Just like the title says; Post up your most memorable road trip experiences. Doesn't need to be in a Gbody either.
August 1998: I had been working on my truck for almost a year in preparation for Hot August Nights. I had done an engine, transmission and rearend swap over the previous months and was out of money. I knew that there was no way my stock 1935 radiator would make it so I got my hustle on and worked a deal. I agreed to do some work on a guy's '73 Grand Prix in exchange for his Jeep DJ5 (mail truck). I then sold the Jeep and used the profit to have a custom radiator built by a local shop. It was finished about a week before the trip, immediately started leaking, was removed and returned. The shop had the radiator repaired on Tuesday. That left me with about 100 miles of shakedown before I left town.
My buddy Jerod and I were all packed and ready to go. He was in his '38 Chevy and I was in my '35 Ford. The plan was to leave Pendleton, Oregon on Thursday night after work and sleep in Burns at a friend's ranch. It was 150 miles and couldn't have gone better. Got up the next morning and left to meet up with my dad in Susanville (another 300 miles), then we all caravaned in to Reno, then on to Carson City where we had a room. We went back in to town that night for the Virginia Street cruise and saw hundreds of cool cars. Saturday morning we decided to cruise over to Sparks. While sitting in traffic trying to get out of Carson City my radiator started leaking, well, more like gushing at the top tank seam. Perfect. We all pulled into a Napa parking lot to survey the situation. The split was about 2 inches long and about 1/8" wide. I went inside, bought some JB Weld and used an old nail I found on the edge of the street to bridge the gap. We left the '35 in the Napa parking lot and I caught a ride with my dad in his V8 240Z. We had a great day and enjoyed the sights but I was pretty stressed about making it 600 miles back to Pendleton. We made it back to Carson City about 7pm and were trying to decide what to do. After talking it over, Jerod and I decided that we'd grab a couple gallons of water and leave that night. Little did we know, by leaving early we avoided the famous riot where dozens of cars were damaged.
By 9pm we we burning up the asphalt. My dad traveled with us as far as Susanville then headed west. Neither of us had very large tanks so we tried to stop every 100 miles or so. It was dark, the moon was out and the stars were bright. There was almost no traffic at all on the 2 lane roads and we were making great time with the occasional 100+mph blasts. The JB Welded nail held up great. It's a pretty rural stretch with few small towns. We made it as far as Burns for our last fill-up around 3am and were headed north covering almost 400 miles so far. Knowing that nothing would be open in John Day for our next gas stop, we pulled off the highway and up on to a plateau overlooking the valley. In spite of the freezing temperatures we rolled out our sleeping bags in the back of our respective pickups and got about 90 minutes of sleep. Up before the sun and on tho our last fill-up. Then back to Pendleton in time for breakfast.
It was Two Lane Blacktop meets Easyrider meets Vanishing Point. Pretty sweet trip and I'll never forget it.
BTW, the radiator shop fixed the radiator again but never once said the magic words, "I'm sorry" :?
Who's next?
August 1998: I had been working on my truck for almost a year in preparation for Hot August Nights. I had done an engine, transmission and rearend swap over the previous months and was out of money. I knew that there was no way my stock 1935 radiator would make it so I got my hustle on and worked a deal. I agreed to do some work on a guy's '73 Grand Prix in exchange for his Jeep DJ5 (mail truck). I then sold the Jeep and used the profit to have a custom radiator built by a local shop. It was finished about a week before the trip, immediately started leaking, was removed and returned. The shop had the radiator repaired on Tuesday. That left me with about 100 miles of shakedown before I left town.
My buddy Jerod and I were all packed and ready to go. He was in his '38 Chevy and I was in my '35 Ford. The plan was to leave Pendleton, Oregon on Thursday night after work and sleep in Burns at a friend's ranch. It was 150 miles and couldn't have gone better. Got up the next morning and left to meet up with my dad in Susanville (another 300 miles), then we all caravaned in to Reno, then on to Carson City where we had a room. We went back in to town that night for the Virginia Street cruise and saw hundreds of cool cars. Saturday morning we decided to cruise over to Sparks. While sitting in traffic trying to get out of Carson City my radiator started leaking, well, more like gushing at the top tank seam. Perfect. We all pulled into a Napa parking lot to survey the situation. The split was about 2 inches long and about 1/8" wide. I went inside, bought some JB Weld and used an old nail I found on the edge of the street to bridge the gap. We left the '35 in the Napa parking lot and I caught a ride with my dad in his V8 240Z. We had a great day and enjoyed the sights but I was pretty stressed about making it 600 miles back to Pendleton. We made it back to Carson City about 7pm and were trying to decide what to do. After talking it over, Jerod and I decided that we'd grab a couple gallons of water and leave that night. Little did we know, by leaving early we avoided the famous riot where dozens of cars were damaged.
By 9pm we we burning up the asphalt. My dad traveled with us as far as Susanville then headed west. Neither of us had very large tanks so we tried to stop every 100 miles or so. It was dark, the moon was out and the stars were bright. There was almost no traffic at all on the 2 lane roads and we were making great time with the occasional 100+mph blasts. The JB Welded nail held up great. It's a pretty rural stretch with few small towns. We made it as far as Burns for our last fill-up around 3am and were headed north covering almost 400 miles so far. Knowing that nothing would be open in John Day for our next gas stop, we pulled off the highway and up on to a plateau overlooking the valley. In spite of the freezing temperatures we rolled out our sleeping bags in the back of our respective pickups and got about 90 minutes of sleep. Up before the sun and on tho our last fill-up. Then back to Pendleton in time for breakfast.
It was Two Lane Blacktop meets Easyrider meets Vanishing Point. Pretty sweet trip and I'll never forget it.
BTW, the radiator shop fixed the radiator again but never once said the magic words, "I'm sorry" :?
Who's next?
anyway we pay the bill, tip the waiter NOTHING, and left. By this time, we were allowed back in our hotel, but we couldn't use the elavator. Ok, except we had a top floor hotel room. 
