Life is full of opportunities, and I had my share... Lets look at some...

Date:   3/3/2006 7:10:55 PM ( 18 y ago)

Well back to my Navy days....  Most of the time I was stationed a good distance from my original home, in St Petersburg, FLA....   At first it was Key West , FL then Charleston, SC both of which were about 500 miles away....  

This will be about some of the adventures and happenings while hitch hicking...

The pic is Nov 2005 Kermit (me) in hat between  two nephews Chas 16 on left, and Matt 8 on right; on an island off FLA...  We got there on my brother's boat...

 Have not hitch hiked in some years, but these are some of the things we did:

1) In order to go beyond the 150 miles radius of the Navy Base, we had to put in for an "out of bounds chit..."  {A request to travel beyond the 150 mile limit}  Normally we did not bother, since we know everything when we are young... [It is too bad that we do not think to fix everything then, and life would be so much better later on??]    So one problem that we faced was in going south from Charleston, normally we went through Jax, FL...  There is a lot of Navy there, so if you were caught with out an out of bounds chit, the Shore Patrol or Military police would pick you up, and have you transported back to Base, with some explaining to do before your Commanding Officer...  Usually with some not so nice results...  HUH!!

2) Another time I linked up with an Army soldier over near the Ga - SC border, and soon we were thumbing our way south...  Well as it turned out a Marine Medic {Navy Hospital Corpsman} came along from  Parris Island USMC Recruit Training; Picked us up in his Red Ford Convertible....  We were soon tooling south, in the dark of a Fall night in Dixie...  Well this guy had a lead foot and blinders on because when we got to the Stop Light at US 301, he sailed clean through it at fifty plus MPH, we were airborne for at least twenty five feet, leaving sparks, and car parts along the highway....  That is when my Army buddy spoke up and said..  " Hey let me out of this rolling death trap"  We pulled over the the side of the road; and as he grabbed his bag, he looked at me and said.. "I don't know about you, sailor, but I have jumped out of planes at over five thousand feet, but never experienced such a ride... I am out of here..."   I was in the back seat and I jumped out over the side of that Ford quicker than you could say "Scat" ...  As we watched our Corpsman drive off into the night... We are not sure he ever got where ever he was going...

3) Another time when I, was stationed in Key West, got a ride with another sailor... He had a Plymouth Duster, really a nice car...  Well there were four of us going up to St Pete/ Tampa for the week end...  Yes there was a girl involved, but I will have to tell you about that on a later blog... Something for you to look forward to, HUH!!

We started this 500 mile trip, [BTW it is over 150 miles from Key west to the Homestead area...] Most of that way is dark, as we were driving through the Everglades...  Mostly two lane roads, with large ditches on the sides... This keeps the water off the roads... But it is a bad place to land if you run off the road, epically in the dark... {BTW Snakes, alligators, spiders, panthers, bears, and several other animals live in this region}  On this particular night, we were stopped by; emergency crews, pulling a flat bed Semi out of one of these large ditches... Traffic was stopped for about a mile, we got out and I ask how they knew where to look for the truck driver...  They said the driver had apparently fell a sleep at the wheel, and it was only because of the skid marks on the road that they were able to locate the truck...  The driver was dead, had several snake bites...  Sad but true.. 

4) Another time we were coming back down toward Key West, and off on the side of the road we saw several men, having target practice with submachine guns...  Cuban Gorillas, we presume, as groups like Alpha 66 were known to practice in the glades...  You learned to keep your head down, don't ask any questions, and say you saw nothing...  This was a rough time, and some of this activity lead to the assassination of JFK...  More on that later, stay tuned for that blog info, soon....      

  There are a couple of stories I have related on some of these happening and hitch hiking events....  I'll bet some of you thought I made this all up, HUH!!   There are more, but that is another day...  Have to get back with you, so check back and read of my adventures....  Stay tuned for unusual stuff....   

see Ya... Real soon.... K

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