08/21/12

Long-Haul Trucker Relives a 2-Day Gridlock in One Instance…

Nature’s Fury in Another…….All on the same road trip!

Hubby had a crazy thought this week. It occurred to him that one particular trucking gig years ago saw him experience two monumental events in one week:  The Woodstock Music Festival, in Bethel, New York, on Aug. 15, 1969 and Hurricane Camille in Biloxi, Mississippi, on August 17, 1969.

He experienced both… as only a TRUCKER can.

First, he headed out on a northwesterly route, out of Rhode Island and was driving along in that central region of New York when he hit the “parking lot” the highway had become. Cars had been ditched everywhere, in breakdown lanes and on grassy strips of median dividers.

Truckers from the opposite direction hadn’t been able to warn him of the problem—they got stuck, too, and their CB radios were out of range.

Everybody just sat there, watching the human parade pass by–young people carrying their favorite accessory—boomboxes, shouting the music they loved.

Many would be stuck for 3 full days, as unintended ‘guests’ of the Woodstock Music Festival.

You’ll read about what this trucker did, during that event, in Grandpa and the Truck Book 3, coming out later in the Fall.

What book’s out soon?  Grandpa and the Truck, Book 2, with “Grandpa Meets the Hurricane” and “Girl Truckers” (remember…it’s for little ones 4-8 years old.) That 2nd. story (every Grandpa and the Truck book has 2 stories) tells of 2 Rhode Island women who made male truckers sit up and notice, as they became phenoms in their industry…

But they didn’t start out as such.

What’s ironic?  Hubby did the Biloxi run on the reverse side of the Woodstock Music Festival run….two potent events on the same road trip…. two that might have driven anyone else (but a trucker) “bonkers.”

Book 1 and 2 are available now on the www.grandpaandthetruck.com site ….

Book 2’s story with “Girl Truckers” has been endorsed b Women In Trucking. OOIDA gave us a shout-out, too, and Overdrive’s given us two.Women InTrucking and OOIDA’s edorsement are proudly affixed to the back of every Grandpa and the Truck book.

PS…We know you’ve got your own ‘chilling moments’…every trucker does. We aim to tell them to a public that knows very little about what we truckers do—via stories told to little ones.  After all, they’re our best Fan Club.