When nature attacks

Since today is a ‘Sisterhood of the Traveling Thursday’ and I haven’t blogged on a Thursday in quite some time, I felt that although it’s nearly Friday (11:36pm), I really should squeeze in a traveling story.

And since I’ve only really talked about my travels abroad, I think that it’s only fair to bring things domestic this time around. Because after all… I do actually spend more time traveling around this great country than I do in others…

So alas…

This is one of my most ridiculous travel stories.

It takes place when I was about 19 years old, a sophomore in college, living in San Diego. I remember it specifically because we were living in the haunted house at the time (still a blog to look forward to once I can figure out how to put that into words) and I only lived there while I was 19 years old.

Not really important.

It was late December. As a matter of fact, I will go ahead and say that it was 23rd of December. This is important, obviously, because my roommates and I were still in San Diego and needed to be in Northern California for Christmas. This is the whole problem that starts the travel story from hell. The problem, however, was not necessarily that we weren’t home YET. Obviously in any normal world there would be plenty of time to get home in time for Christmas. The problem was that there was a giant, unstoppable, unpredictable, immeasurable, CRAZY storm approaching…

Let’s go back a moment.

KayTown, DMo- my roommate in the haunted house and all around great friend- and I were planning to drive home in a caravan. DMo and KayTown lived in the mountains, while I lived in the valley, but we all lived North. So it made sense for us to travel together because after all… there is safety in numbers…

In most situations.

So KayTown, DMo and I, very aware of the fact that there was a storm on the way, came up with a plan: We were going to stay awake all night so that we would be able to sleep the following afternoon and early nightfall. And then we would be able to wake up around midnight/1am and drive home having been well rested. This was our original, brilliant plan to avoid the on coming, moderate storm.

Stupid Sophomores.

So after we stay up the entire night, KayTown and I were at work, exhausted, and we were checking out the approaching weather pattern…

I am not kidding you… a HUGE, California sized green blob was engulfing the west coast on the doppler radar.  It did not look good. And it definitely looked like A) things were much worse than the weather men had anticipated (if you can believe that) and B) it was coming much sooner than the weather men had predicted as well.

Shit.

So Kay and I thought things out and talked it over with our boss and headed home with only one solution in mind.

DMo, however, was already fast asleep… carrying out the original plan (Sleep in the afternoon to prepare for the long ride home in the middle of the night).

Kay and I, even though we had had NO sleep ourselves, knew we had no other option. We woke him up and we told him that the plan had to be pushed up.

To now.

It took some convincing I assure you, but about an hour or so, and 3 espresso shots later, DMo (very grudgingly), Kay and I were on the road.

DMo drove his convertible SeaBreeze behind  Kay and I (with the top up of course). And Kay and I, and all of our things for the month-long winter break were crammed into her 1938 Jeep, with a tarp for a roof.

Why you might ask?

Because Kay was going to be purchasing a new car in Nor Cal and needed to bring her old OLD car back home, and my car (a new Ford Contour) was missing… yes missing. It had been stolen. But don’t worry… I got it back a few months later.

But anyway… that’s why we were in the Jeep.

So off we went, at about 10:15pm, under what appeared to be a perfectly clear sky.

But the green mass on the doppler was telling us that any moment, things would become really interesting.

Our main concern at that point: The Grapevine closing. Who would have ever guessed that it snowed anywhere in LA ever? Well I guess that the Grapevine gets to a high enough elevation that in some storms, there is snow. And because no one in LA would ever have any idea how to drive in snow, they always close down the road when this happens.

This would 100% insure that we would not be home  in time for Christmas.

The weather man claimed the road would be closed by midnight.

We were racing the clock.

So we took off, DMo in toe, video rolling. Yes, it’s true. Amazingly enough, most of my college career was caught on tape!

We made it to about  Disneyland before we saw any rain at all. However, that does not mean that the trip had not yet become eventful. Please do keep in mind that we had not slept and that we were in a tarp covered car with nothing more than a 6 pound bag of gummy bears to eat.

We realized very quickly that a tarp covered Jeep was not really  meant to be on the freeway. Between the ripping wind and the jolting clutch, it was not a very smooth ride.

And LOUD! Let me tell you… by the time we made it home (11 1/2 hours later) Kay and I had no voice at all from yelling at each other over the sound of the wind. Not to mention, we didn’t have a stereo, so I held a boom box in my lap the entire ride and we sang along at the top of our lungs (when we weren’t in  fear for our lives).

And FREEZING!! If a tarp covered Jeep is not meant to be on the freeway, it’s certainly not meant to be on the freeway in the dead of winter! Kay and I had on sweats, beanies, sweatshirts with hoods, gloves, blankets and we could see our breath in the air the entire night.

So yes, even before the storm caught up to us, we were already having a very adventurous time.

So around Disneyland, the rain started. It was light at first, but quickly got harder and harder.

If a tarp covered Jeep is not meant to be on the freeway and it’s certainly not meant to be on the freeway in the dead of winter, then it is most definitely not supposed to be on the freeway in pouring rain.

Now we were getting wet as well.

As we approached the bottom of the Grapevine, we pulled off the freeway. We needed gas, but we were in a hurry. It was nearly midnight and the storm was ripping. I am not kidding you. It was hard to stand up straight in the extreme wind. The trees were doubling over and the rain felt like pellets. It was actually very scary, but we were doped up on gummy bears.

We got back in our respective cars, and for Kay and I that meant no escape from the piercing cold, and we headed up the Grapevine, which we were hoping and praying would not be closed.

We made it to the top and just as we were about 5 miles from cresting, the snow started…

And it wasn’t just a little snow… it was hard-core, mountain snow, right in the middle of Ventura county. Lucky for me, both Kay and DMo lived in the snow, so they knew how to drive in those conditions. The other drivers, however, did not. It’s no wonder they have to close that road at the first sign of snow. Our windshield was being covered as quickly as we could wipe it, and the lanes on the road were indistinguishable. These cars were shooting by us going the normal 70mph. I couldn’t believe it.

And wouldn’t you know it… as SOON as we got to the other side of the summit, we saw a long line of cars coming the opposite direction stopped along the roadway. It was literally JUST after midnight and the Grapevine was being closed. I couldn’t believe it.

If we would have decided to take our chances with our original plan, or even if we had decided to leave 10 minutes later… we wouldn’t have made it home for Christmas.

So needless to say… we were in a really good mood coming down that hill. And as we were coming out of the snow and returning to the normal, crazy windy rain storm, we were really thinking that the  worst was behind us.

Ha.

That’s not how it works when nature attacks.

At the bottom of the Grapevine we saw, way out in the distance, a glowing light. Now, it is pouring rain and it has been for quite some time. If you have driven up I5 you know that at this point in the journey, there is nothing left to look at. Especially at night. The middle of this busy state, California, is simply empty. It’s very weird.

So naturally, this glowing light caught our attention  and held our attention for the 5 or so minutes it took us to actually approach the glowing light.

As we got closer, we could see that it was off to the side of the road, maybe 50 or so yards off to the left, and then suddenly we realized… it was a fire.

A fire on top of a pole… Assumably a telephone pole of some sort. But there was really no sign at all as to how or why it was burning. No car wreak. No down power lines. No other sign of any damage. Just one large fire at the top  of this one pole.

In the pouring rain.

At that point I got a call from DMo asking me if we too could see the fire. Um… yes. He also had no idea as to what could cause such an unexplainable fire.

We laughed, the three of us, about how random our trip had been. First clear skies. Then rain, then ripping crazy wind, then snow, then fire… I mean, what could be left?

Fog.

Yes, fog came next.

A few hours up the road the rain started to let up and the terrible wind started to die down… which I have to point out, really did nothing for our hearing conditions in the tarp covered Jeep.

And just as we were thinking “Maybe we are through it”, Mother Nature came and slapped us across the face.

All of the sudden, out of nowhere, we found ourselves in the thickest, most dense fog I’ve ever seen in my life. And it was still freezing.

We could hardly see DMo’s headlights behind us and we were sure that at any moment, we were going to smash into the car of another stupid college duo in front of us who we couldn’t see because of the crazy fog.

But alas, we made it through the fog too.

And then we stopped for gas again.

By this point in the trip, all three of us were fried. I mean, haven’t slept, been at a 9 on the stress scale for hours, freezing and annoyed kind of fried. We got out at the gas station, completely empty except for us morons, and we danced. We turned up DMo’s car radio and blasted “Move your body” by Eiffel 65 as loud as we could and we danced. It was one of the most amazing moments of my life.

When we were ready to leave, I offered to drive the tarp covered Jeep but Kay didn’t think it was such a good idea considering I didn’t know how to drive stick. I figured two things:

1) Once I got on the freeway, there would be no more need to change gears and

2) It’s not like I trip could get any worse…

Kay still said no. DMo agreed. There was NO WAY we were going to throw that out in the universe to be screwed with. Clearly, things were not going our way as it was.

Back in the car, we drove right into more windy rain. It seriously felt like the longest, most incredible journey of our  lives. And although we managed to maintain a sense of humor about the whole thing… we were definitely over it by hour 7.

The pouring rain and terrible wind continued the rest of the way. I remember coming into Woodland over the river and across the coz-way. We were trying to pass this huge semi in the rain and wind on that narrow road and the truck kept creeping into our lane because the wind was pushing it so hard and I was thinking… We are going to make it this far, through all that, and we are going to die 5 minutes away from home.

They were both going to be spending the night at my house before continuing on into the mountains.

But  we didn’t die. We lived. We made it all the way home. And we made it in time for Christmas. We got home on the morning of Christmas Eve I believe. Early in the morning. And we were very grateful to have made it in one piece.

I will never forget looking at that Doppler radar picture and seeing the entire state of California being swallowed up…

We lived it.

We survived when nature attacks.