Ohio is for Luggers
Our trip began with a punishing challenge, because before every oasis lies a vast desert. Turns out the van rental company doesn’t provide any sort of customer parking. Fair enough, but so then in order for us to retrieve our chariot, we needed to haul our entire month’s worth of luggage from Long Island into New York City and then from there into Hoboken through various cruel and unaccommodating means; packed subways, delayed trains, and a pair of Uber XLs for two, not to mention a dozen sets of scornful stairs and a short but bewildering trek through midtown Manhattan, all with our shimmering oasis in mind.
Shortly before I lost a wheel on my luggage.
Entering Penn Station is no unfamiliar experience to either of us, but this time around it felt almost new. Everyone I passed was another character in my unfolding story. There was a man busking near Starbucks, an older African-American gentleman, tall and thin with a curly ponytail. He sang karaoke versions of “Imagine” and “Lean On Me” and “Wonderful World”, nodding gratefully to people dropping money into his paint bucket. His charm greatly outweighed his talent.
As I watched this karaoke cat doing his thing I noticed Knicks analyst, Alan Hahn, moving briskly through the station with a backpack on. A New York basketball hero by my own estimation. He’s taller in real life.
Then there was my friend Rodney at the Starbucks counter who let me slide on a pair of cute little notebooks I was attempting to buy for Gabby to write in after they failed to scan a number of times. I dropped a healthy tip into his jar and he left me with a look reminiscent of karaoke cat watching old green presidents flitter into his coffer.
On our way out of Penn, we stopped to ask a police officer and a construction worker for directions to the PATH station. After a moment or two of being totally ignored, the construction worker looked up and informed us we’d need to make our way up several flights of stairs and out into the brimming streets of midtown. Gabby looked down at her bags, then up at him, and mouthed “fuck”, to which he responded, in the most Brooklyn accent you can imagine,
“Far? Get the hell out of here, that’s not far at all. It’s right ova there.”
A wonderfully authentic New York moment and a much-appreciated parting gift.
Turns out he was right, it wasn’t far at all, but when you’re lugging 9000 pounds of everything you’ve ever owned and the PATH station is about as conspicuous as an Atlantic City speakeasy, not far at all seems as far as all hell. Nevertheless, we made our way through and soon found ourselves barreling down dark tunnels toward destiny itself.
Finding Fishtank
The Escape Campervan New Jersey office is a modest operation. That is to say it’s a trailer in a boatyard with just a small sign on the fence outside to indicate its existence.
It was here that we met the next character in our story. Sean was an affable. mustachioed, twenty-something dude, born and raised in Minneapolis, Minnesota and seemingly familiar with every other city, highway, and mountain in the country. He was both knowledgeable and interesting, leaving us with two key quotes to be kept in our breast pockets for the duration of the journey:
“It seems like our generation might be alright with being poor…”
and
“Travel is sacred.”
After an introduction to our van, Fishtank…
Now that’s a fine American…fish van…
….and a brief tutorial on her various features, it was off into the maze of filth and dismay that is Jersey traffic. Once safely out of the throes of that utter hellscape, we began our journey to Ohio by way of Pennsylvania….
On to Ohio
The trip was beautiful. We wound through lush green woodlands in the fog and, after outpacing the gloomy clouds, found ourselves beneath cotton candy skies touched by a golden red sunset that shone its way down onto the rolling green mountains that flanked us on all sides. Once we hit I-80 it was 300 miles straight on.
Here’s a lovely gallery of god-awful pictures from the road…
Guess you had to be there…
A number of different Ohio musicians found their way into Fishtank’s speakers along the way, but it was Warren-born Dave Grohl and his Foo Fighters who provided us with the official lyrics of the ride:
“One of these days, your heart will stop, and play its final beat…”
Something to remember every step of the way on this wild journey of ours, and in general, really. This ride does end and nobody really knows when.
Rolling into rural Ohio near midnight was a strange feeling. An unfamiliar place in untrodden territory. Someone’s solitary hometown invaded by strangers beneath the moonlight. I looked on with great curiosity as we passed unlit homes resting in the shadows and thought of all the lives being lived in this place I’d never been. Lonely houses on sprawling properties, looming white churches, a lone Amish man on horse and buggy, The Isley Brothers mournful combo-cover of “Ohio” by Crosby, Stills, Nash, & Young and Hendrix’s “Machine Gun” playing in the background. A powerful, midnight scene on a wonderful first night.
We pulled up to the Walmart in Mentor, Ohio around 12:30 a.m., around 8 hours after our New Jersey departure. Gabby toughed out the last couple hours of driving and sat with red-eyed relief out front for a moment before we went in to shop for a few things in order to justify our Fishtank van spending the night on their property.
Setting up for bed was a strange and paranoid affair, but we were reasonably reassured to see that multiple large RVs and other rigs were stationed across several parking spots themselves. We converted our living room into a bedroom for the first time of many, drew the shades tight, locked the doors up, hid a large butter knife beneath my pillow, and turned out the lights.
The view from our hotel window was breathtaking.
