After a night of very stormy weather, and many tornado warnings in most of the areas we have been over the last 2 weeks, we set off from Louisville in sunshine although with a definite dip in temperature. We had booked a motel room for the night in Lafayette…although when I typed the address into the sat nav I discovered I’d actually booked it for Lafayette, Louisiana rather than Indiana!! A quick WiFi hook up and the problem was soon sorted and off we went.

Things were going smoothly until we reached Colombus. There was some construction work happening in the central reservation of the Interstate and all the trucks were using the left lane. We were driving on the right, doing the speed limit of 60, and keeping pace with the surrounding traffic. At the end of the construction work a sign instructed the lorries to move to the right again and unfortunately one driver decided to pull over at the same time as he indicated rather than wait and give time for anyone in his blind spot (ie me!) to have time to pull back or go ahead. The next few seconds are a bit of a blur, but he hit us and we skidded into the crash barrier at the edge of the carriageway, bounced off it and back into his lorry. Thankfully neither of us were injured, apart from a cut finger, ĺ

The driver of the lorry got out and initially tried to say I was deliberately undertaking him. He wanted photos of my drivers license and insurance, but not being sure of procedures over here I asked him to call 911 and get some police assistance. Within about 10 minutes of being called a lovely officer called Chris was with us. He listened to our side of what had happened, took all my documents then talked to the truck driver. I have no idea what was said, but after half an hour or so the driver was off having been told by Chris he did not need a picture of my license or any of my details, and we were waiting with Chris for a tow truck. He was incredible, he arranged everything so that we would be able to continue our journey, filled in whatever reports he needed to do, made sure I had all the report numbers, his details, the department phone number etc so if we needed any more help we could get hold of him. He drove us in his patrol car to the nearest car hire place, which thankfully was an Avis desk, which is where our car had come from, and stayed with us until he knew we had a vehicle. At one point it looked like we might have to get to Indianapolis to pick a car up, and even though he only had an hour of his shift left, he told us he would drive us there if he had to. Despite Mum being naturally upset and in shock, I was somehow much calmer and able to deal with everything to get us back in the road, I think she was quite taken with Officer Chris!! She managed to sneak several hugs out of him and a roadside selfie 😂 On the way to the rental desk he asked me if I have children and when I said I do, he gave me a police patch. Apparently kids over here often collect them so officers offer carry them to hand over. Needless to say Mum has commandeered that as a souvenir!

We took a bit of break before starting off again in our new Chrysler minivan and decided that neither of us really wanted to finish the drive then have to do it again on Wednesday just to get to Chicago so we cancelled our Lafayette motel and booked another night in the Chicago hotel we were already heading to on Wednesday. Officer Chris had come pack and seen our new car had not yet moved so he was waiting by it for us to make sure we were alright!

It was a very long and tiring drive. We made a coffee stop and then the sat nav unfortunately didn’t recognise the address we were meant to be going to so took us right into downtown Chicago and to the Navy Pier we visited on our first day here, through road works and rush hour traffic. By the time we made it to the hotel we were both exhausted and ready for some food, a hot shower and bed! Thankfully the hotel has a number of places who deliver to your room so we didn’t need to go out again. Ideal after we had set out at about 11am and not arrived here until nearly 8pm, plus crossed another time zone which jumped us back another hour…I am so confused about time right now, I have absolutely no idea how long we were on the road yesterday.

I don’t think Mum slept too well, but I slept like a log until the coldness of our room woke me early this morning. We are spending today watching movies, eating M&M’s and popcorn and getting sorted ready to come home tomorrow. I’m also hoping that I have done everything I need to in regards to the car. What a 24 hours. This morning we are a little achy, the tops of my arms and shoulders especially, I think from where I braced against the steering wheel then was obviously a lot more tense that I realised for the rest of the drive, but I think we’re OK. I’m very sad about poor Miss Maybelle, the minivan is nowhere near as much fun to drive.

I guess this will be my last blog entry, but I’ll get Mum to do a final overview of the whole trip when we are at O’Hare airport tomorrow. I’m sure this won’t be last visit to the USA, but for now, it’s have a great day from me. H xx