Advertisement
Published: October 9th 2015
Edit Blog Post
It was a rather uneventful journey, as far as car trips go. I only had my GPS and my new (old) Wales air freshener to accompany me. Oh, and the ants still in my car from the trip I took to Tifton a week ago. I left Athens, GA, this morning about 11:30 AM EDT and arrive here in O'Fallon, IL, around 7:30 PM CDT. So, that's just about 9 hours to make the trip. I stopped once, somewhere in the middle of Kentucky, to fuel up and get some food. If you read my blog from this morning, you'll notice that I posted in the midst of an oil change; they told me I needed 2 new tires, but they said it would take 2 hours and cost too much, so I went next door and got the tires in half the time and for $75 less than the Honda dealership wanted to charge me. Score me. And now I feel like my car will make it safely through this road trip.
A couple of observations from the drive today:
If you advertise food at an exit, it should be less than 1 mile from the interstate. Otherwise,
you're lying.
Once I got past Nashville, the traffic lessened considerably, the landscape flattened considerably, and I saw no more rain.
Also, gas prices on this side of Nashville are higher. In GA, it was around $2/gallon, and in some places between ATL and Nashville, you could get it in the $1.90s. But once you got to Kentucky and Illinois, it was always above $2.25, and in some places around $2.50. Yeah, it's the interstate, so prices tend to be higher there, but then those prices in GA were also along the interstate.
The lower half of Illinois has been neglected by their department of roads and highways and general cleanliness.
But really it was a pleasant drive, all things considered. When I pulled off the interstate, I didn't feel like I had been on the road for 9 hours. I guess my CDs kept me good company. Yes, there are only CDs to play music in my car, since radio signals in a lot of these areas are shoddy. And my car's aux input doesn't work, so I can't just plug in my phone. And have you ever tried to use your phone's
speakers while driving for more than 10 minutes? Just don't.
This is the third time in 3 years that I've made this drive to St. Louis, but it's the first time that I didn't have a MASSIVE delay around the I-57/I-64 intersection. As in 45+ minutes to get 5 miles and not during rush hour. I'm very grateful for that, since I had honestly planned in an extra hour this morning that got chewed up with mounting new tires for my car.
I'm staying at the Day's Inn in O'Fallon, just off I-64, about 15 minutes from St. Louis. I can't really recommend this place, but I didn't pay a lot for it and it's got everything I need. I just hope the a/c gets to working more efficiently. I have a pretty rough time sleeping in a warm room. It's cooled down a little, but I'm not planning on sleeping until a couple of hours from now at least. The new movie
Pan is out tonight, and there's a theater only a minute away, so I may go see that in about 30 minutes. I have the MoviePass, so I won't have to pay to see it. I'll have to see how tired I am in the next 30 minutes.
Advertisement
Tot: 0.207s; Tpl: 0.01s; cc: 14; qc: 51; dbt: 0.0993s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 1;
; mem: 1.1mb
D MJ Binkley
Dave and Merry Jo Binkley
Collage
Nice collection.