Our recent road trip reminded me that exactly fifty years ago Dawn and I embarked on a three-month long road trip, looking for a new beginning. We had been living in Portland, Oregon; both of us quit our jobs and left to explore what other options were out there. We had saved some money and had my little 1969 Toyota Corona 2-door: all of 95 hp and no A/C. We had disposed of Dawn's car and everything else, then towed the smallest size U-Haul with our other belongings to her parent's house near San Francisco. Our sleeping bags and a pup tent were packed, and we headed out.
We first headed south toward San Diego and the Salton Sea. The Salton Sea was disappointing in every way, not a sea, not even much of a lake, and we quickly departed for Nogales, NM. We made a short visit across the border there, then headed north. We spent a night in our sleeping bags under the stars in the Petrified Forest then, at sunrise we drove into northern Arizona. On a lonely two-lane road, we came across three drunk Indians standing blocking the road, waving their arms. Their car had run out of gas, and they wanted a ride in our little coupe. Fortunately, they were telling the truth; it got very crowded with us all in the car.
We crossed into Colorado at Four Corners then headed northeast toward Denver. I stopped at an employment agency in Denver, but discovered they just wanted a fee and had nothing to offer. Passing into Wyoming, we visited the original Fort Laramie then headed northeast into Nebraska. We visited Fort Robinson, went swimming at Box Butte Reservoir and slept at a Pine Ridge campground. We were about the only people at the campground. A cottontail rabbit was resting outside the flap of our tent when we awoke. Very quiet and peaceful.
From there we stopped in Omaha to visit family, then headed east. In Illinois, we visited the Abraham Lincoln home in Springfield. In Kentucky we visited Mammoth Cave NP, world's longest known cave system. From there we drove to Great Smoky Mountains NP. That evening, we set up camp in an open meadow in a remote part of the park. Despite being sheltered in our tent, we learned what "no-see-ums" are later that evening. These minute creatures, the size of a grain of black pepper, are not stopped by mosquito screening. Sometime after midnight, we surrendered to their onslaught, struck camp, and started driving to get away from these nasty little tormentors.
We didn't stop until we were in Mississippi. Two of Dawn's HS classmates had married, and the husband was in Marine pilot training at the Naval Air Station in Meridian, MS. We stopped to visit them, and they offered us their spare bedroom. It was easy to sense that the marriage was in trouble, not a happy household. We left quickly. It is almost always better to stay in a hotel than interfere too closely in others' personal routines.
We headed for Florida. Near Destin, we discovered an area where a new beach development was planned, but no building had started. There were just signs announcing the future concept. It was a perfect opportunity to sleep right on the beach with no one around. The sand was amazingly white, fine-grained and pure. Looking through the face of an incoming wave, you could see fish swimming in the seawater. What a beautiful (and free) site to camp!
From there we drove to the St. Petersburg area. There we were again able to camp on the beach, but in a more discrete fashion. We found a country club with extensive beach area and waited until near dark to set up our tent. The light of sunrise was our alarm clock, to get us up and packing our gear. We toured a yacht building company while in the area.
I should mention that, throughout our trip, we would alternate between camping and staying in motels where we could have a real bed and get laundry done. I mention the camping more often because it provided the more scenic and notable surroundings. Next stop was St. Augustine, FL, which claims to be the oldest city in the US. It predates the US with almost 500 years of history. Very pretty with Spanish colonial architecture.
From there we followed the coast northward. In North Carolina we took the ferry to the Outer Banks and Cape Hatteras. Again, we found an isolated beach with no one else around where we could sleep right on the seashore. However, a park ranger did find our parked car and wrote us a ticket for being outside an authorized area. Still haven't paid that ticket.
In Washington, DC, we took time to see the sights and toured the White House. However, a hurricane had formed in the Caribbean and was now approaching the US East coast. As we traveled further north, its remnants finally caught up with us in Pennsylvania. After touring the Hershey Chocolate factory in Hershey, PA, we set up our tent in an organized campground, and I tried to dig trenches so that the anticipated heavy rainfall would be deflected away from our tent. It worked, sort of, but with not much sleep. The following night we slept in our little car with seats reclined, another bad night.
Next destination was Boston, MA. On the way there we stopped at the cutest little motel. Every motel unit was a separate cottage. Each of these cottages was decorated as if it were a child's dollhouse. Very clean, bright, and cheerful.... still memorable. In Boston, we drove to Boston harbor. There I was able to interview a naval architect about the business of designing yachts. While I was engrossed in this discussion at the architect's office, Dawn was walking the pier looking at yachts. A young man approached her, initiated a discussion, and ultimately offered her a chance to join the crew of a sailing yacht which would soon be leaving for the Caribbean. Fortunately, I dodged that bullet, and she elected to stay with me!
From Boston we again headed north to Quebec, Canada. On the way there we camped one night in a farmer's field in Maine. We set up our tent in a remote field off a farm road at sunset, then packed up at sunrise. Quebec was very scenic: 400+ years old, a fortified colonial core, the impressive Frontenac Hotel, and the site of a famous battle for North America. A report I had done in HS: the battle between the troops of Montcalm and Wolfe (French & British) on the Plains of Abraham. I was able to actually see how British troops from ships had stealthily climbed the cliffs of the St. Lawrence River to meet their enemies west of the city.
Now we headed west to Montreal. The architecture was/is very French. We bought a sheepskin rug there to help keep us warm. A cold front came through and we holed up in a cozy motel. Then we drove onward to Toronto and Niagara Falls. Crossing back into the US, we headed west. Of course, no GPS at that period, but we used state maps to see where the state parks were. The parks denoted scenic areas, plus they also usually included campgrounds. We would arrive at a campground after the admission fee staff had left and before sunset. Then we could set up camp and use the bathrooms and showers.
Heading back through the Midwest, we stopped in Painesville, OH, on Lake Erie to look at a new sailboat, but overall made fewer stops until back in Omaha. Staying only a few days, we headed toward the extreme NW corner of Montana. Along the way we visited the Corn Palace, the Badlands and then wanted to see Mt. Rushmore. But we never made it to Mt. Rushmore! When I pointed our Toyota uphill, the motor would race, but the car would barely move. The clutch plate was slipping. We headed downhill into Rapid City to the local Toyota dealership.
If any auto dealership deserved an award, it was this one. Rapid City had suffered a recent major flash flood. Buildings had been swept away, and the dealership was included in the destruction. Their entire building had been flooded including strong currents; the parts department was a mound of squashed cardboard boxes covering the floor. New cars on the lot were full of mud. Our car's clutch was broken, and we needed replacement parts. We waded through the boxes, plucking out shapes of about the right size, but none turned out to be the correct part. The part was ordered and needed to be flown into Rapid City, but would not arrive until tomorrow, Saturday.
The owner of the Toyota dealership drove us on a tour of the city and offered a vacant home (due to the flood) as a place for us to stay. Meanwhile his mechanic disassembled our clutch in readiness for the new part. We brought in a KFC dinner for our mechanic; he worked until 9pm. After a good night's rest in the offered home, we returned to the dealership. The part had arrived, the clutch was re-assembled, and we were on our way by noon. The total repair charge: $35.00. Amazing! We wrote to Toyota HQ about this incomparable service.
No time left to see Mt. Rushmore; people were expecting us in Montana. We did stop for an hour or so at the site of Custer's Last Stand on the Crow Indian Reservation. It was a somewhat barren hilltop where his men were overwhelmed by Indian forces. Then we pushed onward. I wanted to introduce Dawn to a female friend of mine and her super parents.
At a party of UCSB students in Spring 1969, I had met a young woman, Kathy B., who convinced me to meet her for tennis the next day, after I sobered up. From that meeting, we became friends. Not sure what she saw in me; we came from vastly different backgrounds. But we had some good discussions. Her career approach was to go to wherever the job was. My approach (at that time) was to go to where I wanted to live and then find a job. She invited me to visit she and her parents at their summer cabin in Montana during the coming summer.
August 1969, after flying from Newport Beach to visit my family in Omaha, I had flown to the Burk's remote corner of MT. I met her parents. Her father was Joe Burk (he has a large entry in Wikipedia). Joe received the Sullivan Award in 1939 as the top amateur athlete in the United States. He was the US and Canadian champion in singles sculls (rowing) 1937-1940. The Olympics were cancelled in 1940; thus, he lost that chance. He went on to become a PT boat commander in the Pacific during WWII. He was head coach for the champion Univ. of Pennsylvania rowing team for many years. Amazing man and still very fit in his late 50's. And Kathy said about her mother, "My mother is in her mid 50's and still has a better figure than I do!" The Burks had built their own cabin in the wilderness, while they slept in a trailer. Then Joe shoveled out a silted beaver pond to make a swimming hole. I caught trout, first cast, in the stream that flowed through their property.
Kathy had graduated in 1970 and become a PanAmerican flight attendant. Two years later and now Dawn and I were meeting the Burk family at the summer cabin. Once there, they recommended or guided us on hikes to remote lakes and streams. These were people I wanted to emulate in our marriage. We discussed with them our wanderings to find the ideal place to live. They suggested northern California, and we concurred (Remember this was 50 years ago.) After this visit, Kathy and I stayed in occasional contact until her marriage five years later. She flew internationally including government contract flights to Vietnam.
Back in our Toyota, we headed west to Idaho, then south through a corner of Oregon and into northern Nevada. It was now July and getting warm. We could see the snowcapped Santa Rosa Range of mountains to the east of our highway. We turned off the paved road unto a jeep trail that led us up the mountainside, up until we were able to camp in cool comfort next to a snowbank. Getting back to the highway by a different route, we drove through an abandoned "ghost" town. Then it was Lake Tahoe, San Francisco, and our trip was over. That little Toyota had handled the jeep trail and served us for six more years.
After interviewing twice in the Bay Area, I was hired for an engineering job near Santa Rosa, the wine country of California. And a new adventure began.
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