Back Behind the Wheel, With the Highway Fuzz Hot on My Tail

Sometimes the world is a wondrous place, filled with mystery and magic. Need proof? Try this on for size:

As I was juuuust preparing to write this blog about our recent road trip to Atlantic City – our first car vacation in nearly seven years – I opened the mailbox to find a letter from the New Jersey Transportation Authority, sending us warm greetings about that very road trip.

Quite a coincidence, no? The stars were aligned!

That’s not even the best part, either. The Transportation Authority wanted to pay us $50 for using the Atlantic City Expressway, maybe as a way of thanking us for traversing the state’s highways and byways and spending our money along the way. Well, needless to say, this was an unexpectedly pleasant surprise.

How kind of them, I said to myself – sending us money just for road trippin’. How gracious! How neighborly and generous! How….how….huh? Wha?

Whazzis?

Oh.

It wasn’t a payment to us. It was a $50 ticket from the Great State of New Jersey (plus an additional $1.40) for not paying one of their tolls on the drive to Atlantic City.

I remember that toll. We couldn’t find the cash-only payment booth. They all appeared to be EZ Pass booths. EZ Pass is the pre-paid program that gives you a small electronic transponder that attaches to the inside of your windshield so you can zip through the EZ pass tolls. For us newbs who don’t have EZ Pass, you have to hunt down the cash-only booths and veer toward them without being slammed by speeding EZ Pass vehicles rushing to get through.

Only I did not see a cash-only booth at this particular toll. I looked, believe me. So I drove through the EZ Pass lane, and immediately told my wife, “Well, we’ll be getting a ticket in a couple weeks.”

And sure enough, a ticket we got. They have cameras at the toll booths to record the license plates of all the hardened criminals who drive through their precious tolls without paying. I figured it would be about 20 or 25 bucks. But nah. It was $50 – correct that: $51.40. We also had to pay the $1.40 toll.

Because New Jersey is going to get paid.

Since moving here nine months ago, I have gotten a ticket for parking in front of our house overnight. I got another ticket for not shoveling snow from the sidewalk in front of our house. I didn’t realize those rules existed, because nobody in New Jersey bothered to tell us. But hey, no problem – New Jersey needs the money. Because even though it has some of the highest tax rates in the country, there’s always room to hit up its fine citizens for a little more.

I’m not sure what they do with all that tax and ticket money. They sure as shit don’t spend it on road, highway and sidewalk maintenance – because many of those are falling apart. My guess is that a lot of that money helps fund Caribbean vacation homes for the folks in charge, because in addition to being one of the highest tax states in the country, New Jersey is also one of the most corrupt at the government level. It’s also one of the richest, and most educated. Go figure.

Well, I paid the ticket. And I hope the New Jersey Transportation Authority puts the money to good use….folding it into halves and shoving it up their collective ass.

*****

One of the things I missed most during our five-and-a-half years living in London was road trips by car. We did not ship our cars over to the UK when we moved there in early 2018. I never got a UK driver’s license, and never once operated a motor vehicle while living there. I just wasn’t sure how well I would adapt to driving on the left side of the road after more than 40 years driving on the right side in America. And anyway you didn’t need a car. We got around on trains, tubes, buses, cabs, Ubers, bikes, and feet.

We took a whole lot of vacations around Europe, all either by train or plane. This meant we spent a lot of time hustling to make sure we made it in time, before the departure gates closed. More than once I found myself longing for the freedom of a driving vacation, when you can leave at your leisure, without being married to a schedule.

I don’t often get excited about vacations anymore, not like I used to. There’s just a lot to keep up with on vacation, and it can sap your energy, and I’m getting older. But I really, REALLY looked forward to this two-night road trip to Atlantic City, during our daughters’ Spring Break from school.

For the first time since August 2017, we were driving to our destination instead of flying or taking the train. We could leave on our own schedule. We were not trapped inside a plane or train with a bunch of strangers. It was just the four of us, in a car, with plenty of leg room. We could pull over and grab a snack, use the bathroom, stretch our legs, breathe the fresh air. We could drive straight to the hotel without having to catch a cab from the airport or train station.

In the old days, when I was a younger lad, it was not uncommon for me to drive hundreds of miles at a stretch, 12 hours running. I made cross-country drives in four days and three nights, east coast to west coast, roughly 3,000 miles of ever-changing U.S. terrain. Those are special memories, and the kind of experience everyone should try at least once, no matter where you live.

Atlantic City was a simple two-hour drive, about 100ish miles from where we live. I figured the traffic would be heavy on the Garden State Parkway, but it wasn’t. Pretty free and clear. It was everything I remembered it to be, the freedom of the highway. I loved doing it again.

*****

Did we love Atlantic City? Well, we liked it well enough. This was my second trip there. My wife and I took a vacation there in 2006 or 2007, when we still lived in New York City and before we had kids.

You’ve probably heard of Atlantic City. It’s one of those places that punches well above its weight in terms of pop culture significance. Jersey native Bruce Springsteen wrote a song about it. The Drifters sang about it. Burt Lancaster and Susan Sarandon starred in a movie about it in the 1980s. TV shows have been devoted to it, including “Boardwalk Empire,” a Netflix series that ran last decade.

Atlantic City is a combination beach/gambling town located in south Jersey, closer to Philadelphia than Manhattan. It’s a very old-school place whose heyday has long since passed, but which still tries to put up a good fight. AC used to be best known for hosting the Miss America pageant, and the fabulous old art-deco building where it took place is still around. I have no idea if the pageant is still around, and don’t care. AC also was well known for being a favorite haunt of East Coast mobsters, but I’m not sure if any of them are still around.

A few high-rise casino/hotels still line the beachfront. Atlantic City’s famous old boardwalk has not changed much over the years. You’ll find the usual tattered collection of hot dog/pizza/cheesesteak eateries, arcades, palm reading establishments, candy and taffy stores, and about 4,000 cheap souvenir shops. It’s a gritty place, weathered and worn by the years, with a million secrets buried deep below the ground.

We stayed at the Bally’s hotel/casino, which had a couple excellent restaurants but has otherwise fallen into disrepair. The carpets are stained and frayed, the drapes are torn, some of the rooms don’t have proper locks. Our hotel rooms were located above a nightclub that howled its loud, thumping, tedious, shitastic music until 2 a.m., right in our ears. On a scale of 0 to 10, I give Bally’s Atlantic City a negative-4.

But Atlantic City has its charms. It represents an American yesteryear, stubbornly wedded to the past in ways that Las Vegas – its former gambling rival – is not. Vegas long ago pulled away from Atlantic City as a gambling/tourist destination. The race is not even close anymore. It’s like comparing Mount Everest to that hill behind your house. While Vegas is always bustling with energy and seems to add a new high rise and upscale mall every minute, much of AC is just tired, worn out, and boarded up.

But Atlantic City has an ocean to look at, and Vegas doesn’t. Our youngest daughter found some cool seashells during a sunny, windy, and chilly couple of days.

Did I gamble?

A little.

Did I lose?

Yes.

As a family of four, we usually travel to places with some kind of historical and cultural significance, where we drag the girls to art museums and ancient historical sites. But sometimes you just wanna have mindless, brainless, decadent fun. Even if it’s just playing Down the Clown in an old arcade.

******

After leaving AC we stopped briefly in the charming, historic little town of Smithville, New Jersey, which looks like it just beamed in from the late 19^th century. It had some excellent artisan shops and a fun little choo-choo train. No chain stores, no chain restaurants, no large crowds or loud noise. We hung around there a few hours, then hit the road again….

….in a car, down the open highway, with no boarding passes or timetable in sight. It was a beautiful thing, toll booth ticket be damned.  

Note: The collage includes a photo from the backseat taken by Eldest Daughter, and a couple photos of Atlantic City, in all its gritty glory. Black-and-white seemed to best fit the general vibe in AC.