Train hopping episode 3

Hi there fellow steemit users!
This is episode 3 of the Anarchist Amtrak, here you can find episode 1 & 2

Ep. 3: Cleveland to Lacrosse Wisconsin

So once again I was on my way to a National Rainbow Gathering, and I found myself in Cleveland, Ohio this time. I was heading to Rapid City, SD and once again I decided I was going to use my ability to hop freight trains across the country to get where I needed to go.

I left the squat house and boarded the local city bus to the metro station. I walked over to the local train yard. It was getting way too hot in Cleveland, Ohio and it happened to be the middle of the day in the middle of June, so I decided it was some time for some cold beer. I waited till dark 30 to approach, and just as the night hit, in rolled in an awesome ride: A double-stack container train, known as a hot shot. I began looking for rideable cars and found a perfect one to ride and managed to hop on board immediately before the train took off.

What a "Hot Shot" looks like (Photo Credit)

It took off in the middle of the night and kept going until the brink of dawn. Outside of Chicago, I disembarked the train and went looking for some supplies, food, and other things that I would need on my journey. I then went back to the train-yard and waited for another train, as the one I rode had already left. I ended up catching a junker train, and when it took off in the right direction which I was super happy, as I hadn't known exactly which direction it was going, I just had a general idea.

We got to the Mississippi River "Big Muddy" and started cruising north. The scenery was so amazing and beautiful in the morning with the fog over the Mississippi, a completely unforgettable experience if it weren't for the mosquitoes; they were eating me alive. I rolled through a whole bunch of little towns that I can't ever remember the names of to save my life. I ended up in a train yard where the train got broken up in a gravity yard. For those of you that do not know about train hopping, this is a very terrifying experience. Basically you get un-coupled and they sort the train in this little Barn. The workers uncouple all the train cars and puts them together in a different order. I've never ever gone through something like that and hoped never to because I didn't know that I was being disconnected from the power locomotive. I was asleep when we first went through the gravity yard and that was one of the most rude awakenings I have ever had.

I awoke to being slammed against another train car, almost knocking me unconscious. I was hidden in one of the cars and the workers never saw me, so I didn't immediately get off that train, but all these cars are flying down the hill, a completely terrifying experience trying to dodge million tonne cargo rolling free with the flow of gravity. I ended up finding out that I needed to walk 3 miles to reach the departure yard. I walked to a local gas station to resupply and shake off my terrifying experience with a joint and a beer as nothing better to do that with :-)

The next morning, I hiked all the way up to the departure yard and looked for a train going my direction & I found a perfect one going in the general direction I was wanted. I could tell it was going in the right direction with my GPS, so I was going to ride that train until it was going to terminate its schedule and that's exactly what I did. The next day I was in the town of Lacrosse, Wisconsin. It felt so amazing to be less than 300 miles away from my destination.

It dropped me perfectly on the right Interstate to my destination so I decided I was just going to hitch-hike the rest of the way across Minnesota and that's exactly what I did. Until I got dropped off in a work zone... work zones are notoriously bad for hitch-hiking. I ended up making friends with one of the workers that was driving a dump truck, and he said that he would drive me to Blue Earth, Minnesota when his shift was done. Blue Earth has a free campground with hot showers he told me. The next morning, I woke up and decided to use the hot showers again, because I wasn't going to get a hot shower for a while. After I got out of the shower and got back to my camp and started packing up, the cops showed up. They said that they were looking for someone that ran from them last night, but the guy wasn't there of course. I decided it was time to get out of town and went to the local store, resupplied, and headed to the interstate for some more hitch-hiking.

I ended up catching a ride with a woman that was from the campground I was staying at, who was going to the Badlands in South Dakota. On our way there we got pulled over by the local Highway Patrol. I was freaking out because I had a big bag of weed, but I didn't know that it was medicinal in Minnesota and the crime was decriminalized there, so as the cops were waiting for our plate to run and make sure that it wasn't stolen I ended up stashing the weed... somewhere they would never find it. They ended up writing me a ticket for pot seeds because they found my seed library in my backpack. After they let us go on our way, we stopped at a local gas station where I smoked a bowl in the restroom to decompress and de-stress. My ride was an awesome person, and she thought cannabis should be legal anyway, just like I do. She bought me some fried chicken and some soda and we kept going we ended up in Wall Drug, a tourist trap which ended up having a bus just where I needed to go: Rapid City, South Dakota, so she let me off and continue going on her way.

I was amazed that they had bus service out in the middle of nowhere just for this Wall Drug tourist trap. I didn't realize how expensive food was going to be in South Dakota, it is ridiculously expensive there, so I ended up getting some Arizona Iced Tea and a few beers and waited for my bus to arrive in a couple hours. I cracked a beer and went underneath the interstate overpass in and lit up a fat joint, the perfect way to relax for a few hours while waiting. My bus arrived an hour and a half late, bu I didn't care because I wasn't on a strict schedule .

Once I arrived in Rapid City, I called the family and let them know that I had gotten there safely and that my phone was going to be off for a few weeks and not to worry too much, as I was in good hands: my own. I had directions and GPS coordinants, so I wasn't too worried about where I was going. I caught a ride with one of the locals, who I invited to come up to the Gathering when he got off of work. I was surprised he actually took me up on the offer, and took me to the local ice cream restaurant where we got foot-long hot dogs and ice cream, then he went home and I ended up hitchhiking all the way up to the gathering with a local rock-climbing guide. He was super interested in joining us for a few days, as he was not working that day, so he ended up staying the night, which is really cool because he'd never experienced National Rainbow Gathering. I recommend everyone at least try it for a few days, so the next morning he went home and said that he would be back; I told him that I would probably be working at one of the kitchens and he was welcome to come see me and I'd serve him up some good vegan hippie food.

Instant Soup (Photo Credit)

So, finally at the National Rainbow Gathering, I ended up working for Instant Soup, an amazing kitchen that serves 24 hours a day. I volunteered to work night shifts in the kitchen, serving soup to anyone that needed it for free. Of course I was smoking weed the whole time, as everyone knows a kitchen work better stoned as fuck. I worked there until the end of the Gathering when they shut it down, and cleanup began.

I caught a ride out of the Gathering with a good friend, who took me to Laramie, Wyoming to another one of the kitchen worker's house. We had a whole bunch of kids from the Gathering there, and we ended up invading his house for a few months and providing food and our services in exchange for place to stay. Needless to say it was an amazing experience there. We had steak barbecues as well as amazing vegan food cooke by @kennyskitchen every night, and campfire stories with amazing musicians.

I look forward to sharing all of my experiences with you all. Look for all my free traveling experiences, more coming soon, remember to follow me so you don't miss any.

Next episode is train-hopping from Laramie, Wyoming to San Francisco.

Thanks for taking the time out of your day to read this.
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