NJ Adventure

Jun and Noel haven’t been to NY so we decided to tour them. We stayed in Weng's place in Northvale, NJ.(ang bait ni Mare!) Virginia to NJ is a 5-hour 30-min drive. The plan was to leave at 5PM, Friday, to arrive at Jun's place at 6PM. Noel needed to finish something so we were able to hit the road at 6PM and arrived at Jun's place at 7PM. We didn't have our dinner yet because Rene planned to eat at turnpike. But at 9:30 PM, Augs was already hungry and asked everyone if we could eat first, everyone agreed and we took the I-66 67B exit in Maryland. We saw Mcdo but Jun said, in a demanding voice, "Wag dyan sa McDonald. Ayaw ko na dyan". So we took a left turn and tried to look for Chik-fil-a. We went to a place called The Avenue. It has outlet stores, theaters and restaurants. Since it's Friday night, there were lots of people (should I say young, beautiful and sexy people?) around. My friends enjoyed the "view" so much. We were getting very hungry so we circled the area to look for a place to eat. When we saw Barbecue Galore, Noel and Auggie hurried up while shouting "Barbecue! Barbecue!" thinking that it was a barbecue restaurant that turned out to be a barbecue grill store! hahahah! We tried Chili's but the waiting time was 15 minutes. We decided to leave and continued to look for Chick-fil-a or Panera Bread. By the time we saw Panera and Chick-fil-a, it was already 10:30 PM and the stores were closed. We ended up in McDo! Hahaha! No choice!

After traveling for 120 plus miles, we saw the I-495 and I-295 exits. We're supposed to take 295 but Jun didn't notice that he was on the 495-exit lane and it was too late to change lane when you're driving at 70-75 mph. We ended up in Delaware but we easily managed to go back to 295. Start of another 120 plus miles. We arrived in NorthVale at around 3AM. But the "fun" didn't end there. We couldn't find Weng's house number so we turned back and stopped in front of a house that we thought of Weng's. While Rene was talking with Weng on his cellphone, a car behind us appeared out of nowhere. Jun turned on the emergency light. Then the police officer turned on the car's blinking light and stepped out. We were very afraid because we stopped in the main road, Jun decided not to go to a side street so the police officer won't think that we're trying to run away. We were also thinking of our unpaid toll. (We were unable to pay our toll fee because nobody was in the post, not even a basket to put the fee.) The officer asked "What's the problem?". Jun said the truth. The officer asked "Do you have your documents with you?". Jun handed him his International Driver's license. I told him that it's not valid without the country-issued driver's license. Jun handed him his license and the officer asked for his passport and the car's registration, too. He shined his flashlight into the car's interior as if searching for something then looked into our faces. After getting the documents he returned to the police car while we waited inside. (You are not allowed to stepped out unless told by the police officer or else...) After 5-10 mins he returned Jun's documents and told us that our friend is waiting for us. Weng was already there. (So glad to see her! ) She was able to speak with him and told us that we didn't commit any traffic violations. The police just thought that we needed help and just verified the documents. Nothing to worry about. Whew!

Hmm.. how about the unpaid toll fee?