Rest Areas.. What's not to like?

Ohio offers showers in certain rest areas. But you will probably notice blood from drug users hiding in there a minute to shoot up. The hard core addicts will spin the needle looking to hit blood before shooting the drugs through. As such you will have to consider it a infectious agent and a threat to your health and life in ways you cannot imagine.

Certain rest areas are not very good places to go to because of the deviant activity that occurs in them. You eventually learn to stay out of them.

The better ones are the state welcome areas. Tamarack in West Virginia comes to mind as one of the best.

You also better have locking fuel caps. The time you spend in a rest area is just enough to get some fuel out of you. And you wont know the difference until for some reason your truck is thirsty all of a sudden and your boss is asking why is your fuel miles down to 4's per mile?

Certain rest areas you just dont go. Lombardi in Jersey comes to mind. But there will be times you are there. Just keep in mind there are two major schools beyond your eyesight and you do not want to be there with hazmat if something should happen.

Western rest areas in some areas require a different line of thought. That pretty raked stone landscaping with the tines making the lines across the stones. Make sure Mr Rattlesnake has not messed with those lines carefully drawn into the ground. That's why they landscape it so carefully. Snakes can and will get in there among the people and it would be like a shooting gallery and a threat to those who don't know anything about snakes.

Certain rest areas are wonderful to get a nights sleep There used to be one just south of Flagstaff on 17, and if you screened in the windows overnight all you get is pine tree. By morning whatever allergies, sniffles or problems you had are cleared by that Pine wafting through your cab. I understand it's closed now and that's a shame. It usually was a real quiet stop.

 

I'm a tree hugger by nature.

 

Stay the hell out of rest areas after midnight. Trucks parked everywhere often blocking the exit from the rest area.

 

What gets me are flowers. I don't mind them too much particularly when Honey Bees come out for about 6 weeks a year (Ours have pretty much just finishing up, they got a extra two weeks work in this summer because we did not burn so much.) We depend on those bees because we also raise tomatoes etc in part of the land. Lady bugs too. Praying mantis also among certain other useful insects. As long we have bees that work we have food as a Human Race. Without bees we have nothing given enough time.

 

Showers aside, the advantage to most rest areas is that they don't fill up as quickly as a truck stop, especially a chain truck stop.

Rest areas along the I94 in Wisconsin are a good example of how a rest area should be built and maintained. They tend to be much quieter than most truck stops and usually are in a nice area where, if you are inclined, can go for a good walk.

It's getting to the point now where most Pee-lots and Flying J's are full by 5pm. Everyone seems to have got on the "start early; finish early" schedule with elogs. I'm starting to prefer to park on the customer's lot overnight even if a 24 hour bathroom isn't available.

 

[QUOTE="Zeviander, post: 7734807,
prefer to park on the customer's lot overnight even if a 24 hour bathroom isn't available.[/QUOTE]

Exactly...reason enough to invest in a portable potty, as is currently being discussed elsewhere.

 

I love the Oasis going around Chicago.

Not

Always a Clusterpuck of parking

 

We need about a 100 of these added in strategic areas across the nation

 

What he said

 

im gonna airhonk everything till I exit it