The Driving Thread

[trap15]

I don't think this sort of thread has existed here yet, but yes, the driving thread.

Today I came back from ACen, and had an interesting path to get home due to dropping off friends. ACen is in Chicago, Illinois; friend we dropped off lives in Ashland, Kentucky; I live in Columbus, Ohio. Not sure why, but my GPS unit decided that from Ashland, we were going to take a few bits of interstate, then drive through Wayne Forest in south-east Ohio. Notable stretches of highway there were OH-233 and OH-141 (both northbound), which were absolutely gorgeous and incredibly fun to drive through during the morning sunrise at a bright and early 7am.

I need to try a southbound trip through there sometime soon, I'm curious if it's just as pleasant as northbound. Unfortunately, getting to there from my place is about an hour long drive in itself, and driving through those two is about another hour, so a roundtrip is 4 hours. But certainly worth it, I think.

So yeah, share any notable drives you've made! Make suggestions of routes for people to drive for leisure.

[Despatche]

can this also be a "choice cars for leisurely driving" thread

[Vexorg]

Probably the most interesting drive I've done was quite a few years ago (2007, if I recall correctly) was where I flew into Salt Lake City and rented a car to spend a couple of days with my brother in Provo, and after that I took several days where I drove from there down to Flagstaff Arizona by way of US-89 (which goes through some really cool terrain in Southern Utah,) and then spent a day at the Grand Canyon, then took a day to drive to Las Vegas by way of some of the remaining portions of the old Route 66, and spent a couple of days there before heading back up to Utah, not really being in any hurry to get anywhere along the way. Definitely some interesting country down there, although it would have been nice to have something a little better than a rented Saturn to do the drive in.

[CMoon]

I already hated driving before I moved to LA.

[Ed Oscuro]

I already hated driving before I moved to LA.

ugh, I feel your pain

I think many big cities would do that (PHILADELPHIA BITCHEZ, oh and even going straight through Columbus at rush hour seems kinda bad (for example). Never have hated driving through / by Cleveland though (I like Cleveland). But the only thing I can think of that approaches, in my experience, LA driving would be sitting at tightly guarded border crossings (i.e. the US/CAN bridge crossing in Detroit at the old and decrepit Ambassador Bridge). That, and a day of epic rides through Hawaii.

For drivers thinking of Michigan as a destination or as a thoroughfare, I hope we have better news for you soon - recent polls suggest Michiganders realize the problems with our roads and want to put at least $1.8B into fixing them up. On the other hand, we might stick Canada with a bill for the second bill, and there are some rumblings about highways going to the dreaded toll system (dear god no).

[Ixmucane2]

Notable drives in Italy:

• Bientina - Altopascio on the SP3: two bland towns, linked by less than 15 km of unusual tree-lined high road, straight through beautiful hills and farmland.
• Ora - Canazei on the SS48: the most impressive transition from plains to Serious Mountains I've ever seen.

Seaside roads along the whole west coast should be good, but I don't have specific places to suggest.

[Marble]

I have a really hard time understanding how anyone could find driving leisurely. Some roads may have some beautiful scenery, but you shouldn't be looking at it if you're behind the wheel. In my area, the popular roads for 'leisurely' cruises are all windy single lane roads with 80km+ speed limits. Gotta fucking hate it when you're just trying to get from A to B and it takes twice as long as anticipated because you got stuck behind some fuckwit doing less than half the speed limit while staring out the window. People get their cars and faces smashed for driving like that. Well, unless their inattentive driving causes them to injure or kill an innocent first.

[shmuppyLove]

My favourite drive to date was the Island Highway on Vancouver Island.

Drove all the way from Victoria up to Campbell River in a rented Subaru Impreza hatch with the moonroof open and windows down. Great road with incredible scenery.



Wow.

[Obiwanshinobi]

Nothing beats Eastern Ukraine in mid-nineteen-nineties. Nerve-wrecking, make no mistake, but what a ride.
(One of those huge stray dogs getting hit by a car keeps haunting me to this day. So does every creature hit by a car in my presence in fact.)