World Trip 2002 - Virginia Tech
Day 20
The
trip down from Washington to Virginia Tech was almost a repeat of the one
from Cincinnati to Penn State University. It was kind of doomed from the beginning.
The bus left Washington more than thirty minutes late. I was worried that
maybe Tick would not meet up with me in Blacksburg. I should not have worried,
things were going to get worse. Not really worrying worse, but something worth
telling a story about.
One of my fellow passengers was a young guy, maybe in his mid twenties who had been a driver for Greyhound in the past. He said that there must be something wrong with the compressor because the air conditioning was playing up. He was right. Coming in to Dulles airport outside of Washington the heat began to rise.
Dulles was the scene of some strange activity. I looked out of the window to see three guys wave some sort of pass at the drive and then get on board the bus. They didn't look like passengers, they had no baggage. They walked straight to the back of the bus and checked the toilet. Then they began to talk to some of the passengers. I looked at them trying to figure out what was going on. They must have noticed my curiosity because one of them walked up at me, waved some badge at me for maybe half a second and then asked a really stupid question. "Do you mind if I ask you a few questions sir?"
Now here I was thinking this could be a lot of fun but I decided to answer in the affirmative. I had seen what had happened in Phoenix to a guy who declined a 'random' security check. So I said "Sure, go ahead."
So he asked his next stupid question. "Are you carrying any drugs or illegal substances with you?"
I was thinking how dumb was this. I mean I wasn't, as I don't use drugs, but how many answers to this question were there? Which druggie in his right mind was going to say yes? I of course said no. The guy looked at me and probably figured I was a bemused and harmless Australian and went off to question another passenger. I watched in amazement thinking this was really poor security, and that these young cops had to be trainees or rent a cops from the airport. They naturally had no success at finding anyone with drugs and got off the bus.
We pulled out of Dulles heading south west. I chatted with my passengers about the strange incident. We had to agree that with it being just a few days before the anniversary of September 11 that security was being beefed up here. One guy said he had been talking in English to a fellow passenger when a cop asked if he could ask him questions. He had answered yes then the cop began to speak to him in Spanish. Neither he or the cop looked even slightly Mexican. It was a bit surreal. Another passenger suggested that perhaps they were looking for something else than drugs.
The
heat soared as we drove west then south west. The driver stopped the bus beside
the highway to climb up on the seats and open the roof vents. We knew the
bus was in trouble as the air con dropped out all together. My fellow traveler
who had been a bus driver said that if the the air con had gone there would
be a chance the bus would loose pressure for the breaks. If that happened
we would not be going anywhere. The bus made it as far as Greenville before
it broke down for good. The drivers went to call for another bus while the
rest of us grabbed a bite to eat and considered the situation.
I did not worry too much. The weather was quite agreeable and it wasn't like we were in the middle of nowhere. Food and drink were close by. Eventually another bus would come along. Some day. So we all sat down in the shade and got chatting. I began to get to know my passengers well and got chatting with a guy from New York who was heading south to stay with relatives. He was a truck driver and was keen to buy his own rig some day. Those big trucks cost a fortune in America, far more than what we pay for them in Australia. We chatted with the former bus driver who was trying to make out with a girl from England, the other broad accent in this mob of strangers.
I
talked truck driving with the guy from New York and the former bus driver.
I had driven big twenty two wheelers up from Melbourne to Sydney on week ends
to help raise money for my trip. My new found friend was amazed at the big
road trains we have in Australia. He wondered how we backed them up. I guessed
nobody ever did. They would drive into transport depots where there was plenty
of room and no need for backing up.
We sat in the heat under an awning by Arbys in Greenville for four hours till a replacement bus from Richmond made it into town. We got a move on down the road again. I wasn't too inconvenienced, I had rung Tick from a payphone to let him know of the delay. Others had rang relatives back in Washington to come pick them up and return to where they came from. Others would miss their connection. I had a feeling their tickets were non refundable either.
I finally made it into Blacksburg at night and rang Tick. I was picked up, went to his place, settled in then went out to dinner at a theme restaurant, not sure which, but the food was okay and not too expensive. I was glad to fall to sleep that night. It had taken thirteen hours to get from Washington to Blacksburg.
Day 21
The college tunnels at Virginia Tech were hot, damn hot. But like those at Penn State they were well worth the visit. One of the things that struck me about these tunnels was the extraordinarily large amount of tags left by previous explorers. There were heaps of them. These had to have been some of the most visited college tunnels in the United States. There were tags from individuals and groups. Things like the Ninja Turtles and others.
I think the part of the tunnels I liked best was the miniature lake and underground waterfall. I kid you not. There was an underground waterfall. We had to climb down a ladder under it and then climb back up later.
Then, there was the live steam vent. Tick casually mentioned it as we were approaching it. It was some sort of pressure relief valve that shot out steam every now and then. There was some discussion as to if it would burn you or not. Tick figured the steam coming out would really cool rapidly and would not be hot enough to burn. None of us wanted to try out this theory though. Tick had timed the thing and and said that we would have no problems getting by it. We'd just have to wait for the vent to go off and then run past it while it built up pressure again. The timing was completely random but he mentioned something about it being between seven and forty seconds apart. A seven second window would be enough time to let us run past.
We walked up to the area near the vent. I could see it down the tunnel, belching small clouds of steam. It made a loud noise every time it went off. Tick had said when he first heard it he thought it sounded like a burst of static from a two way radio. I had to agree, that's exactly what it sounded like.
Tick went first, waiting for a burst of steam to clear before he ran past. There was a small pop noise which was so pitiful that Tick had to ask: "What the hell was that?" Before the thing belched a good cloud of steam. Tick wasted no time as he ran down the tunnel then stopped safely past the vent, waiting for the rest of us. I waited quite a while for the next burst of steam. Then I too ran down the tunnel to where Tick was standing and turned around, pointing the video camera at the vent to film the next person in our little group. It was pretty cool to see the thing belch out steam.
Tick showed me a little hidden room in the college tunnels, an ideal hiding spot. The place was like a labyrinth. Hidden rooms, secret passages, live steam vents, underground waterfalls, ladders leading to more levels. It was great! Unlike the PSU tunnels, these ones were lit up so they were great for long distance photos and video.
Eventually after exploring a particularly hot section of the tunnels we got out and walked across campus to another entrance to the tunnels. We entered them again then explored another section. There were pipes down here so hot that they heated up everything else in the tunnel. I was feeling the heat pouring out of my digital camera into me. Any metal surface was hot to the touch. Climbing up one ladder I had to balance so that I could get up without using my hands too much. Really, I have to take up a less adventurous hobby one day. The college tunnels were finally exited and the team split up to go home for a rest.
Day 22
The next day was spent exploring buildings on campus. Tick managed to show me some neat roof tops. One in particular had great views over campus, yet it was highly unlikely that anyone would ever see you up there. I got a cool photo of Tick standing up there, silhouetted against the sky.
Day 23
From Virginia Tech I traveled north again to New York.
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