by Ray Anderson

Created on: September 14, 2007   Last Updated: November 24, 2008

Being a traveling musician I have had my share of bad road trips in the past. Some bad things are unavoidable and those are the worse road trips , in my opinion. If you plan everything to the smallest detail and have a great itinerary then you can stop many bad experiences, but the inevitable is bound to happen at some point if the road trip is long enough. Car parts wear out, people get to feeling uncomfortable on long rides and not everyone can be pleased all of the time. These are just some of the things that can go wrong.

My last bad road trip was in July. I was touring with two music groups and we were starting in New Orleans, Louisiana and the tour would end in Chicago, Illinois. We had everything down to the finest detail and knew the tour this year would be a total success. The tour started out great and the dates flew by : New Orleans, Jackson , Memphis, Saint Louis and then the trip went sour. The next show was in Indianapolis and I had driven ahead of the other vehicles to see the hotel and get settled in. I had the make-up lady and one of the other guitar players with me when my car broke down. It was a new car so I could not imagine it breaking down.

We got out of the car and looked under the hood. It wasn't smoking and didn't seem to be broken in any way , but it wouldn't start. It was like the battery was dead. We used our cell phones and called the other guys to tell them what had happened and told them about where we were then began the wait for them to arrive to rescue us.

If you have never been to Indianapolis then you have to understand that the highways there are being repaired and you may have to exit five miles before the exit you need, then fight traffic to get where you need to be. If you are not totally familiar with the city then it may take you as many as two hours just to get where you need to be , and it may only be three miles away !

It wasn't long before a road-side aid truck came to save us. He happened to be going the exit we were on and stopped to see if he could figure the problem out for us. He looked under the hood and did a few tests and said that the battery was dead. He said he could give us a jump and maybe that would get us to the hotel. He gave us directions to the hotel and then we began to make the seven mile trip to safety. He had explained to us that we were lucky that he had came along because it was a very bad neighborhood and after dark we may have been robbed or worse.

We got back on the highway and proceeded

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