The Southern East Coast: Tales from I-95
- Aaron Schorr
- Jan 7, 2021
- 13 min read
Updated: Jan 18, 2021
A brief introduction to our road trip: Jake and I had planned a trip from Washington, D.C., to the Grand Canyon with a few other friends from college. Jake had agreed to supply us with his car, as long as someone was willing to drive it up from Florida with him.
We set off bright and early the next morning to pick up a passenger. Shervin was a classmate of ours, the son of Zoroastrian immigrants from Iran living in San Diego. He was in Miami for New Years , staying with a friend from the Yale tennis team, and wanted to tag along to D.C. The parents, who lived in a house they had just sold for $58 million in Indian Creek, didn’t want the kids staying with them and posing a COVID risk, so they put them in their “second guest house” in Surfside. The friend greeted us in his underwear, we said hello to Shervin, and were off. Shervin was severely hung over and promptly fell asleep in the back seat as we headed north along I-95.
Day 1: Miami, FL, to Savannah, GA
South Florida was an endless expanse of urban area, from Miami through Fort Lauderdale to Palm Beach. It was also hideous, a vast and dizzying grid of highways, industrial zones, and golf courses. So many golf courses. Over the course of 15 miles between Fort Lauderdale and Palm Beach, I counted ten, including the famous PGA course. The other thing that made the surroundings so hellish was the complete absence of terrain features in the entirely flat marshland (read: swamp), other than the occasional landfill.
Our first stop was Cape Canaveral, where I was very excited to spot the iconic Vehicle Assembly building in the distance. We passed the Police Hall of Fame and Shooting Range, which we concurred was liable to get us all canceled at school. Admission to the NASA visitor center, however, was going to cost us $57 per person, so we made a hard u-turn at the gate and I vowed to come back with more time to spend. Trying to reach SpaceX Mission Control, we contined driving east along NASA Parkway until we arrived at a large gate and were told we had to turn back. A woman keeping her hand awfully close to her gun walked out of the guard booth and escorted us as we made our u-turn and headed back to the mainland.
We continued north to Daytona Beach to charge the car. The charging station was across the street from the Daytona Speedway, perhaps the most famous NASCAR racetrack. We crossed the five-lane road and acres of concrete before reaching a fence. There were push bars to open the gates with wide gaps at the edges, and my arm was just thin and long enough to fit in the gap and push one open from the inside. We climbed up a staircase and found ourselves standing on the largest bleachers I’ve ever seen, with rows of multicolored seats streching a kilometer end to end. The racetrack was so big we could hardly see the end of it. There were pickup trucks towing wagons full of tourists in the center of the track, so we had to duck into the shadows every time one passed near us.
We were seeing Christian billboards demanding our repentance every few miles, so we decided to call 83-FOR-TRUTH to see if our souls couls still be saved. Shervin said he was a Jew from Alabama and was thinking of converting to Christianity. The problem was that he was living a life of son, as he was married to his sister, and he had been taught in Jewish school that Jesus was the devil. The man on the other line patiently explained that he still had deliverance, as long as he repented and accepted Jesus as his savior. Things got more complicated when Shervin said he was also considering Islam and was cheating on his wife with his cousin Candy, but our would-be savior was relentless. When Candy was revealed to be a man, our conversation partner finally cracked and asked if we were being “less than truthful” but still invited us to accept the teachings of Jesus Christ. All in all, not a bad way to pass the time in a traffic jam.
60 miles more brought us to St Augustine, purportedly the site of the oldest continuously-inhabited European settlement in America. The Spanish first established a trading post here in 1565 to dislodge French Huguenots who had settled further north in an attempt to usurp the Spanish claim to Florida. After some sparring between the two, the Spanish erected the Castillo de San Marcos to defend the town’s natural harbour in 1672 and a town sprung up around it. It was this town that was causing the traffic jam, as evidently everyone in Florida had had the same idea to visit St Augustine on New Years weekend.
Driving into town had a very different feeling than southern Florida. There were lots of used car lots, side streets weren’t paved, and we saw more than one trailer park. This was a phenomenon that Jake characterized as “cultural inversion”, since “the further north you go in Florida, the further south you come”. South Florida is not really part of the South, its largest groups of inhabitants being Caribbean and Venezuelan immigrants and retired Jews, but this definitely started to feel like redneck country. My favorite moment was when we passed the Islamic Center of St Augustine, immediately followed by a virtually identical structure in a dirt lot called the Freedom Church.
The old town of St Augustine was an absolute mess. Granted, the Castillo was impressive, but the line to enter looked several hours long so we made our peace with walking around the moat. There were hundreds of families milling about, clogging the narrow streets which looked rather like the historical center of a European city, with cobblestones, statues, and cute shops. The problem was that so much of it was simply tacky, with Olde English fonts and weird architectural blends that didn’t make sense. The worst offender was Flagler University, which had a campus that was supposed to be built in Spanish style, but the architect had probably never been to Spain and tried to mix in elements from several other styles, including Chinese pagodas. We found a thrift store and bought two Morgan Stanley hats for $2 which rather completed Shervin’s obnoxiously preppy look.
We headed out of town to find a charging station, which ended up being in one of the largest strip malls I have ever seen. We parked the car on one side of it, but wanted to eat a BBQ restaurant on the other side, which would have been nearly a mile’s walk. Fortunately, we found a passage through the mall, albeit one that made us go through the delivery area which was the size of a mall on its own. The restaurant made it clear that we were in the South, both due to the waitresses’ accents and the size of the portions. The five TVs playing five different channels (including one which seemed to just be a nonstop advertisement for prostate medication) didn’t help, either.
We walked back around the mall and into Claire’s, since Shervin wanted to prank his girlfriend that he had gotten his ears pierced. Jake had gone back to the car and the clerk saw Shervin and me browsing magnetic earrings. Judging by the number of times she called Shervin “honey”, she definitely thought we were a gay couple, which might be somewhat unpopular in these parts. We drove away before we could find out.
The sun went down and the route took us around Jacksonville, through more suburban monotony. Suddenly, we came to a massive bridge across a river. This was the Dames Point Bridge, a 1,300-foot bridge across the St Johns River, one of the largest cable-stayed bridges in the U.S. Below us was the surprisingly large Port of Jacksonville, a vast expanse of shipping containers. The combination of sleek bridge and container port felt more like the east coast of China than that of the U.S.
Approaching the Georgia state line, we played Cee Lo Green’s “Fuck You” as loud as it would go in the car. Jake hates his home state and I was glad to be rid of it, as well. Highway driving at night in Georgia was less than exciting, though. We had to stop and charge in Brunswick, 40 miles in. Apparently, the city has a charming old town, but the part we were in was just strip malls and chain hotels. We had been passing branches of Waffle House at practically every exit since Daytona and the other two were ogling them. Fortunately for them, there was a branch right across the street from the charging station. The place was downright grimy, even for a diner, but they said the waffles were amazing (and I thought the waitresses’ accents were, too) so I bore with it. The building had a ladder to the roof, so naturally the other two climbed it on the way to the car.
We still had another 80 miles to go, and they were absolutely mind-numbing. The highway was pitch black and virtually a straight line the whole way, like driving through ink. The one good part was the highway safety signs by the Georgia Department of Transportation: “Y’all don’t litter / that’s it / just don’t litter”.
We finally made it to Savannah and checked in to our hotel. To save money, the hotel wasn’t actually in Savannah, but rather near the airport and just off I-95. The receptionist wasn’t wearing a mask, the elevator and room smelled suspicious, but at this point we would sleep anywhere. No sleep yet, though. We begrudgingly returned to the car and headed downtown, where Shervin renounced the driver’s seat and it became apparent I was the only one who could parallel park.
Downtown Savannah was actually very cute and distinctly Southern. The whole district was constructed around squares that also functioned as traffic circles, we passed a beef jerky museum, and there were Prohibition murals on the walls. We got pizza and sat in one of the pedestrian shopping streets as a drag queen began her performance behind us. She and a man who was watching had a dance-off to the tune of “WAP”, which was perhaps not the most appetizing sight to which to eat.
We continued to the waterfront, which was all cobblestoned and decked out in Christmas lights. Shervin agreed to sit on a jet of water in a decorative fountain in front of a hotel for $20, then spent the rest of the evening complaining how cold he was. There was a beautiful steamship docked on the river which we tried to board but were shooed away by a crew member. It was time to end this very intense first day.
Day 2: Savannah, GA, to Norfolk, VA
The next morning, we got breakfast bags from the hotel, whose only COVID safety measure implemented was to not have breakfast. We crossed the highway and charged the car at a parking lot at the Savannah airport, having breakfast on the hood. It was not exactly the most glamorous way to start the day, but at least we got a view of the Gulfstream aircraft factory at the edge of the airport. We crossed the South Carolina state line after a few miles and there could be no more doubt that we were in the Southeast. There were huge numbers of billboards along the highway, all with one of three designs: 1) Say no to socialism - TRUMP 2020. 2) Very dramatic Christian proselytizing, such as “REPENT NOW”. 3) Ads for a place called South of the Border (more on that later).
The next charging stop and breakfast were in Santee, SC, home of another Waffle House. The restaurant staff seemed incapable of actually making waffles, as most of them ended up in the garbage after being torn or burnt. There was a man standing in the entrance with his arms crossed wearing a Kevlar vest emblazoned with “EMS” and a gun hanging from his belt, and we were definitely nervous he was going to open fire at us.
Back on the highway, we made a brief detour into the town of Shiloh. A few miles down very pretty country roads brought us to Woods Bay State Park, which had unique bog scenery in a geological formation called a Carolina bay. The bays are actually thousands of oval shaped craters which vary in size from hundreds of feet to several miles across but are all oriented to the northwest. This bay was flooded and was lush in vegetation with a beautiful reflection across the water. There were big signs warning against alligators, but we sadly did not come across any, even though Jake almost fell into the water which we had dubbed “Gatorade".
Back on the interstate, the signs for South of the Border became more and more frequent until they were appearing several times a mile. The place got its name by being in Fort Pedro, just south of the North-South Carolina state line, which we quickly dubbed “the DMZ”. The place was essentially a tremendous roadside Mexican theme park, with a sombrero tower several hundred feet tall, several Mexican restaurants and shops, and faded I-66 style signs galore. The main shop was the size of a large supermarket. and sold more tacky souvenirs, clothing, and even furniture than I had even considered possible.
We crossed the DMZ and continued north to make a charging stop in Lumberton, NC. Shervin stayed with the car to make phone calls while Jake and I tried to find entertainment in the mall. It being a Sunday, that amounted to a Burkes Outlet store where we bought Shervin a ridiculous t-shirt. Jake received a notification from the car saying that the alarm was going off, so we returned to discover that it was Shervin who had set it off, as well as another parked Tesla by hitting it with a tennis ball he was hitting around.
We had to go on a significant detour, including some off-road shortcuts, since a truck had fallen off the highway, but we finally made it to Fayetteville, NC. We all put on magnetic earrings and walked into a BBQ joint that looked like a shrine to the armed forces and the institute of police, with military and police mementos and insignia covering every available surface. The fascist aesthetic was strong, but the food lived up to the North Carolina hype, even if I later discovered it was a chain.
Shervin took a wring turn and drove us into Fort Bragg, where we were turned away by some very stern guards. The sun was going down and we still had a while to go, but we had to make another charging stop in Rocky Mount, NC. This supercharger was located in an even more horrible strip mall than the previous ones, and the fact that it was dark and cold wasn’t helping, either. 28 hours previously, it had been 82˚ in St Augustine, and now the temperature was in the 50s. The current at this charging station was shared between all the charging vehicles, so we cheered every time a car left, gradually boosting our charging to normal levels. We went for a walk among the chain hotels and parking lots, tried (and failed) to enter a Best Western that was under construction, discovered the grass was actually installed in squares with manure, and I fell into a very cold puddle. I hated Rocky Mount with a passion.
Two more hours of night driving finally brought us to the outskirts of Norfolk, VA, after a bridge-tunnel crossing of the Elizabeth River. We drove to a commercial center called Janaf right out of town to charge again, and discovered that almost everything was closed due to it being Sunday evening. After dismissing the idea of dinner at Hooters, we found a place to burn 30 minutes as the car was charging and checked into our hotel downtown.
I had drank a beer, an act for which I was repeatedly being called an alcoholic, so Shervin drove us to town. Shockingly, he made a wrong turn which carried us all the way across the river. As we tried to find our way back, we stumbled upon a locomotive at a siding. We climbed on it and took pictures, making our hands look like coal miners’ in the process. We made it back over the bridge and looked for dinner. Unbeknowst to us, Virginia had a 9 p.m. restaurant curfew, so at 9:30 the only options we had were fast food drive-thrus. It was not a great way to end the day.
Day 3: Norfolk, VA, to Washington, D.C.
We slept through our alarms the next morning, but finally set off after a breakfast of microwave oatmeal and orange juice that tasted like jet fuel (these were becoming a theme). We quickly reached the Chesapeake Bay Bridge-Tunnel, which was a highly impressive combination of three bridges and two tunnels over the Chesapeake Bay, totalling 14 miles end-to-end. The ocean views were great, especially after many hundreds of miles of straight highways, but the skies on the Eastern Shore were grey and imposing. We drove up the Delmarva Peninsula on US-13 until we reached Salisbury, MD, where we had lunch with Patrick and Brian, twins from our year. It was cold and gray and any remnants of the color green had disappeared by now as we pushed further north, so I was happy we would be driving back south the following day.
Jake was missing Delaware to check every East Coast state off his list, so we continued north to the town of Laurel, DE. We pulled into the creatively named burger shop Smash and Dash and got ice cream as we watched the traffic on US-13. This part of Delaware was anything but attractive, and in fact in the hour or so we spent in the state we saw a solitary pedestrian and not a single aesthetically pleasing building. The town slogans were great, however: “Laurel: If you lived here, you’d be home already!” Facts.
We stopped to charge in Kent Narrows, MD, by far the most attractive charging stop we had visited yet. We were on an island in the Chesapeake Bay and went walking on the beach as we waited for the car to charge. The sky and sea were both a flat gray and it looked more like Connecticut than Maryland, but it was a very different kind of scenery than what we had been seeing until know.
We drove back across the Chesapeake, through Annapolis, and into DC. We checked into a hotel in Dupont Circle, but Shervin and Jake had phone calls to make, so I took the opportunity to drive out to Kemp Mill to deliver some things to my grandfather’s assistant. This was truly a trip down memory lane for me, as I used to live and spend my summers there and hadn’t been back in six years. It was strange to be driving a Tesla alone in the landscapes of my childhood and it looked very different from my memories in winter. This was also the furthest point north I would reach on this trip, which was slightly ironic since it was essentially the southern end of my previous East Coast life, which was heavily centered on the DC-New York stretch of I-95.
Back in the city after braving the suburban traffic, we met up with Akeel, the next member of our trip. Akeel was a fellow international student from Colombo, Sri Lanka, and I would be living with him next semester. We wanted to head downtown so we split up to get 4 Lime scooters, but Akeel's and Shervin’s died and we decided to double up on them. We cruised down Connecticut Avenue at precisely 9.5 mph, trying to balance precariously until we reached the White House. The entire area was cordoned off and the scooter Akeel and I were on died, so we ditched it outside Decatur House and walked down to the Washington monument. The entire area was cordoned off by police and the park just south of the White House, which I discovered was called the President’s Park, was full of construction vehicles preparing for the Trump rally happening the following day, obscuring the views of the White House from the south.
After visiting the Monument and the World War II memorial and getting a look at the Lincoln Memorial, we hopped into a Lyft and headed north to Adams-Morgan to have dinner at an Ethiopian place that was recommended to us by a DC native. Shervin had had his trepidations about the place (“Ethiopian food is just air”), but we all agreed it was delicious even if we had to eat outside in 40˚ weather. We walked back through streets that were plastered with “Trump lost! Fascists get out!” posters and had an early night.
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