Thousand-Mile Days

Back in the 1960s, 1970s and early 80s I drove coast-to-coast a number of times — 20 one-way trips, actually.

Part of the fun was doing it as efficiently as I could.   In the 60s the Interstate system was still a work in progress, so every year when I was traveling I’d buy a road atlas and search for a route with the most freeway mileage.   Of course I still had to drive a number of stretches on two-lane roads, often enough in a queue behind a slow-moving truck or travel trailer.  About the most miles I could manage per 14-hour driving day in those conditions was 700.

By the turn of the1970s, the system was nearing completion. In my ’68 Volvo 142 I did about 950 miles on a couple occasions.  Then the Big Gas Crunch hit, and the government’s infinite wisdom dictated that absurd 55 MPH speed limit.  That made seriously long mileage days hard to attain.

But just before that, I traded the Volvo for a Porsche 914 with its huge gas tank (scaled for the 916 6-cylinder model) that allowed a 600 mile cruising range at 30 MPG.   In that car, I drove from Albany, NY to Seattle in three days.  Another time I began the day in Evanston, WY and wound up in Columbia, MO — some 1300 or so miles away.   I wanted to stop sooner, but was experiencing strong thunderstorms in eastern Kansas and didn’t want to pull off the highway.  And in Missouri in those days, all the motels seemed to be 10 miles off I-70, so I wasn’t willing to stop until I reached Columbia late in the evening.  And then slept for 11 hours, spoiling my plans for the next day.

Even in recent years I’ve driven between Seattle and Holister, CA in one 15-hour day, a little more than 900 miles. I’m not sure I’d want to try such a thing now: Seattle to San Francisco in one day will have to do.