This report is from Day 15 of our 2005 Summer Vacation, on August 11, 2005.

The Froggie/LadyMegs 2005 Great Circle Tour, Day 15:  friends and frustration.

- After spending the night in Kankakee, we began by heading east on IL 17.  IL 17 is 4 lanes east of Kankakee over to the junction with IL 1 South, then narrows to 2 lanes along the IL 1/IL 17 duplex.

- IL 1/17 hugs a riverbank on the south side of Momence before the junction with IL 114.

- We took IL 114 eat of Momence, which becomes IN 10 at the state line.  IN 10 wasn't much to speak of, although we noticed some housing developments near I-65 that are probably tied to Chicago-area sprawl, even though we were a good distance away from Chicago.

- Saw the new interchange on I-65 at IN 14...didn't get a photo, though.

- Stopped in Lafayette to spend several hours with an old ship buddy of mine.  You can easily tell that he misses the Navy (he's got his bathroom decked out in a very obvious theme), and I think my occasional visits only spur it on further.

- Construction was underway for a widening project on IN 28, from I-65 east to where the existing 4-lane highway goes into Frankfort.

- The existing 4-lane on IN 28 only makes it to the outer core of Frankfort.  Through the core of Frankfort, IN 28 is basically a 2-lane street, with a short 1-block side-jog on the east side of Frankfort.

- US 421 duplexes with IN 28 east of Frankfort, then the two routes share a brief multiplex with IN 29 before IN 28 turns east while US 421 continues south with IN 29.

- The US 31/IN 28 junction was signalized.

- IN 9 is 4 lanes where IN 128 ends at it, north of Anderson.

- Where IN 28 and IN 67 split in Albany is a 5-way signalized intersection.

- Union City is a town that straddles the Indiana/Ohio border.  IN 28 and IN 32 have a brief duplex on the Indiana side.  The trailblazer for IN 32 East also has a "TO OH 47" trailblazer.  Meanwhile, where IN 28 turns east has a "TO OH 571" trailblazer.

- At the state line, where IN 28 becomes OH 571, is a 4-way stop at "State Line Rd".

- There's a 3-way OH 49/OH 118/OH 571 multiplex leading into downtown Greenville.  At the traffic square downtown, OH 121 and OH 502 join the intersecting mix, and there's also a shield for a "BUSINESS LOOP US 127" where "BUSINESS LOOP" is within the shield above the route number.

- US 127 bypasses Greenville on the east side of town.  US 36 also joins this bypass briefly.  There's an interchange on the bypass where it intersects OH 571...this is where US 36 turns east and OH 571 splits to the southeast.

- By this time, it was getting too dark for photos, but we continued on via US 36, which has several turns in Piqua.  We split off of US 36 onto OH 29 at Urbana, then onto OH 161 to cut over to Columbus.

- Though it wasn't a problem in the late evening, the I-270/US 33 interchange in Dublin seems underpowered, being a simple cloverleaf.

- ODOT has put a lot of work into widening I-270 on the north side of Columbus.  A lot of it was 8 through lanes, with additional auxiliary lanes on top of that in some locations.

- A LOT of reconstruction underway at the eastern I-270/OH 161 interchange in Huber Ridge.  Looks like ODOT is adding some flyovers at the interchange, with braided ramps between I-270 and the first interchange to the east on OH 161.

- OH 161 continues as a freeway east of I-270 for several miles, out to a couple miles past US 62 where the freeway ends and OH 161 becomes a regular 2-lane road.  The road was fairly busy, even at night, all the way out to OH 16.

- There's a short freeway section on the south side of Granville punctuated by two interchanges.  Route numbering on this freeway segment, from west to east, goes as follows:  OH 37/OH 161, OH 16/OH 37, and OH 16.

- East of Granville, OH 16 is a 4-lane expressway for a couple miles with only a couple of intersections before it becomes freeway-grade pretty much the whole way through Newark.  In the middle is a 3-way directional stack with OH 79 South, which itself is freeway for the first mile-and-change south of OH 16 before it becomes a 4-lane arterial.  Except for a bypass around Hebron, it stays a 4-lane arterial all the way down to I-70.

- And this is the point where the frustrations began.  We started looking for a hotel room along OH 79, as this is where most of the hotel rooms in the Newark area were located.  Every hotel we stopped at was booked.  So we hopped east on I-70 and stopped at the next interchange with a decent hotel.  It too was booked.  And on to the next interchange.  And the next.  Unbeknownst to us, there was a big drag racing event going on at a nearby speedway, and this apparently had hotel rooms booked solid for miles.  I was so frustrated by Zanesville, not to mention dead tired, that Meaghan had to drive for awhile.  We finally found a hotel room at Exit 178 in Cambridge.  At 1am.

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(C) 2007, Adam Froehlig