Hitching to NY With Cyndi

Hitching to NY With Cyndi

It was the summer of '75 and Cyndi and I had been traveling across the country with Connie and Andy in their VW micro-bus. Cyndi was now visiting with her parents in Barrington, Illinois and I was visiting with my friends from Valparaiso, Bill and Maryann, who lived in Indiana. Connie and Andy had continued on to Connie's family in New York, out on Long Island. Cyndi and I were going to hitch the rest of the way to my parents' home on Long Island. We all planned to eventually meet back up on Long Island for a return trip to Eugene. I managed to get up to Barrington once during this time to meet Cyndi for a concert. We saw Corky Siegel in a small venue with one of Cyndi's old high school teachers and I think his wife. I can't recall how I got there but I remember the concert well. It was a one man show and Corky delighted the crowd singing and playing harmonica and piano.

A few days later Cyndi and I met back up and Bill took us over to the nearest on-ramp of the Indiana Turnpike (I-80). I had done a lot of hitching and had hitched this route before. I remembered many times being at a location where there was a guy and a girl hitching and they usually got the first ride. I was looking forward to finally having that advantage. Our first ride came quick and took us through Ohio and into Pennsylvania. Our driver proceeded to take the Pennsylvania Turnpike, I-76. I-80 splits off and heads over the Mountains. At that time I-76 was the superior road as well as the more traveled road. As we approached the Pittsburgh area our driver turned off the turnpike and let us off at the on-ramp. He told us this would be a good place to catch another ride as many people got on the Turnpike there. It connected with another major highway. I think it was the Warrendale (Warren with an e) Exit. Well, many people did get on at that exit but just about all of them were going West not East. Turned out that the highway connecting with the Penn Turnpike there ran parallel to it from that point going East. I-76 was a toll road and the other highway free, why get on the Turnpike when there's a free highway going the same way? We should have hitched back a couple of exits to get in a better location but of course at the time we did not know what the problem was, only that no one was going our way.

There was a hitch-hiker already at the on-ramp when we got there that afternoon. He was also going East and he'd been there for over an hour. We all stood there hitching for another couple of hours and nobody was stopping. It was beginning to get dark, our spirits were getting low, and it began to feel like we might be spending the rest of our summer there. Hmm, this post might have been “How I Spent My Summer Vacation at the Penn Turnpike Warrendale On-ramp”. Finally a pickup truck stopped, Hallelujah! The driver rolled down the window and motioned at Cyndi for us to get in. I pointed to the guy who was there before us. The three of us had been stranded here together so long I didn't want to jump in front of him. Besides, I had an “ace in the hole”, Cyndi. The guy said he'd take us all. We would not all fit in the cab so somebody had to ride in the back. We told the other guy to get in the cab and Cyndi and I got in the bed of the truck. It was not ideal, but we were so glad to finally get a ride that we gratefully climbed into the back of the truck.

It was now dark and getting chilly. Cyndi and I laid on our backs in the bed of the truck to catch as little wind as possible. It was cold riding uncovered in the back of that truck but that turned out to be the least of our problems. As the truck hit the freeway we found ourselves sliding back and forth and up and down and all around. It was uncomfortable and quite unsettling. It was a battle just to keep from being thrown out of the truck bed. I wondered just what the driver was doing but I was afraid I'd fly out of the truck if I got up to take a look. We had waited so long for this ride and now I was wondering how long can we last riding like this? It probably was not that long but it felt like forever when eventually the truck pulled into a rest-stop. I felt a sense of relief and Cyndi and I were all too glad to get out of the back of that truck. The driver got some gas told us to meet him in the restaurant. He wanted to buy us something to eat. We all went in and sat at the counter. It was good feel warm again. Our driver came in and tried to ordered a beer. He told us he was a doctor and was on his way to a hospital where he was supposed to do an operation. I thought “Gosh, I wouldn't want this guy operating on me”. He talked loud and tried talking to anyone and everyone. He seemed both erratic and drunk. The other hitch-hiker who had been riding in the cab told us the guy's driving was scary. I thought “You thought it was scary? You should experience it riding in the back of the truck.” Our driver was making enough of a scene that someone called the cops. The police showed up and stopped us as we left the restaurant. “The doctor” told the police the same story he had been telling us. They checked his identification and I guess there must have been some truth to it as they let him go.

We were not sure we should continue but the cops OK'd him so maybe he was not as bad off as it appeared. As we got to the truck the Police returned and this time asked to see everyone's ID. They then told our doctor that they would only let him leave if I drove. Yes, that's the kind of contest that I seem to be able to win. The other guy wisely decided he'd had enough and would stay behind at the rest-stop. Being chosen by the Cops and not feeling comfortable about leaving our doctor friend in the lurch, I accepted the challenge. Heck, we would be riding in the cab and I'd be driving. How bad could it be? Our only other option was spending the night at the rest-stop. The three of us got in the cab and we took off. My question was soon answered. He was obnoxious and it wasn't long before I'd had enough and I'm sure Cyndi did too, especially since she was sitting right next to him. I now realized that spending a night at a rest-stop was clearly the better option. We decided to get out the first chance we got. At the next rest-stop I pulled over and we abandoned “the doctor”. We were relieved to be away from him. It was late and ride opportunities were nil so we decided to try to get some sleep over in the picnic area and start back up in the morning. All in all, we only spent a few hours with “the doctor” but in that time he managed to rescue us, scare us, and irritate us, in a way that made him hard to forget.

The next morning we quickly got a ride from a truck driver. He took us all the way to New York City. As we got close to the George Washington Bridge (GW) the truck driver became a little unsure of himself. The GW crosses the Hudson and becomes the Cross Bronx Expressway. The traffic is almost always heavy on the Cross Bronx. I've been in “stop and go” traffic jams on the Cross Bronx at 3 AM in the middle of the week. I suggested an alternative route to our driver but he did not go for it. At times the Cross Bronx is below the street level and the sides of the roadway are concrete walls with no or minimal shoulder. We got to an area like that where we were stopped, because of the traffic. There was a cement landing area to the right where there were stairs leading up to the street level. The driver told us we should get out here. I tried to explain that this was not a good spot and we'd wait for a better one even if we had to go out of our way. He insisted we get out there so, having little choice, we did. Now I was worried. We were in the Bronx and this was not a good section of the city at any time of the day. Unless traffic was stopped and one of the two cars next to us were willing to take us we were going to be stuck. I was thinking if we are going to be stuck maybe we should go up to the street level and find a subway station while it's still daytime. I definitely did not want to be walking around that neighborhood after dark. Heck, I wasn't thrilled with the prospect of walking around in the daylight for that matter. The traffic was heavy with some stop and go and luckily within 15 minutes a car that was stopped by us motioned for us to get in. The driver was an older Jewish New Yorker. Well, older to me at that time he was likely a bit younger than I am now. Anyway, he was on his way up to Connecticut to visit his Mom who lived in a home up there. Now we had another decision to make. Soon the Cross Bronx was going to fork. One direction was to I-95 heading to Connecticut and upstate New York, the direction he would be going and the other to I-295 and the Throgs Neck Bridge leading to Long Island where we were headed. The only place to drop us would be a safety zone in the middle of the fork. The safety zone, while good size, was still just the concrete roadway in the middle of the highway with two lanes splitting off on either side. It did not have a traffic barrier. The good news was that there was space for someone to stop. The bad news was we would have no protection and standing there could be uncomfortable. The highway was elevated at this point so there was no way off the highway so we'd have to stay there until we caught a ride. It was coming on rush hour and there would be lots of cars so I opted for being dropped on that safety zone figuring we were bound to get a ride from someone. We got out and while it was a decent distance from the speeding cars, it did not feel safe and we felt quite vulnerable. Cyndi immediately became concerned. I couldn't blame her. She began to question my decision making some rather valid points. She began to express her displeasure with, shall we say, a bit of passion. I tried to assure her that in spite of how it looked I did know what I was doing, even though now that we were standing on this “safety zone” I was having doubts myself. Just then a car pulled over to offer us a ride. We were still engaged in our “conversation” at that point. He had to honk his horn to get our attention. This greatly helped to ease the growing tension as we thankfully rushed over and jumped into his car. He was a construction worker heading home to Patchogue out on the Island. He took us all the way to Huntington where my parents lived.

Cross Bronx Expressway below street level           Safety Zone between I-95 and I-295

We made it safely and except for that one exit in Pennsylvania we got rides very quickly. In the end, hitching the route with Cyndi ended up taking about the same amount of time as it had when I had done it by myself. Still, I know Cyndi's presence helped us get rides. Heck, without Cyndi I'd probably still be stuck in Pennsylvania!

Cross Bronx Expressway Transitioning from below street level to above street level