Dulltona Beach

The deal was; no illicit substances allowed anywhere near the van, a 1960 Ford Econoline. I knew that we had nothing to fear crossing the border at Detroit, we were all clean and innocent as the day we were born. Naturally, the extremely surly border guards hauled our asses into the station for a search and questioning. They would find NOTHING. As I awaited my turn, I looked around at downtown Detroit, a morass of burnt out hulks that turned day into night, and the few we saw on the street didn't look like they wanted my company anytime soon. That's okay, we aren't staying. After a 45-minute holdup, we were on our way and the next thing we knew, it was Toledo. If I had to choose between Detroit and Toledo, I would honestly take Detroit, even taking into account the Mud Hens and the Danny Thomas clan.

We continued on our way down 75 and pulled into a rest stop for the necessary emptying of bladders and a chance to stretch. Hughie Miner pulled me to one side and reached into his boot; "hey lookit this! I fooled them dumb guards and now you and I can split THIS!" A couple of hits of acid. The fucking idiot! (pardon the language) I was now convinced that I was sharing a van with the stupidest man alive. He took the chance of putting each and every one of us away in a hell-hole like Jackson, Michigan for the rest of our short lives, just for the ability to screw himself up even more on bad acid. I didn't tell the rest of the crew, they would've murdered the bum.

Onwards down 75 through a snowstorm, at times going 10mph on the icy interstate, arriving in Dayton. The alternator was giving out and no one in Dayton could help us.
Or wouldn't help. We made our way gingerly to the multi-cultural paradise of Cincinnatti, where we had to wait all night in the parking lot of Von Kruger's Ford dealership. It was cold in that bloody van and I didn't want to cosy up to guys who hadn't showered for 2 days, so I went across to an all-night diner to kill the rest of the grim night. The place was confusing, it ought to have been located 500 miles to the south given the pair of bozos seated next to the cash; when they saw me one of the pair pulled out an eight-inch hunting knife, looked at me with eyes too dim to hold real hatred and made a sawing motion with his knife against his throat. This was accompanied by the insane sound of a gobbling turkey coming from his mouth. I was naturally tempted to give them a wide berth, but instead, I asked them "What's good in here?". Mr. Deliverance just gobbled some more and pointed to the 'menu' on the wall. I could have 'pie a la mode' for 25 cents or 'pie a la mode with ice cream' for only a nickel more, so I just had coffee. I also could have enjoyed a doughnut for 10 cents or the 'special', two donuts for 25. To this day I have always wondered about how many took the special.

After $41 for a new alternator, we were on our way and by late afternoon we had reached Knoxville, home of the Vols. We spent a couple of hours in a bar right outside of the football stadium being entertained by a political science professor. His life dream was to come to Canada to see the American Dream in action, the poor shmuck.

We were in Florida before we knew it, safely installed in some lowlife camping spot. They advertised a fetid swamp as a swimming pool, and after a few Pabst a couple of us took the plunge at 11 at night. The water was so cold that I thought shrinkage was going to be a permanent state. Hughie took the opportunity to take a hit of his acid, and while high, sidled up to me to profess that he was gay.