The Road Thing, Part IV

 

I-40 in Arizona

“Sometimes I wonder whether the world is being 

run by smart people who are putting us 

on or by imbeciles who really mean it.”
― Laurence J. Peter

 The trip from Las Vegas to London, if one takes the southern route, is approximately 2005 miles.  A good portion of the journey takes you through Arizona, New Mexico, Texas, and Oklahoma on I-40, a freeway.  In Oklahoma City, you switch to I-44, a turnpike that bisects Oklahoma diagonally from southwest to northeast before crossing into Missouri and becoming a freeway again. Around St. Louis, you hit I-70, (another freeway) and follow it east to Central Ohio and London.

I like the roads in Oklahoma.  Unlike the roads in Texas, they are smooth and provide an easy ride.  I didn't even mind the turnpike because I'm using the road, so I can pay a little to maintain it.  There was, however, one little hitch.  Allow me to explain.

After Riles and I stopped in Elk City for his pit stop and my coffee (with two expressos), we headed east on I-40 for another few hours.  Just west of downtown OKC, I took the on-ramp to I-44, the Oklahoma Turnpike.  As we took the final turn onto the road, I saw a big sign that announced the rates for driving on the turnpike; two-axle cars cost $1.10.  Two seconds later, I saw another sign that read, "EXACT CHANGE ONLY."

I-70 in Indiana

In all honesty, I had given all my change—about 50 cents—to expresso lady at McDonald's two hours earlier.  "HOLY CRAP." I had nothing else to say. I had visions of the OK police snatching Riley and me out of the hotel in the middle of the night for not paying $1.10 as we went through the toll plaza (Neither of us looks good in stripes, by the way.). I also had visions of being stuck at the toll plaza gate with cars piling up behind me because I couldn't pay $1.10 in exact change.  "Holy, holy crap."

No, I ask you this: If you run the Oklahoma Road Department, would you not think it wise to announce that one must have exact change to travel the turnpike BEFORE ONE GETS STUCK ON SAID TURNPIKE?  Maybe Oklahomans know that they have to pay turnpike tolls in exact change, but I bet most travelers do not (until the first time they venture through without exact change in hand).

We did not come across the toll plaza immediately, so I fished around in my purse to see if I could find any coins that dropped to the bottom of the purse.  No such luck.  I found a dollar bill, though. Maybe, I thought, I could ask the person I was holding up behind me for change.  Maybe.  We continued on, and I started to think that maybe I was out of the woods because I had not seen a toll plaza sign.

Albuquerque

Right.  Not long after that thought hit me, I saw the, "TOLL PLAZA—2 MILES" sign.  I approached the plaza and saw that the car in front of me had stopped at a machine a few yards away from the toll machine.  A bill changer!!  I pulled up, put the $1 bill I'd found in the machine, and got 20 nickels back.  Yippee!  I pulled up and threw my two quarters and 12 nickels in the toll basket.  The gate lifted, and we were through.

A few miles down the road, I noticed a sign on one of the exits as I passed, and it announced that exiting cars would have to pay another toll.  Of course, it also advised that it was "EXACT CHANGE ONLY."  I had no idea how much *that* toll would be, and except for bills, I had the remaining 40 cents in nickels somewhere in the bottom of my purse.  The thoughts started to swirl again.

I got to my exit eventually and saw that I owed 35 cents to exit the turnpike.  It took me a few seconds, but I located the coins and threw them into the machine much to the delight of the guy behind me who had to wait for me to find them.

Starbucks in Albuquerque

This was not, by any stretch of the imagination, a horrible experience.  My only concern was that I didn't have exact change and had no idea what to do.  The one change machine saved me, so that was good.  That said, however, it irritated me to no end that there was no alert to the exact change rule until I was already on the turnpike.  Maybe have the sign at the border or a few miles before the intersection.

It put me in mind of our move to Las Vegas in 2009 when Mike and I drove the Honking Big Pensky Truck west along I-70.  Just after we passed the Green River exit in Utah, we saw a sign that said, "No Gas of Services Next 100 Miles."  We had about 1/2 tank of gas at that point, and that truck was NOT getting good gas mileage.  I don't want to get into that story here, but suffice to say that the Utah Road Department could have put that signage BEFORE THE LAST EXIT WHERE GAS WAS AVAILABLE.


At any rate, I checked in, got Riley settles,  and bought a salad at a place near the hotel. As I paid, I asked the guy at the register to give me a few dollars in coins, PLEASE.  He said, "You're taking the turnpike, I bet."  I nodded.  He added, "If you're not from here, it can be hard if you don't have exact change.  You can pay online, but most people don't know that and don't know how to do it.  It's a pain." 

You bet, Skippy.