It was 1 AM, on a June morning in 1966, as I got into my 1965 Corvair. The car Ralph Nadar loved to hate. I had just finished my swing shift at DDO, and now I was going to drive all night to Colorado Springs. My route was through Wyoming, along what was becoming interstate 80.
After driving for nearly 12 hours I arrived in Colorado Springs. The purpose of this drive was to talk to my girl friends parents about our desire to get married. That's a story for another blog. After our one night visit we headed back to Ogden. We came home using a route other than I-80, and arrived back in Ogden a couple of very sleep deprived people
This trip to Colorado and back was the start of my 47 year saga of driving I-80 through Wyoming. For the next few years my trips along I-80 were to go visit my wife's parents and family. Yes, my girl friend had become my wife. Those trips were so long in my non air conditioned cars, and on some pretty bad stretches of road. Even though Wyoming has some spectacular places to visit, none of them are along I-80. So it meant just getting behind the wheel and forging on to your destination.
When you look at a map, it appears you can take several routes to Colorado Springs that are shorter than using I-80. You can't. Having tried them all through the years, Wyoming is the quickest.
It wasn't long and children were added to the thrill of the drive. That meant more stops, and less peaceful time in the car. No electronic entertainment gadgets in the late 60's. My in laws moved to Grand Junction at some point, but I was in the Army Reserves and we went to Ft. Carson for training every other year. So I was still making the drive to Colorado Springs. The trips I made while in the reserves meant that there were several adults in the car. It was nice to have company and to be able to change drivers. One year we decided to go as far as Rock Springs and spend the night. We drove up and down motel row checking rates, finally settling into a room with a couple of us on the floor to save money.
Through the years the road got better and the cars did too, so the trip became less tiring, still not scenic, but not as wearing on you. I-80 started bypassing some cities so the time of the drive started decreasing. That was good because one year I had to drive home quickly to attend my graduation when I received my masters degree.
Winter drives across Wyoming have there own set of adventures. The wind always blows so you always find sections of the highway with blowing snow, even with the proliferation of snow fences at strategic locations. I drove back from Colorado alone one winter, having left the family there for a Christmas visit. At Little America the road was closed. I went to get a room, but decided I could stay in my car. I had all the gear I needed, so I prepared to spend the night snuggled into my sleeping bag in the back seat. After a few hours I could tell vehicles were moving around. I got up and drove to the gate blocking the highway and waited. They opened the gate and we all lined up behind the snowplows and headed west at 35 mph. At Evanston the plows left us, the road was better so we all took off on our own, I got home only a few hours later than originally planned.
On another trip back from Colorado, this time with the family, the car started acting up as we drove in a heavy snowstorm. The car finally stopped a few miles west of Evanston. Soon a highway patrol trooper pulled up and said he would push me into the cafe in Echo, a few miles down the road. So we enjoyed the ride in the increasingly colder car until we reached the cafe and I could call my Dad to come and tow us home.
About the time I left the Army Reserves, my three youngest children relocated to Colorado Springs with their Mother. So now my trips were to visit my children. They were quiet, thoughtful trips as I drove over, visited, and then back home alone. As a Father to a split family there was a lot to think about on the long drive. Sometimes I drove over and brought the children back for the summer. These trips were adventures. One time the air conditioning was broke on my car, we all sweltered across Wyoming. Another time one of my daughters was sick and just laid in the back seat miserable all the way to Utah. Also it was raining heavily along I-25 at times on that same trip, and the car was not running right. We got as far as Ft. Collins and the car just wouldn't go anymore. We had to be towed to a shop and get the car repaired. Luckily there was a shop open on Saturday. The part to repair the car was three dollars. My bill for towing and repairs came to fifty dollars. I paid it and drove away fast before they changed their mind and decided I had been under charged.
I tried to find stops for breaks that would help cheer the kids up. We found a place we liked to stop for breakfast and we would stop at Little America for an ice cream cone. The times I took them back to Colorado in the summer were very emotionally draining for me and I think for the kids too, especially my youngest daughter Julie.
There is a lot of traffic on I-80 in Wyoming, much of it trucks. But its a good stretch of road to try and find a license plate from every state in the United States and to play the alphabet game. Along with the games we could always count on a thunder shower on the western end of Wyoming when we were coming to Utah, and one on the Eastern end going to Colorado.
Eventually the trips I made were for high school graduations, watching cross country meets, to help grown kids move, to see new grandchildren, and to attend college graduations. One trip I made with my parents so we could bring a piano back to Ogden, We spent the night in Rawlins on that trip. Eventually I didn't have to be the one making all the trips. The kids were older and would drive to Utah on occasion.
By now I-80 was long since completed, and it became my habit to count construction zones on my trips to Colorado. For the record, there is usually and average of eight each summer as they work to keep the road repaired and updated. With the advent of the higher speed limit and the interstate bypassing all cities, the trip has been shortened considerably.
I had become comfortable with the 5 hours of I-80 I drove through Wyoming on my trips. Ive even found some stark beauty in parts of the drive. One spring the median had wildflowers blooming in it. You can always spot antelope along the way and a couple of years as I was coming home I saw all the NASCAR haulers heading east after a race out west. A fun sight for me.
The serenity I had come to enjoy driving through Wyoming was shattered in May of 2010. My youngest daughter, Julie, had committed suicide while living in Broomfield Colorado. Me, my wife and daughter made the very sad, tearful drive across I-80 one more time. No drive will ever equate to that one that late May day. We made it, I'm not really sure how, to my other daughters house, which was the saddest place on earth that day. We stayed a week planning and having a memorial service for Julie.
The day after the service I knew I had to get back to Ogden and begin to process what had happened. It was just me and my wife on the way home, a very sad and quiet couple. I made the trip across I-80 regularly that summer and fall. The tears falling each time. The pain got less as time and each trip went by.
The past three years has found me still driving I-80 through Wyoming. Ive found it to be a time to contemplate my life, to look at Wyoming more, and of late, to listen to my play list for nearly the entire trip. The trip from Ogden to my daughters house in Erie is about eight and a half hours total. On occasion I take one of the alternate routes just for a change of pace. When I get ready to come home I always come back on I-80.
Now that I am older I have to make more stops along the way, but my goal is to still make the trip in eight and a half hours. A couple of times, to help pass the time, I have counted trucks going the opposite direction for a hundred mile stretch. I have my gas stops and food stops and know every hill and dale on the road. How many trips have I made? as numerous as the sands in the sea.
My trips along I-80 now are so different from that first one so many years ago. I have an air conditioned car, with a great stereo system, comfortable seats, a very quiet, smooth ride, and all sorts of digital data for me to interpret along the way. I have a wife who is willing to share the driving with me, when she goes with. My concession to her is that we stop and sit in a restaurant for lunch.
I'm not sure how many more trips I will be making to Colorado, but as long as I have a daughter and grand kids living there, I will occasionally be spending 5 hours with my four lane friend, I-80 through Wyoming.
