My dear old Mom always told me “If You Can’t Say Something Nice, Don’t Say Anything!” And normally I try to follow that advice. But when it comes to Atlanta traffic…there are no good words to say. Except that once again we survived that mess on our snowbird trek to Florida. Thank God!
We left Dalton Georgia with the plan to roll through Atlanta in mid-morning, hoping to avoid the typical rush hour snarl. But it wasn’t long before we realized our plan was NOT working out as we had hoped.
Oh, things started out GREAT. We felt like giving each other High Fives for picking the perfect time to jump into the fray…
We even got through downtown Atlanta relatively quickly by cruising in the far left lane called the HOV Lane. (Only cars with at least two passengers are allowed to use that lane during most hours of the day.)
But before we could crow about our good fortune…THIS happened.
This traffic jam went on for HOURS. Yes. Literally. For HOURS…
We try to remain upbeat during these times, and we just keep thanking God that we are safe amid the chaos all around us. After all, that’s all you can do.
We FINALLY escaped from that Georgia traffic “parking lot” and made it to the Sunshine State. And of course we stopped at the visitors center for our free taste of orange juice so we could toast our successful journey through the awful bumper to bumper traffic jam we had experienced.
We planned our trip to arrive in Ocala, Florida in the late afternoon, in plenty of time for Peepaw to watch the Iowa Hawkeyes play in their bowl game that night. And after that Georgia traffic nightmare we still felt sure we could make it to our hotel in Ocala in time for kickoff.
But about twenty miles from Ocala…another dead stop on the freeway!
We could have WALKED to our hotel faster than we drove those last twenty miles! In fact we could almost SEE our hotel while we sat in that mess! There were no accidents, no cars in ditches, no stalled vehicles. Just miles of cars…dead stopped on the freeway. Not moving…at all. Again…it took HOURS to go those twenty miles.
But FINALLY…we pulled into our hotel, and Peepaw checked in as fast as he could. And about that bowl game? He turned on the TV in our room JUST in time for kickoff! So like I said, the traffic WAS terrific but thank God we lived to tell about it! And if you’ve got a solution to that ever present Atlanta traffic jam we’d LOVE to hear about it before we head back North in the Spring.
Oh…BTW…Our Hawkeyes DID win that bowl game.
Just sayin’.
Isn’t there any kind of s detour around Atlanta? It will be more miles but probably less time than sitting in that parking lot
No…there isn’t. But we may take a VERY different route next time.
It’s always awful!