenne, and with my
rated "20" F (but not really) sleeping bag, I was comfortable. I got up at
7:30am, cleaned up (ex. washed hair and shaved) and hitched by the truck
stop exit. This was perhaps the best hitching spot so far on the trip.
I soon met a police officer, who looked at my ID and wrote down my name. He
informed me that hitching was illegal in Wyoming (which I knew), but
otherwise was nice and even gave me advice on how to go to Alpine. He also
said the spot I was at was probably good since it was on private property
(I wonder if it is legal to hitchhike on private property, unless the truck
stop people tell you to leave?). After I said that I was going to Alpine,
he correctly guessed that I was going to the Earth First! rendez-vous. I
guess the police know all about it. Hrm. I didn't take his directions
advice since they were good for driving, but not hitching.
Within an hour I got a ride with a male trucker going to Utah who drove me
the short ride into Evanston, where he stopped his truck twice blocking
part of the road in-town. Other than that, he was a regular nice guy and
somewhat talkative. In Evanston, he let me out at a truck stop but it
looked terrible (more of a regular in-town gas station than a truck stop)
so I walked around for a bit. I visited the free county museum which had
lots of historical artifacts, and also an old train station where I left my
name with the comment "Where is a good place to hop a freight?" Now
Evanston has three interstate exits, but they all lead to highway 89 that
goes north to Alpine. So I figured I'd walk to the north side of town and
hitch on 89. I asked a young guy for directions to 89 and after hearing
where I was going he offered me a ride! I figured this was at least one
time where I was legal since I got the ride without soliciting it.
He said he'd leave in 45 minutes, so I waited around. So I ate some food,
notably my soy nuts which had broken out of their bag and were now a total
mess (not to mention the fact that they were very oily and got my hands all
messy - note not to buy soy nuts in the future for trips and to double-bag
food). 75 minutes later and after a little worrying on my part that I was
being dumped again, he returned and we headed off.
He was a young guy about my age (early 20s), driving a truck with three
vehicles from his dad's Evanston dealership to Afton, a town 30 miles south
of Alpine. We talked a lot about the countryside, which by my standards was
very scenic (though quite dry until you get further north where trees can
grow). We drove past a ranch that he said was one of the ten largest in the
world. He was also taking classes at a community college, and also would
take people on hunts on private game fields. If you have private land you
can raise animals and have an endless hunting season, in exchange for
paying a tax by giving one of every ten of your permit-to-kills to the
government (which sells them).
I got out in Afton and started walking on main street to get to the north
side of town. I walked with my "ALPINE" sign pointed towards on-coming
traffic. Within several minutes a pickup pulled-over behind me, but I
didn't realize for sure that they were offering me a ride since there were
already two people in the cab (and cars normally pull-over in front of you)
until they pulled-over a second time. These guys were characters. An older
guy (40-50) who likely served in Vietnam and was from the area, and a
younger guy (late 20s) who was born and raised in Mexico (possibly of
American parents). They were nice, though they got me a little worried when
they started describing themselves as "outlaws" or even "mercenaries"! It
was hard to tell how much of what they were saying was true, but likely
they viewed themselves as outlaws in theory and had at least some run-ins
with the police to back it up. Whether or not they were running from the
police at the time or were guilty of significant crimes for which they had
not been caught - I could not tell. At the time they were running a
landscaping business with the pickup. Part of their philosophy was violent
rhetoric, i.e. they said they'd kill someone who did x to me. The older guy
had cut off part of someone's finger and had to pay $10,000 fine for it. He
pointed out the spot where he did it as we drove. The younger guy had hit
someone with Mexico with a bottle and only paid $50. They pointed out
places like where the rough cowboys lived and another place where a guy who
made the most powerful shotgun in the world lived (it could kill an
elephant). The younger guy was teaming up with the older guy who was going
to teach him to be an outlaw (or whatever). They talked a fair bit about
guns. As outlaws, they and the others who were hiding from the law in
Wyoming were not happy about all the police descending on their home ground
due to the Earth First! rendez-vous. They knew all about the rendez-vous
and dropped me off at the entrance to the national forest on the road that
led to the gathering. They were nice, but for a while they had me worried
since they were talking a little violent and there I was sitting in between
the two of them in the truck cab. They didn't distinguish between political
left and right which was very interesting, and almost seemed apolitical
(except for their general anti-government stance). For instance they
referred to both left and right as "radicals" (ex. the radicals in Michigan
- i.e. the Michigan militia). Though they were clearly closer to the right,
at least culturally.
At the entrance to the national forest it rained a little, though there was
some cover. There wasn't much traffic, but most people would stop to see if
you needed a ride. I met my first person who was going to the rendez-vous,
decked out in EF! gear, he had hitched there and was now walking on foot.
He decided to keep walking to the camp, even though it was twenty miles, in
hopes of getting a ride on the way (and he got a ride just after I did).
After being there for 45 minutes I got a ride from a woman in her thirties
from Portland who was also going to her first rendez-vous. We arrived at
6pm (the day was Tuesday). I walked around a lot, took a long time to setup
my tent and feed the local mosquitoes. It was very difficult to get all my
gear in the solo tent (a three pound Eudora Solitaire - which is too low to
sit-up in), so I stuck some of it on the side of tent partially sheltered
by the rain fly. I tried to go to sleep starting around 10:30pm to the
sound of "The Freddy's back and there's going to be trouble, Hey na, hey
na, the Freddy's back!" and other noises of the night that kept me awake
for a while. To top it off at 3am we were hit by a big thunderstorm. As I
had very little camping experience, and never tested my new tent in the
rain I wasn't sure if it would hold-up for the hour-long storm. But it did
and only let a tiny bit of water through.
Middle Section
The next day I got up around 10:45am, and eventually headed over to the
morning circle in time to catch discussion on whether or not we should file
for a forest service permit.
The typical day started with a 10am morning circle where everything was
discussed ranging from people stealing, to the shitter situation, to
workshop announcements. The morning circle started with a group howl. From
noon until 8pm, there were workshops every two hours. There was a workshop
schedule that anyone could add to, but workshops were always changing
location. Despite many people not using watches, things were pretty timely.
Food was tricky. There was a communal kitchen ran by Seeds of Peace which
served good vegan food. As some people who showed up without plates learnt,
the kitchen would serve you food on cardboard - if you found some. Also
some people dumpster-dived in town, scoring us many donuts and one-time
about ten bags of cookies. The tricky aspect was that you never knew when
meals would be served, so I often missed meals since I was in a workshop
and there wouldn't be any food by the time the workshop ended. I attended
workshops on BC forests, paganism and activism, Peg Millet's account of how
the FBI got her for trying to cut down power lines, a music jam and
sing-a-long, EF! history, and community living. After workshops, around 9pm
the sunset, it became significantly colder (I wore pants, and up to three
t-shirts and a sweatshirt) and people hung out at campfires.
I guess there were up to 400 people who attended at least part of the
event. It was hard to say since we were generally in different spots, and
people were coming and leaving. It was mostly young people in their
mid-twenties, primarily hippies and punks. There were also some old-timers
who'd been around for a while, as old as fifty and several children.
I had expected that I'd know at least several of the people there, but I
didn't meet anyone I knew until a friend from UC Boulder SEAC showed up on
Friday. It felt somewhat cliquish, as people weren't making an attempt to
befriend me, I didn't know people, and I hadn't put up my tent in one of
the main encampments (in fact I consistently had to stumble around every
night trying to find my tent in the dark). Compared to others I looked
really mainstream. I guess I should have kept my beard. Maybe a third or
half of the men (the hippie-types, not the punks) had beards. I guess I'm
much more used to working with people who are less radical than I. My take
on the typical attendee was that they were anarchists, revolutionaries (of
course), and would have no problem with monkey-wrenching or even the
tactics of the ELF/ALF (notably fire). EF! has been evolving to have
greater concern for non-wilderness issues and the people in attendance
cared about issues like globalization. Many attendees had hitchhiked or
hopped a train to get there. One person even hitched a ride on a private
plane to Jackson, WY. It seemed like many people did not have full-time
jobs, many of them might be doing full-time activist work or roaming around.
I especially enjoyed campfires when there was music. The two songs that I
remember the most are the Anarchist Love Song (which is a blast) and Burn
them Down (a song about Vail). I bought a copy of a newly published
songbook whose songs I hope to learn someday soon! One night, I was sitting
around a camp fire listening to people play and sing when there was some
chanting coming nearer and nearer. We were being invaded by a small group
of people from the "naked make-out party" who were chanting "This is what
democracy looks like." In solidarity with the several naked newcomers, our
performer declothed for the next song. It was the first time I'd seen
someone perform naked, and it was even better since he had a talent for
switching voices and was very funny. Several days later, this was topped by
a naked older performer who tried to walk across the fire on a log (he
slipped and fell, but recovered without being hurt). The peak of silly
nakedness was a young guy who put on a short piece of "Nutcracker Theater"
with Mumia and Officer Faulkner "puppets" whom he drew on his testicles.
Nakedness never reached mass proportions, perhaps because it was so cold at
night.
Weather was excellent. It was sunny and warm during the day, but not hot,
and then cool at night. It generally rained just a little bit in the
afternoon. We had a second thunderstorm in the morning of the last day I
was there with some worrisome close lightning strikes.
After three days of workshops, I spent the last day hiking. I tried to hike
up a mountain which was mostly burnt, however I was unable to get all the
way to the top as it got too steep and it was also extremely tiring work. I
did get some excellent views though. I was mildly lost on the way back, but
fortunately got back to camp just as my water was running out. I was real
dirty from the soot but too tired to clean-up so I just walked to where the
rally was and stayed there from around 6pm until 4am. The rally was
awesome. It was basically a talent show / coffeehouse style. There was
music, rap, radical cheers, poetry, and a play (which I missed). There was
an official program that ended around 10pm, but the music and fun kept
going past 4am. I decided to turn in at 4am, since I wanted to get some
sleep as I'd decided that since people were beginning to leave before the
mysterious "Action" on Monday (which nobody ever told me about what was
going to happen - I guess the planning was done on Sunday), and that it'd
be good to get a ride out of the place on Saturday early afternoon.
Part II : And Back Again
Since I'd stayed up late, I did not have my things in order until 2pm. I
got a ride to Alpine with three people from Wisconsin. They could have
given me a ride to Wisconsin, which would have been extremely nice, but
since their car was tightly packed, I had to de-car in Alpine.
That afternoon it rained, hailed a bit, and when I arrived in Alpine I sat
down at the gas store for perhaps almost an hour to wait out some very
strong winds. After they died down, I walked south to the outskirts of town
and found a low-traffic intersection where vehicles could pull-over to pick
me up. After a moderate period of time, I got a ride from two young guys
who were going all the way to I-80. Yeah! They had been camping and were
returning home to Salt Lake City. On the way back we passed two hitchhikers
who'd been at the gathering, who were stuck at an intersection with no
services. The funny thing is that it's normally easier for women to get
rides, however in the case of these two hitchhikers that advantage might be
muted since my drivers though they were male.
Unfortunately I did not pay much attention to where we were going, and when
we realized that we were going a different way than which we came, I
figured we'd just missed the 13-mile highway 89 shortcut and would be
shortly back on route. But instead, after finally studying the map we
learnt that we were on Idaho and Utah's 89 instead of the 89 in Wyoming.
While this was fine for the two guys who were going to Utah, it put me
around 70 miles off-course. The advantage was that it even more scenic than
the way I'd came - we often had mountains on both sides of us. The two guys
were quite talkative, one had even been at Purdue and knew about and was
supportive of the anti-sweatshop campaign there. I ate two of their large
pretzels and a piece of red licorice. Around 7:30/8:00pm, I got off at a
truck stop on the north side of Ogden.
After about an hour, around sunset, I got a ride from a quiet guy perhaps
in his thirties who was just driving around without a particular
destination. Anyways, he gave me a ride about 70 miles to the third and
most eastern Evanston exit, which was great. I tried talking to him, but he
said very little. So we mostly listened to music with the windows partially
down. We stopped at one rest stop, and as an example of the trust that
people put in each-other, he left his keys in the car so I could have taken
off with it if I was malicious.
I tried hitch-hiking for a couple minutes at Evanston, but it was night and
there was very little activity at the truck stop, so I walked under the
interstate overpass a short distance to a rest/information area. I scoped
it out. There were only several cars using it each hour, but the police
drove by at least twice and there was a sign saying that you weren't meant
to sleep there (and if drivers aren't meant to sleep, they probably don't
want hitch-hikers even more). Perhaps though sleeping at rest stops is
tolerated out west? I've heard some accounts where there were a
considerable number of people sleeping out in the open in rest areas and it
seemed not to be a problem. I rolled out my sleeping bag on the grass in
the back. I slept there from midnight or so until 6am, so that I'd be up
before the staff came to open the building at 8am. It was pretty cold,
especially towards the morning due to the wind, so I didn't get the best
night of sleep. Around 6am, I woke up to find that the sprinklers were on,
and the spot I had chosen was within a couple feet of getting very wet. My
sleeping bag was already quite wet since there was a lot of dew, or maybe
I'd been sprinklered without noticing. I shook my sleeping bag out to dry
it off, packed it up, cleaned up in the bathroom (including washing my
hair), and headed off to the interstate to get a ride.
I first tried hitching in front of the on-ramp, but probably most of the
traffic was local, so I wasn't getting any rides. After an hour, I switched
to the interstate, and around 9am I got a ride from a middle-aged pothead
in a hippie-decorated peace/love car. The car was a little beat-up,
upholstery coming apart and the speedometer didn't work. He was going to
Boulder to spend a couple days in jail (for drugs I assumed, but didn't
ask). He smoked marijuana while driving, though seemed to drive fine. We
stopped a lot. For one thing, he liked to have the gas tank 3/4 full if not
more and this was aggravated by the fact that he didn't have any money
(other than $50 left on a credit card), so to get money for gas he'd stop
at gas stations or truck stops to sell bracelets which he hand-made out of
four different colored pieces of string. He'd also check to see if there
were any "brothers or sisters" (hitchhikers) that needed a ride since he
used to hitchhike a lot until he had recently bought a car. On two
occasions, I saw him raise $5 in only a matter of 5-10 minutes. I also
donated $6.20 to gas. He also didn't like to drive fast, arguing that the
roads were only built to go 55 miles, but fortunately as we didn't have a
speedometer - we were going faster than that. With all of the stopping, we
averaged only 50-55 miles per hour. Remember that the speed limit was 75. I
was a bit upset since if I'd have got a ride with somebody driving 75-80,
I'd have done the distance in an hour or likely two hours faster. He let me
drive twice. First because he was likely tired of doing so, and secondly
because he wanted to drink a 40 oz beer. He had strange opinions, like he
was into being nice to people (the whole peace/love thing) but he also
thought that most people were stupid and wrote "be smart" on his car. So he
seemed pretty cynical, but lacking in any political analysis which would be
necessary to understand the problems of our world. He was somewhat hard to
get along with, since I didn't want to argue with his strange ideas as it
didn't seem that he tolerated disagreement that well.
He left me off in Laramie at the first truck stop. There I waited an hour
or so and got a ride from a Mexican-American driver of a small truck who
gave me a lift to Olgallala (120 miles into Nebraska). He worked for the UP
railroad. We talked a bit about hitchhiking and train hopping, but he
wasn't too talkative so we listened to the radio (sports talk and a Spanish
AM station from Boulder). Olgallala has a very good sized truck stop, but
as I was about to hitch-hike a little past sunset I ran into two guys who
were also trying to hitch-hike. They'd been there two days and were trying
to get to Tennessee. This was a bit perturbing since by hitchhiker ethics,
I should wait for them to get a ride before trying myself. Yet, I was
likely to have a better chance since I was travelling by myself. I
encouraged them to make a sign, and also suggested hitchhiking on the
interstate. I guessed that much of their problem was that there were two of
them, while most trucks have only two seats. They'd been going up to
truckers to ask them for a ride (whereas I'm more shy and tend to use the
"wave a sign" approach). I thought I'd see them again, but they
disappeared. Hopefully they finally got a ride just after I showed-up.
Since I wanted to sleep, I decided to walk to the rest area that was two
miles away. Unfortunately it was very dark and I had to walk along the
interstate so that I could find my way there. Since we had left Wyoming,
the altitude was less and it was still warm at night (70?). So I walked in
the grass by the interstate, getting blinded when cars approached. My
flashlight batteries had given out a couple days ago, when I must have left
it on all night by accident. After 30 minutes I gave up since I was being
attacked by a very prickly painful plant that was getting stuck into my
feet (I should have worn shoes), and also since it was somewhat dangerous
and I was very hot. So I returned to the truck stop and went looking for
the other two hitchhikers. They'd said that they stored their bags in a
trailer that was used for Christian services for truckers, so I found the
trailer with its door open but their stuff was no longer there. I sat down
inside the trailer and realized that it was a good place to get some rest,
so I meditated/thought/prayed for a while to see if anyone else would check
on it before I crashed there. Someone came by, but left when they saw I was
just meditating, and after an hour or so of no-one, I lay down on the
carpeted floor and got around four hours of sleep just in my regular
clothes. It got a little cold by the morning.
I got up around 6am to the sound of a voice calling my name ("Aaron!")
which must have been part of a dream. I walked out of the trailer without
anyone apparently noticing. I cleaned up a little and then hitched by the
truck stop for a couple hours before moving to in front of the interstate
on-ramp where I soon got a ride from a Chinese-American truck driver who
only had one seat in his truck. The other had been removed. This was
actually rather fortunate, as I could lie down on the truck's bed and
despite the bumpy ride (it wasn't one of those air-ride trucks) I managed
to sleep a considerable amount of the time through Nebraska and part of
Iowa. He wasn't that talkative and I was too tired to make much of an
effort. For lunch we stopped somewhere where he made an oriental noodles
soup and gave me a little. He dropped me off at the Iowa 80 truck stop,
reportedly the biggest in the US (and possibly the world) which is near the
Quad Cities on the border of Iowa and Illinois. I got there a couple hours
before sunrise and figured that since it was the biggest truck stop I
should be able to get a ride on I-80 all the way to South Bend. I had two
offers of rides to Chicago, but much to my later regret I refused them
since I figured I could do better. Later I accepted a ride from a couple
that had two dogs, no driver's licenses, and were driving a car that
someone had recently given them that didn't have rear lights. They were
travelling folk, who'd walked around the US and had a trailer in which they
pulled their stuff. Unfortunately, they wanted to veer south to go to
Indianapolis, so I figured I was much better off returning and hitching at
Iowa 80. So we only went a couple miles and then they drove me back. I gave
them $5 since they were short on cash.
I continued hitching at Iowa 80. I met a police officer who told me that it
was illegal, but tolerated. The only main rule was that I wasn't allowed to
solicit people for money (a local city rule). He was somewhat puzzled that
I was hitchhiking as he was used to seeing homeless people doing it. There
was a lot of traffic, though half of the trucks took another exit where
they would be unlikely to stop for me. I guess that most of the car traffic
was local, as I saw a lot of Iowa license plates. I didn't see a single
Indiana plate on a car. So I hitched through the night, ate two bags of
potato chips (99 cents each for about 90 grams), a 20 oz pepsi and 20 oz
coke for caffeine, and a "super biggie" order of fries (hope they're
vegetarian, they weren't from McD). Overall on this trip I probably lost
several pounds as I had brought a lot of snack food (granola, dried fruit
and nuts), but I wasn't eating that much. I took some break time, say
around 3am, to sit down, eat and drink and read the 20th anniversary Earth
First! Journal. There wasn't any good place to crash so I stayed awake the
entire time. I should have been ok, since I'd slept until early afternoon
the day before, but perhaps it wasn't good sleep as I was extremely tired.
In the morning, I was even nodding off when I'd sit-down or even standing
up trying to hitch a ride. Maybe I should have drank more caffeine? What
made my failure to get a ride even worse, was that every couple hours a
Greyhound bus would arrive, either going to Chicago, New York, or Los
Angeles. So I knew that I could easily be on a bus and take that back home
to South Bend. The first time or two that I saw a bus, I optimistically
figured that I could get a ride back to South Bend faster than the bus -
since Greyhounds don't drive as fast and I expected to get a direct ride
from a truck so I wouldn't have to wait at the Chicago station for the
South Bend bus. I took a short break from hitching when it started to rain
as a storm passed through.
Eventually, around early afternoon (2-3pm) I decided that I was too tired
to continue hitching. By this time, I was possibly not the most
friendly-looking hitchhiker as I was getting madder and more frustrated as
time passed, though I make an effort to smile at times. I think making a
sign listing how long you'd been trying to get a ride might be a good idea
to negate the free-rider problem, as everyone assumes that someone else
will pickup the hitchhiker. So you could cross out the number of hours
you've been there, or even write "Stuck Here since 3pm". During all this
time at Iowa 80 I switched between using my "EAST I-80" and "SOUTH BEND"
signs. At first I was using the South Bend one, but when I later decided
that I'd accept a ride to Chicago I went with the EAST I-80 one. So I got
tired and decided to take the bus. It wasn't a regular stop, but the driver
figured out how much it would cost to go to Chicago by calling the
Greyhound number (around 33$). Since I wanted to go all the way to South
Bend, he asked for a $25 deposit and then we'd get a ticket at the next
station which was Chicago.
I had two seats and slept easily on the bus. By now I could have slept on a
concrete floor. In Chicago, I got my bag and waited around a bit for the
bus driver. But he'd disappeared, so I looked for him in the station, but
didn't find him. Rather than try to navigate the Greyhound chaotic
bureaucracy and get a ticket to South Bend, I decided that I'd just go take
the South Shore commuter train instead since it was more comfortable,
cheaper, and likely faster. So I don't know if my driver kept the money or
gave it to Greyhound. While I was in the Chicago Greyhound station (on my
way out), a young guy asked me for money to help pay for his ticket which
cost more than he'd been originally told. As I was pondering and somewhat
doubting his story, an elderly woman came up to us and exposed him since
she'd already promised to pay the extra money and here he was still asking
around! Even after this, she was still willing to give him the money(!!!),
but he refused and since he was caught in the act he walked away. The
problem with people making up these stories is that if someone actually had
a problem it would be very hard for them to get help. At least I have a
very hard time telling the difference. In this case, Greyhound messing up
the fare made sense since Greyhound often messes things up.
I left the bus station and walked about half an hour to the South Shore one
which I found without much trouble. Took the 5:10pm train ($9) to the South
Bend airport (note hitching would have been better since the interstate is
only a mile from my home), then caught the bus (75 cents) and transferred
downtown to take me home. I arrived home around 8:30pm. So the return trip
took three days and six hours.
Miles - On the Way There
140 - from I-70 to I-80
350 - Nebraska, west on I-80
400 - Wyoming, west on I-80
160 - north to Alpine
20 - from Alpine to campsite
à1070 miles
(2.33 days of hitching - 459 miles/day)
Miles - On the Way Back
200 - from Alpine to Ogden
70 - Ogden to Evanston
400 - Wyoming, east on I-80
450 - Nebraska, east on I-80
280 - to Iowa 80 truck stop, east on I-80
à 1400 miles
(3 days of hitching - 467 miles/day)
So I hitched for a total of 2470 miles. On average I traveled 460 miles per
day which was about the same as my first trip (where I averaged 500
miles/day), though this time I got significantly less sleep since I didn't
get to sleep in trucks. I also got really stuck twice. In comparison to
these two times, spending the night in North Dakota stuck in the Theodore
Roosevelt National Park (on my first trip) was nothing.
Apparently hitching is far easier in Europe. A lot of American truck
drivers would be willing to pick you up, but companies have rules against
it stemming from insurance reasons. So they're taking a significant risk,
unless perhaps they own their truck.
Overall I probably won't go on a long hitchhiking trip for a while. I think
shorter trips are fine, say one or two days where you can go without sleep.
But longer ones are draining. Being homeless isn't that fun, and if you're
going to pay $35 for a motel you might as well save money by taking and
sleeping on Greyhound. You definitely do meet fascinating people and it is
the most adventurous way I know to travel, but you know that, for instance,
when you start composing new verses to "The Bear Went Over the Mountain",
singing "500 bottles of soy milk on the wall" or decide to hitch-hike
standing on one foot - that there are more exciting things to do than stand
by the side of the road for ten hours. That's not to say that everyone
shouldn't try it at least once, especially males for whom it's less risky.
Hitchhiking is an ideal. I believe that people are good and by hitchhiking
hope to learn to trust and like people whom I'd never ever meet. I don't
think it should be too impossible to make hitching an effective form of
transportation. Everyone used to do it. My dad even hitched to his wedding.
Ideally hitchhiking is part, albeit a rather small part, of my radical
commitment to build a just society.
*Appendix*
And here's a song spoof I rewrote two verses for that goes as follows:
This land's not your land, this land's not my land
>From Silicon Valley to Wall Street
>From the corporate towers, to the factory farms
This land's not made for you and me
(need to add some verses here)
I was walkin' - I saw a sign there
And that sign said - no tress passin'
But on the other side, I saw ten thousand people
Shutting down the IMF and World Bank meeting in DC!
This land is your land, this land is my land
>From California, to the New York Island
>From the redwood forest, to the gulf stream waters
This land was made for you and me
