Neither have I since I lived through the Chattanooga Blizzard of 1993 when I was in the 5th grade. Apparently, I’m lucky enough to survive two blizzards in one winter. The fact that I’m not traveling and stuck on I-81 makes this blizzard much more pleasant. By comparison, watching a blizzard from the inside of toasty apartment is not bad.

In my opinion, braving the stores on Thursday night was the opening skirmish in the Snowpocalypse II. It took me two hours to drive from my new job (yes, I got a new job!) in Herndon to Alexandria, where I live. I ended up at Wal-Mart since no one shops there in this area. Most people in this region are extremely anti-Walmart and would rather starve than buy from an evil corporate giant (although Whole Foods was started by a libertarian. Go figure.) I managed to get one of the last three gallons of skim milk in the store and was only in line for about 15 minutes. (Tennessee readers, Walmarts up here are the old types. Super stores aren’t allowed in the area, so they have small grocery sections.)

I also decided to snag a camping stove and propane. No one, I repeat, no one was buying those. With 20-30″ of snow, tree branches are going to fall on power lines, and electricity is going to go out. The camping section would have been wiped out in Tennessee. Sorry local readers, but metro dwellers are not very resourceful. I also loaded up on granola bars,* bottled water and batteries.

Yesterday, I worked from home, so I got to stay of the road. The snow started falling around 10 a.m., but didn’t start accumulating until the evening. By 7:45 p.m., several inches were on the ground, and I decided to start taking photos to document this experience. (Photos are below.)

This morning, I went for a walk around the neighborhood. The two main roads were plowed, but side streets are covered in at least 18″ of snow. There were a lot of people walking around and exploring the winter wonderland.

The local coffee shop, 7/11 and a Mexican restaurant were open. Surprisingly, there was a vendor at the Farmer’s Market. Target is closed, but the Farmer’s Market is open. That explains so much about Beltway life. I also discovered that the nearby Shopper’s and Shell station were open.

The snow is supposed to end some time tonight. The interesting question will be if the roads and Metro are working by Monday. Even if streets are plowed, the snow has to go somewhere. Cars parked on the street are blocked in by huge drifts. Northern Virginia is also completely cut off from the Metro because above-ground stations are closed. The real adventure starts Monday.

Update: At 4:30 p.m. on Saturday, the snow is up to 24″ or to my knees when I stand in it. Snow is also falling off the roof of my building and crashing in front of my living room window. It sounds incredibly scary when it happens. Snow has also covered up the vent to my window unit heater. Not sure if it’s safe to turn on the heat so I’m layering blankets over my snuggie.

*I grew up camping with my family. On one primitive camping trip to Cumberland Island, Georgia, raccoons got to our food supply with two days left on the trip. Since the island can only be accessed by a ferry, and there aren’t any stores, we survived on granola bars, gummy bears and marshmallows until it was time to leave. Most situations can be survived with the help of granola bars.

I quickly packed, cleaned my apartment and was on the road by noon. I tried thinking ahead about the possibility of driving through snow and loaded my car with extra food, water bottles and blankets. I didn’t have any sand or kitty litter, so I put a heavy box of books and suitcases in my trunk to weigh it down. I always have extra books around.

As a Southerner, I have a deep fear of snow. We don’t get much white stuff in Chattanooga,  so I have zero experience driving in it.  After living through the freak blizzard of March 1993, I view snow with an awed fear. That storm dumped about 16″ of snow in our yard and shut down the city for more than a week. We lived without electricity the entire time and eventually ran out of water. I don’t know how we would have survived without our camp stove and  heater.  Snow is pretty and fun to play in for a few hours, but then it should go away.

As I drove south, the counties around DC were proactive and dumping salt on the road. As soon as I got on I-81, all preparation efforts stopped. Not a salt truck or snow plow was seen. Around Lexington, it started snowing heavily and quickly went from annoying to dangerous. By the time I got to Roanoke, traffic was at a standstill due to a wreck. My mom called the local news stations and monitored VDOT’s web site to give me updates.

Snow conditions around Roanoke

Eventually, I got off the interstate at Salem to tank up my car. I noticed that a state highway was clear and seemed to parallel the interstate. I got directions and decided to bypass the wreck and hop back on the interstate 10 miles further south. By this point, there was a couple of inches of snow and ice on the ground and quickly growing dark. The countryside was beautiful, and I felt like I was driving through a Christmas card with decorated farmhouses and snow-covered barns.

I got back on I-81 around Christiansburg and thought the worst was behind me. Then it suddenly went from drivable to awful. Big fluffy flakes were pouring down, and I could barely see the truck I was following. My wipers were so covered in ice that they just smeared water on my windshield.  My car was sliding all over the road, and I was barely driving over 10 mph. I pulled off the interstate to clean my windshield and wipers. I didn’t realize how bad it was until I stepped out of my car and sank into a half foot of snow. A nice man at the gas station volunteered to spray my windshield with de-icer, and I added it to my mental list of a much-needed winter driving kit.

Once again, I got back on the interstate.  It was now around 7 p.m. and pitch black. I got a few miles further and hit a wall of stalled traffic at the first Wytheville exit. On the radio, a helpful weatherman said that the brunt of the storm was directly over us. Frequent panicked calls to my parents informed me that I-81 was essentially shut down due to a wrecked tractor trailer five miles ahead of me.

Hours started ticking by. Every 30 minutes, I’d turn on my car to warm it up. I would  also get out and clean my windshield and knock ice off my tires with a $1.99 flip flop from Wal-Mart. Normally, I pride myself on being prepared for every situation, but I somehow lost my ice scraper since last winter. I also discovered that Honda Accords are insulated rather well and praised God that my car battery had been replaced two weeks earlier. I was also thankful that I grabbed my ancient, down-filled parka  and extra blankets.

Around 9 p.m., my dad insisted on getting a hotel room for me. I still hoped that the wreck clear, and I could get through the next 100 miles of snow that night.  Dad got one of the last few hotel rooms in the county at a Super 8 and convinced me to give up on getting home that night.  Now, the challenge was getting to the hotel, which was only four miles away.

My car was stopped about 500 feet from an exit ramp. I could see a truck stop, and people around me were walking up the ramp to get food and use the restroom. I felt sorry for all the people walking by with small children. I was miserable and freaked out by myself. I can’t imagine getting through this nightmare situation with a baby or small child.

Stuck on I-81 at midnight

The hours ticked by. I tried to tweet, but only  every 4th or 5th text message went through. In hindsight, it was an interesting experience. However, sitting there was terrifying. I was alone, stuck on the interstate in the middle of a blizzard and watching the snow accumulate around my car.

Around 10:30 p.m., mom called and said she had reached the state police. The wreck should be cleared in the next 20 minutes and then state troopers would go car to car and help everyone get out. According to the VDOT web site, I-81 was covered in wrecks. Getting home that night would be impossible. I got the address of the hotel and set up directions in my GPS to get there.

Twenty minutes ticked by and nothing. Thirty minutes. An hour. It was looking bad, and admittedly I freaked out. It looked like I would be spending the night on the interstate in my car. I pulled out my pillow and a blanket and tried to settle in. Around 12:30, a snow plow came through and cleared the exit ramp. The truck ahead of me got over and drove up the ramp. I decided to follow. Getting stuck at a truck stop had to be better than being stuck on the interstate.

The parking lot of the truck stop  had at least one foot of snow. I was shocked that my car was able to plow through it. I topped off my car and found out that a frontage road cut between I-81 and I-77 and would get me close to the hotel. It had been scraped and was drivable.

I took the road with some apprehension of driving away from the safety of other cars and followed the directions on my GPS. I got closer and closer, but couldn’t find the hotel. I called home to clarify directions, and my dad told me to get back on the interstate. The hotel had mentioned that Garmin directions were always wrong. I got on I-77 and noticed how abandoned it looked. Cars were grouped by exits, and the left lane was completely empty. It looked like a scene from a disaster movie. I found the exit that I needed, but two lanes of stopped traffic blocked it.

It was late, and I was now driving in circles through a blizzard. I was exhausted, scared and upset. Somehow, I ended up at an exit where I re-fuel my car on drives back to DC. I recognized a gas station and stopped for a cup of coffee and directions. The station was packed. It looked like people were hunkering down there for the night. I got directions to drive through downtown Wytheville and reach the hotel.

Once again, I drove through a snow-covered picturesque town. It looked like the set of a Christmas movie with a 1950s style town center, a giant Christmas tree and lots of lights. Had it not been a nightmare scenario, I would have enjoyed the sight.

My GPS was an annoying loop of “recalculating” in polite British tones that made me want to throw through my windshield. It kept directing me to turn down roads that hadn’t been plowed. My dad called again and pulled up Google maps to find my location. From there, he directed me the last two miles to the hotel.

At 1:30 a.m., I pulled up to the Super 8 and walked through a snow drift to check in. Ahead of me, two drunk rednecks were trying to convince the clerk that they had been locked out of their rooms.

“Great.” I thought. “I’m close enough to Tennessee to encounter rednecks, but not close enough to get home tonight.”

I finally got into my room, called home and texted a few people to tell them I was safe and collapsed. This had been one of the worst nights weeks of my life.

The next morning, I woke up to news that DC was being pummeled by the blizzard.

“Good,” I couldn’t help thinking. “Now my friends are getting a taste of what I went through last night.”

By 8:30 a.m., the snow storm already had a Facebook page and a Twitter tag. I wanted to smack everyone complaining about #snOMG. I had been through hell and wanted nothing more than to get to Chattanooga.

My car covered n snow

The hotel had a complimentary breakfast, and I asked other travelers about road conditions. I-81 seemed to be clear, but I-77 was still a mess. I watched small sedans like mine make it out of the parking lot. The hotel provided brooms and snow shovels to help people clear out their cars. I proceeded to clean off my car with a broom and my trusty flip flop.

By the time I finished digging out my car, the snow was mostly slush in the parking lot. I stopped to take pictures, and a man asked me, “Do you really want to remember this?” I laughed and replied, “Some day.”

I got on the road by 11 a.m. and found the roads to be clear. The snow plows that I had looked for earlier were out in force. As I drove the remaining 250 miles, I watched as the snow conditions decreased from blizzard to ice and eventually rain outside of Knoxville. I was so happy to see green trees. I finally got home around 4 p.m. I’ve never been so happy to see my family and get home.