On 11/1/2014 10:04 AM, KC wrote:
On 11/1/2014 7:39 AM, Mr. Luddite wrote:
On 11/1/2014 2:00 AM, wrote:
On Fri, 31 Oct 2014 22:25:06 -0400, "Mr. Luddite"
wrote:
I did a lot of driving a few years ago back and forth from Florida.
Made
about 11 or 12 trips, about 1500 miles each way over a period of three
years. Many of the trips included hauling a trailer or a boat.
It took 2 and a half days, regardless of how fast I drove.
Did one trip non-stop other than a 20 minute nap and fuel stops. I'll
never do that again.
I used to go to Florida from Southern Md twice a year for years. It is
a shorter ride (950 or so) to St Pete and my fastest trip was a tad
over 14 hours door to door. Usually it was more like 17 or 18 with a
short nap in a truck stop or a rest station along the way (Brunswick
Georgia generally) By then the sun was up and I did the Florida leg.
I had a radar detector but the real aid was the childrens band radio
and choosing your travel time carefully. I did most of the driving at
night but I was a midnight to 8 guy anyway.
The worst part of driving to Florida (or anywhere south of here) is
getting through the southern part of CT, New York and New Jersey.
After that it's a pretty easy drive except for some parts of Maryland.
I used to leave MA at about 11 pm after sleeping in the afternoon or
evening. That would usually get me over the George Washington Bridge in
New York just before the major rush hour traffic.
If you are going through at the wrong time it's worth it to head out 84
which with normal traffic would add about three hours to the trip iirc,
but still better than going through that NE corridor in the afternoon...
Took that route a few times. That's the way we went on the motorcycles
for Rolling Thunder. Left at 5 am from MA and got to Manasas, VA by
mid-afternoon. Nice ride on a bike.
Not so nice a ride in a big, gas powered Class A Motorhome though.
Although the engine was a big GM Vortex something or other, I thought it
was going to blow up sometimes climbing the hills in 2nd or 3rd gear and
the engine racing at about 4K RPM. That's when I realized that rigs
that size really need diesel engines.