![]() They shoot across bridges, glide alongside the churning Colorado River, and blast in and out of a concrete tunnel. #Raindrop falling on my window zip#Every day, more than 22,000 semitruck drivers, soccer moms, and workaday warriors zip between Glenwood Canyon’s rock walls. Beyond being a neat answer at bar trivia nights, the section of highway is a linchpin in I-70’s 2,153 miles, which run from Utah to Maryland-an east-west path through the country’s midsection. This part of the highway, completed 30 years ago this month, was the final section of the original federal interstate system. At a time when more Americans than ever are wrestling with the concept of climate change and its impacts on the planet, this piece of pavement has become ecological proof that something has gone terribly wrong. Among the national web of asphalt, concrete, and steel that connects us, the 66,000-foot stretch of I-70 that runs through Glenwood Canyon stands out both for its aesthetic beauty and environmental fragility. There are 46,876 miles of interstate highway in America. She was sure Glenwood Canyon was about to kill her. She felt a thud on her Volkswagen’s door, and the windshield went black. A wave of dark sludge cascaded over the concrete barrier that divided the interstate. She was one of the only people on this strip of interstate.īair was passing a ravine in the canyon wall when her headlights caught some movement to her left. There were only a few headlights and brake lights in the distance. She couldn’t remember seeing rain this hard her wipers couldn’t keep up. When Bair exited the tunnel’s east end, sheets of water hammered her windshield. Two more miles and she’d be back with her husband and their four kids. She reached the west end of the tunnel about 20 minutes later. After 13 years of living on a ranch in the canyon, she knew weather often changed on the other side of the passage. She fixed her mind on the Hanging Lake Tunnel, a few miles ahead. In the rain, Bair felt like a bowling ball hurtling blindly down a lane. In the daylight, this would likely rank as one of the most beautiful drives in America. The canyon walls reached high above the road, a rain-slickened, two-tiered ribbon of highway and bridges. Her Volkswagen Passat passed semitrucks crawling along in the right lane, their distorted emergency blinkers flashing prismatically through the raindrops that pounded her windshield. She needed to get home-now.īarely five miles into the drive, Bair was already questioning her decision to leave work. Bair looked at the time on her phone: It was almost 9 p.m. A shutdown on I-70 could turn an easy commute into a 90-minute nightmare over two-lane, high-elevation Cottonwood Pass. Like everyone who lives in the area, Bair knew the havoc bad weather could cause inside the 2,000-foot-deep canyon. It had been raining off and on for more than five hours, and flooding was a real possibility. Bair called her husband, Jim, to tell him she was on her way to the family’s ranch east of the city. She’d been visiting a friend who’d just given birth and was late getting home. It was the night of July 29, 2021, and Bair had just left Valley View Hospital in Glenwood Springs, where the 39-year-old works as a part-time labor and delivery nurse. Sign up today!Īutumn Bair had traveled the 12-and-a-half-mile stretch of I-70 through Glenwood Canyon hundreds of times, but this trip had her gripping her steering wheel so tightly her hands hurt. Anju now wonders what happened to the puppy.The Local newsletter is your free, daily guide to life in Colorado. And how it always spoils the fun of whatever it is each child was observing outside. Oh! how many times my mother has probably said this to me when I was a kid. Just then her mother comes and closes the window, as the wind sends some rain inside " You will fall sick", she says. How could I not buy this for my daughter? Even though it reflected my childhood, more than hers, I wanted her to have something to remember her rainy month at my parent's home, looking out of the window, like Anju does in the book.Īnju sees the scene outside on a rainy day, she also notices a little puppy under a big blue umbrella. What caught my eye, when I was browsing, was the wonderful watercolor illustrations of a rainy day in Mumbai, as seen from a window.Ĭolorful umbrellas, people huddled in bus stops, cars splashing water, an auto and even a BEST bus. We picked up Raindrops by Vaishali Shroff, pictures by Ruchi Mhasane published by Tulika Books, on a trip to Kitab Khana. Mumbai rains! Enough has been said on this blog about it, but allow me this one little indulgence. ![]()
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