Bug Smacker

Sleeping with Truckers

Tim R. Enright

After the sun sets following a long full day of driving on the open road, there may come a time when the only choice you have is to find a spot to pull over and sleep with a trucker. Nothing personal about truckers but they wouldn’t be my first choice to sleep with. They don’t stick around very long and tend to be quite noisy when they leave. But then again it is free to sleep with them and you don’t need to make any reservations.

By far the most difficult part of spending the night between two truckers is the noise. Not just the coming and going at all hours of the night but the noise they make just sitting there. Some places post signs telling them to shut off their engines but I have found very few of them that are willing to do so. The worst of the bunch are the refrigerator guys. Those guys keep their motors revving up and down, up and down, up and down. And they do it all night long.

These days you can’t just sleep anywhere you want to. There are rules and local laws to govern this type of activity. Some of the safest places are the ones that the truckers know of. They have been doing this for a long time and generally know how to do it right.

Rest Areas are the most common places that come to mind. These are by no means the only place where you could end up sleeping with them. Other places include: Service Plazas, Mall Parking Lots, Department Stores and Municipal Parking Lots.

Some rest areas have segregated overnight parking for Truckers and RVers. These places are actually not bad places to stop at. The RV parking spots may even come with electricity hookups. We have found some places that provide you with restrooms and showers as well.

Other rest areas offer nothing more than a place to put your rig in park. Some even go as far as to discourage overnight parking of any kind. I have seen these warnings ignored and have often wondered if I would get my rig towed while I was in the back of my fifth wheel sleeping. That would be a real eye opener.

When you’re on a long road trip sometimes you just don’t know how far you can travel in a day. That makes it somewhat difficult to schedule places to park your rig for the night. It only makes sense that you need to pull into a place to get some rest for a while. Weather it is at a Wal-Mart, Mall or a Rest Area sometimes you have no other choice than to sleep with a trucker.

Article Courtesy of : www.BugSmacker.com : Copyright © 2010

I can’t go any further. Our 10 hour trip is now pushing 15 hours. With the stop and go traffic due to accidents and construction this has turned into a VERY long day.

We did stop for a bit to grab a bite to eat. I certainly don’t have any regrets there. The place we ate at was Sonny’s Real Pit Bar-B-Q. We had heard a lot of good things about this place and wanted to give it a try next time we saw one. I didn’t realize that the place we happened to choose was also in the place it all started, Gainesville, Florida.

I did not know what to try when we arrived. The waitress suggested the all-you-can-eat BBQ. She said I could try all the favorites that way. That is exactly what I did. The all-you-can-eat included Sliced Pork, Bar-B-Q Sliced Beef, Sweet & Smokey Ribs, Bar-B-Q Chicken, Pulled Beef Brisket and Pulled Pork. My wife ordered the Baby Back Ribs. Between the two of us we tried all the best BBQ Sonny’s had to offer and let me tell you it was exceptional.

Can you believe it, the all-you-can-eat Bar-B-Q is only $12 dollars. Thats less than a rack of ribs anywhere else.