May 1-9: You'd think we were in a plane the way we're flying

May 9, 2013
Broad Brook, Connecticut

You know those things you say you'll "never do again"? "We learned our lesson"? "I'm too old for this $&@/"? Yeah, well, never say "never".

We knew this was going to be a tough drive when we started out. In retrospect, it wasn't as bad as it could have been, but we wish we'd had a little more time to get from Place "A" (Arizona) to Place "B" (Broad Brook, Connecticut). We did it in about six driving days, way off our record pace of 3.5 days set between Christmas and New Years in 2005 but still much faster than we're used to these days.

The route was pretty simple: north on I-17 out of Phoenix, then east on I-40 from Flagstaff. We've followed this route before, and it's a pretty easy drive. The last time (April-May, 2011), we were trailing strong storms and tornados that caused a significant amount of damage. This time, we were just following a slow-moving soaker of a rain storm.

We caught up to the rain by the time we got to Texas and had some heavy weather for several days. I tried to get pictures of how high the level of the Mississippi River was when we crossed near Memphis, but my photographer was "indisposed" and I'm pretty sure I wasn't supposed to stop in the middle of the bridge on I-55, so this is all I got.

Past Memphis, we swung south on US-78 (partially I-22) and headed for Birmingham. We had a nice visit with our friends Linda and Wendell, then shot northeast to Albertville to see Rick and Annette. We appreciate "driveway camping" with both, but wish we could have stayed longer.

While in Birmingham, Linda and Wendell were gracious enough to host a small birthday celebration for my nephew, Erik, who turned 21 this month. His sister, Alyson, and her friend, Kat, drove up from Auburn (college "kids") to join us, and a good time was had by all.

Leaving Alabama, we headed out on another familiar route: I-59 to Chattanooga, I-24 and I-75 back to I-40 in Knoxville, then I-81 all the way to Scranton, PA. Then east on I-84 to Connecticut, where we used the I-691 bypass to I-91 north through Hartford to Pat and Al's place in East Windsor, near the Massachusetts border.

We ran into two medium-sized traffic jams, both on I-81. The first was near Winchester, VA, and the second was in Harrisburg, PA. Both were caused by tractor-trailer accidents. The Virginia one was a simple tow-it-out-of-the way affair, but the Pennsylvania accident involved a huge fire after a tanker flipped and dropped 7,500 gallons of diesel fuel on overlapping bridges. I just read that repairs won't be completed until November.

We made this cross-country run "on the cheap", using one casino, two rest areas and a Walmart, plus friends and family in Alabama, for our overnights. Not wanting to be overly rigid in planning but still wanting to have an idea of what to expect, I researched the stops and fuel options before we left Arizona and things were pretty much as expected. The only issue we had was on the long stretch up I-81, where we pushed a little further into the evening than we'd like in order to shorten up the last leg into Connecticut. Unfortunately, the rest area I'd targeted was chock full of trucks by the time we arrived, so we pressed on and ended up in the Walmart in Shipsburg, Pennsylvania, about 75 miles farther than planned for the day. But, we have new iPhone apps that help locate places to stop so it was an easy find, plus it helped get us into Pat and Al's at a reasonable 4:22 PM the following day.

So, we know we've still got what it takes to do the cross-country run and we know we don't plan to use this approach any time soon. Now, we rest up!