Here you go.
It was the late 60's. Well that explains everything doesn’t it?
At the time I was working for a consulting engineer who was building the extension to Hwy 403. This was on the stretch of the highway that goes up the escarpment in Hamilton and continues into Ancaster. I'm sure many of you have driven it.
The field office I worked out of was in Hamilton and at the time I lived in Ancaster. As soon as the final grade was built I started using the highway as a very quick shortcut home. It was great, no other traffic and no speed limit.
I would blast up the escarpment (we called it the mountain) get to Fiddlers Green Road and simply drive up an embankment and there I was, only about 5 minutes away from my house.
Well on the day in question I got to the road and saw that they had sodded the side slopes. Not willing to drive back down into Hamilton and fight the rush hour traffic I decided to drive up the slope.
I drive into the ditch and the front two tires sink into the newly placed topsoil.
I try to back out, the back wheels spin on the gravel and I just sit there. That’s when I get my great idea. I’ll take my ice scraper out of the trunk and use it to jam the gas pedal down while the wheels are spinning. Then I’ll simply open the door, push the car out of the ditch, jump back in, kick the ice scraper off the gas pedal and go on my merry way.
As you can guess my idea didn’t quite go as planned.
I did jam the gas pedal, did push the car, that’s when the plan changed.
The car shot off in reverse, and the driver’s door knocked me to the ground. On the way down I grabbed the arm rest and hung on. Picture this; the car is now driving backwards in a circle with me hanging off the door being pulled across the gravel. I couldn’t let go as the front left wheel would have driven over me. I think the car circled twice before it came to rest, and stalled, right back in the same ditch.
I can still remember jumping up and making nobody had seen this little adventure. Luckily this time I managed to drive out of the ditch.
About 5 minutes later I had to stop the car because my hands were shaking so badly. All in all I was pretty lucky. I ruined my jeans and t-shirt and lost some skin, it could have been much worse.
Now lets move forward another year. It’s the same highway, same car, but is still not open to the public. Paving was wrapping up, side slopes were being sodded, and guide rail was being installed.
A Saturday night found me driving eastbound on the westbound lanes, the logical thing to do as the eastbound lanes down to Hamilton hadn’t been paved yet. On my left was a very steep slope with no protection at all as the guide rail had yet to be installed.
The car was a ’66 Chevy Nova and at the time I was doing about 100+ mph, all the windows down, radio blaring and not a care in the world. Then I saw what was ahead.
Kids had taken the guide rail posts, which were 9”x9” blocks of wood about 8’ long and laid them parallel to the edge of the road with about 3’ between each post.
Sort of like this:
I I I I I I I I I I I
I was lucky enough (I would like to say it was skill but I’m sure that would be stretching the facts) to miss the wood with my wheels and straddle a post. As I went over it I heard a bit of a thud.
The whole thing happened so fast I didn’t even hit the brakes until I was past the point of contact. I drove about another mile and then pulled off the highway and went to the field office I worked at. A quick check under the car showed a lot of dripping oil. I called a friend and we towed the car to a local garage.
It turns out the wood stripped off the bottom of the oil pan so clean it looked as though it had been cut off by a torch. For what it’s worth the engine was fine, and at no time did the oil light come. Later that month the same car won a trophy at Niagara Airport Drag strip. About a year later I sold the car, bought a new Z28 and began to drive a little more sensible.
I can’t explain it but remembering driving down that hill on that warm summer night brings back nothing but happy memories.
please ignore any errors, the cat was helping me at the keyboard.
