Cross Country Travel 1990 - Part III

I slept like a log after the 2nd day of my Cross Country Travel culminated in severe emotional trauma. I do not remember the particulars of the following morning. I do remember taking I-80 again, not that there was any other choice in the middle of Wyoming!

I remember the day being overcast for most of the stretch. Quickly I moved into the neighboring state of Nebraska. I am sure it is a beautiful state, but I regret I remember very little of the drive other than the undulating freeway, my loneliness, the large number of trucks on the road, farms, and constant odor of manure. My only excuse is, I was young and was not a great observer.

Somewhere on the way, I picked up another hitchhiker. His story was interesting, he had no car, he worked on a farm; not sure what exactly he did; his daughter lived with her family lived several miles north of Des Moines, Iowa and he was going to see her by bumming rides along the way! Coming from California, the entire mid-west was an eye opener for me. I thought all of America was prosperous and everyone had one or more car at their disposal. And here was me, from a third world country, give a ride to a hitchhiker from the first world!

I moved over to Iowa by crossing a massive river which I later found was the Great Missouri. As a kid it used to hurt me that this river was overshadowed by the Mississippi. I took it personally since, I felt that if the cartographers had been smart and called the whole river, Missouri, then it could have been the longest river in the world with Mississippi being merely a tributary not the other way around! I hated The Nile and The Amazon and would look at the map sadly with thoughts of what might have been! Just check out this link and you will understand. The Missouri is actually longer than the Mississippi!

After dropping, my hitchhiker, I went to a Motel 6 and I found myself at a standstill. They had no rooms. The guy at the reception, another Indian, told me to try my luck at a motel nearby. When the receptionist at the other motel told me that single-room rates were more than $50 I was shocked. Here I was in the $20-$25 range and could not wrap my head around the larger number. I went back to my Indian receptionist as if he could do some magic for me! He took pity on me and told me to tell the other guy, that I was a referral from Motel 6. Well long story short, I got Motel 6 rates and went to sleep.

And so ended my Day 3.

Very few aspects of the Day 4 stand out clearly in my mind. It was mostly about weariness and a desire to see the end of the journey. I guess it is hard to drive a stick shift without cruise control for 12 hours each day for 3 consecutive days and not be tot müde (dead tired). I was so weary that at one point I fell asleep at the wheel for what seemed only a few seconds. I remember the shock I felt when I jolted back awake. I stopped at a rest area and washed my face, rested for a short while and drove on.

I saw a sign welcoming me to Illinois followed by another massive river, The Mississipi. It turns out that Mississippi forms the eastern border of Iowa with Illinois just as Missouri forms the western border of Iowa with Nebraska. I stopped somewhere south of Chicago at a Pizza Hut. Except for a short period when I suffered from Jaundice, I have never been known to say no to food. I used to have an appetite of a rickshaw-wallah. I did not know one could be so pooped out that the sight of food could bring on gag reflex. I did the best I could and drove into Michigan.

At this point I had left behind my friend of nearly four days, I-80 and took I-94. I passed by Kalamazoo and Battle Creek and went North on I-69 towards Lansing. I was nearing the end of my journey. From Lansing, I headed east going towards East Lansing. After getting directions from students, I found out where Spartan Village was. It was late in the evening when I finally landed at PG's place. I had dinner with his friends and went to sleep, a tame ending to four amazing days in my life.