# What's the worst/scariest road you've ever been on? **URL:** \ **Category:** Miscellaneous and Personal Stuff I Must Share\ **Created:** [August 11, 2017, 5:47pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-worst-scariest-road-youve-ever-been-on/793348 "2017-08-11T17:47:48Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 2
**Author:** ![standingwave](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/9de0a6/32.png) [@standingwave](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/standingwave)\ **Post date:** [August 12, 2017, 12:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-worst-scariest-road-youve-ever-been-on/793348/21 "2017-08-12T00:57:12Z")
> [@Rocketeer](#): > > Washington highway 26, east of the Columbia. Way back when, I went to college in Pullman, and at the end of every prolonged school break, the highway would be thick with cars full of Seattle-area students returning to Pullman. > > One Thanksgiving, the road had glare ice on it about an inch thick, and fog so thick you could see about two car lengths ahead of you. > > Traffic was crawling along, thirty miles an hour or so, and then ALL OF A SUDDEN my car was spinning around; 360 degrees, and we ended up on the shoulder facing the same way we’d been going. I still have no idea how the car behind me missed me. Insanely tense and grueling slog. Go Cougs! (Class of '82) Scariest road for me was the old Jackass Ski Resort (today’s Silver Mountain) outside of Kellogg, Idaho. Today there’s a gondola system to ferry skiers up to the base of the ski area from a parking area just off Interstate 90. But back when I was in high school one had to drive up the mountain, negotiating a series of switchbacks. Very exposed with no guard rails nor even trees to stop you from tumbling all the way to the valley floor were you to slide off. The worst part was descending at the end of the day. Your stopping distance is increased, you’re tired, it’s dark and maybe you or some other driver is a little inebriated. Just thinking about it gives me the heebie jeebies. :eek: ---
**Author:** ![Backwater\_Under\_Duck](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/b/ba8739/32.png) [@Backwater\_Under\_Duck](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Backwater_Under_Duck)\ **Post date:** [August 12, 2017, 1:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-worst-scariest-road-youve-ever-been-on/793348/22 "2017-08-12T01:12:16Z")
In America, I offer you [Hell’s Backbone](https://scenicbyway12.com/the-byway/scenic-backways/hells-backbone-road-scenic-backway/) in Utah’s Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument area. It’s a bare, one-lane scrape off the top of this outrageous ridge, so beautiful, that goes a long fucking ways with nothing but straight down on both sides of you. I let my brother-in-law drive. I get crazy vertigo. ---
**Author:** ![Sunspace](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/sunspace/32/1250_2.png) [@Sunspace](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Sunspace)\ **Post date:** [August 12, 2017, 1:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-worst-scariest-road-youve-ever-been-on/793348/23 "2017-08-12T01:52:52Z")
Maybe not the scariest in absolute terms, but I nominate the Trans-Canada Highway through Kicking Horse Pass, before it was rebuilt, in a Greyhound bus whose driver had just been pulled over for speeding… ---
**Author:** ![Darryl\_Lict](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/7cd45c/32.png) [@Darryl\_Lict](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Darryl_Lict)\ **Post date:** [August 12, 2017, 4:19am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-worst-scariest-road-youve-ever-been-on/793348/24 "2017-08-12T04:19:25Z")
> [@jtur88](#): > > I’ve been both ways on a minibus on the famous road to Coroico, Bolivia. I’ve done the downhill bike ride on the [“Highway of Death”](https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Yungas_Road) and took a bus back up it. Christ, that is a frightening road. There’s hardly any room to pass and the drop off is thousands of feet. I guess they completed the new highway in 2006 which they were working on when I was there in 2002. In 2006, one estimate stated that 200 to 300 travellers were killed yearly along the road. ---
**Author:** ![Bullitt](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bullitt/32/5725_2.png) [@Bullitt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bullitt)\ **Post date:** [August 12, 2017, 11:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-worst-scariest-road-youve-ever-been-on/793348/25 "2017-08-12T11:36:40Z")
Roads covered with smooth ice - 3 specific examples I will always remember are on I-80 in late winter (March?) 1983 across Nebraska, on Queen Elizabeth Way in Ontario between St. Catharines and Hamilton along Lake Ontario about 7 winters ago, and on the E4 in Sweden driving from Linköping to Copenhagen about 4 winters back. Not bad roads, but bad winters and ice made them bad. And wind made them worse. Each time, after the drive I said I should not have gone. And one winter on my motorcycle, north out of Mojave CA on the 14, after midnight and with heavy snow falling. The plows weren’t plowing and the snow got to about 4" on the road climbing up through Red Rock Canyon. I turned around and waited back at the Denny’s in Mojave for the sunrise, and the snowplows. Then I went north to Bishop. It was cold. Oh, and [www.dangerousRoads.org](http://www.dangerousRoads.org) is a fun site to check out. ---
**Author:** ![ftg](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ftg/32/2801_2.png) [@ftg](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ftg)\ **Post date:** [August 12, 2017, 1:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-worst-scariest-road-youve-ever-been-on/793348/26 "2017-08-12T13:01:20Z")
As far as paved “real” roads go, there’s one in SW Idaho near the Oregon border an uncle took me on years ago. Very narrow, twisty, built high on a canyon wall. A solid wall on one side and an amazing drop off on the other. Guardrails? Forget those! Of course people “straightened out” the curves by driving over the line. Without a good sight line of course. Fortunately not many vehicles. But several of those were dump trucks. Ooooh. My uncle stopped and showed us a car wreck (one of several you could see) deep down in the canyon. That was where a friend of my uncle and a girl died. When a car went off that cliff, it stayed there. ---
**Author:** ![Hari\_Seldon](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/hari_seldon/32/5173_2.png) [@Hari\_Seldon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Hari_Seldon)\ **Post date:** [August 12, 2017, 3:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-worst-scariest-road-youve-ever-been-on/793348/27 "2017-08-12T15:08:28Z")
I have fairly severe acrophobia. So when I visited the Mount St. Helen volcano in 1989, 9 years after the eruption and then started back down, driving east, it was on an excellent highway, but on the right there was a fairly steep dropoff and no guardrail. All the trees that would have provided visual reassurance were gone from the eruption. (I might point out that the reassurance would have purely visual, having no real effect. But then the fear was basically irrational.) I let my son drive the rest of the way down and sat in the right seat and closed my eyes. Someone I knew with the same problem once circumnavigated Newfoundland. Counter-clockwise. It was hell, he told me. If I ever do it, I will make sure to go clockwise. Not for nothing is Newfoundland called “The Rock”. I wonder whether they ever had left-hand driving. So I googled the question and came up with this: > [@](#): > > RickJay RickJay is offline > Charter Jays Fan > Moderator > > Join Date: Jun 2000 > Location: Oakville, Canada > Posts: 37,936 > > > [@](#): > > > > Originally posted by SmackFu > > Did Canadians ever drive on the left? The obviously have some strong ties to the UK. I’m surprised they don’t have this one. How about the other colonies, like India? > > Actually, driving on the left occurred in both Canada AND the United States, before states and provinces agreed on what side should be preferred. > > In Ontario and Quebec, (as well as Manitoba and Saskatchewan), which comprises the majority of the country’s people (and cars), they always drove on the right. Driving on the left persisted in Atlantic Canada and parts of B.C. until after the First World War, at which point they pretty much had to conform with the rest of North America. > > Newfoundland, which did not join Canada until 1949, drove on the left right up to the time they joined, or shortly before. > > Many other former British colonies drive on the left, such as India, Australia, and NEw Zealand. Its worth nothing that in Canada, Quebec ALWAYS drove on the right, this being the French custom, and they stuck with it after Britain took over, as per the terms of the Quebec Act. Bear in mind that at one point the French were a majority in Canada, so Canada had a different start in this regard than most British colonies. > > * * * > > Providing useless posts since 1999! Since this was from 2001, I assume that Rick Jay was not a moderator then. ---
**Author:** ![blondebear](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/blondebear/32/1022_2.png) [@blondebear](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/blondebear)\ **Post date:** [August 12, 2017, 7:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-worst-scariest-road-youve-ever-been-on/793348/28 "2017-08-12T19:09:44Z")
The access roads to Chaco Canyon are pretty bad but not really scary. Well, maybe scary in the sense that you might feel like your car will rattle apart on the washboard stretches or maybe hit a rut too hard and get a flat or damage your suspension. Once you get to the canyon proper the ruins are amazing and it makes the trip worthwhile. I was in the area recently and thought about revisiting Chaco Canyon but I decided not to…I didn’t want to drive those roads again. I started down [White Rim Road](http://www.dangerousroads.org/north-america/usa/593-white-rim-road-usa.html) in Canyonlands but didn’t make it too far before turning around. The road was actually in pretty good shape–the first couple of miles I was on anyway. But the weather turned bad and I wasn’t going to risk getting caught in a downpour on that road. There are stretches that turn to impassable muck when they get more than a little rain. ---
**Author:** ![madmonk28](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/madmonk28/32/20811_2.png) [@madmonk28](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/madmonk28)\ **Post date:** [August 12, 2017, 7:50pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-worst-scariest-road-youve-ever-been-on/793348/29 "2017-08-12T19:50:32Z")
Proabably the road from Kabul to Jallalbad, narrow mountain roads and people drove like lunatics. I also had to drive the road to the Baghdad airport a lot when it was considered the deadliest road in Iraq: > [@](#): > > Suicide bombers in cars packed with explosives lurk at on-ramps, waiting for American convoys or other targets. > > Insurgents in cars with darkened windows mingle in traffic, then lower windows for bursts of machine-gun fire. Disguised as members of a road crew, they bury daisy-chained artillery shells beneath the roadway, then trigger them with garage-door openers and cellphones. > **[On Way to Baghdad Airport, Death Stalks Main Road (Published 2005)](https://www.nytimes.com/2005/05/29/world/middleeast/on-way-to-baghdad-airport-death-stalks-main-road.html)** > > Iraqis call it Death Street. To American soldiers, it is ''I.E.D. Alley,'' after the improvised explosive devices -- bombs -- that are lethally common on the 10 miles of expressway and city streets that make up Baghdad's airport road. Suicide... ---
**Author:** ![Bullitt](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bullitt/32/5725_2.png) [@Bullitt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bullitt)\ **Post date:** [August 12, 2017, 10:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-worst-scariest-road-youve-ever-been-on/793348/30 "2017-08-12T22:58:21Z")
> [@blondebear](#): > > The access roads to Chaco Canyon are pretty bad but not really scary. Well, maybe scary in the sense that you might feel like your car will rattle apart on the washboard stretches or maybe hit a rut too hard and get a flat or damage your suspension. Once you get to the canyon proper the ruins are amazing and it makes the trip worthwhile. I was in the area recently and thought about revisiting Chaco Canyon but I decided not to…I didn’t want to drive those roads again. > > I started down [White Rim Road](http://www.dangerousroads.org/north-america/usa/593-white-rim-road-usa.html) in Canyonlands but didn’t make it too far before turning around. The road was actually in pretty good shape–the first couple of miles I was on anyway. But the weather turned bad and I wasn’t going to risk getting caught in a downpour on that road. There are stretches that turn to impassable muck when they get more than a little rain. Chaco Cyn: I haven’t been there yet but it’s been on my list. Your description of the road reminds me of another, the road to the Racetrack Playa in Death Valley – 30 miles of some really bad washboard (TripAdviser [description-1](https://www.tripadvisor.com/ShowTopic-g143021-i2027-k5148705-The_Racetrack_is_the_road_really_as_bad_as_it_sounds-Death_Valley_National_Park_California.html), [description-2](https://www.tripadvisor.com/ShowUserReviews-g60787-d104204-r203328542-The_Racetrack-Death_Valley_Junction_California.html)). And that White Rim Road looks awesome! I’ve added Canyonlands to my list. And I imagine those sandstone tracks, when wet, can get as slick as ice. You made the right call. It’ll still be there for you, for another day when it’s dry. ---
**Author:** ![Gatopescado](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/gatopescado/32/5711_2.png) [@Gatopescado](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Gatopescado)\ **Post date:** [August 12, 2017, 11:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-worst-scariest-road-youve-ever-been-on/793348/31 "2017-08-12T23:49:21Z")
> [@Walken\_After\_Midnight](#): > > The worst roads I’ve been on were in the Hindu Kush, Pakistan. “Roads” [like](http://i.imgur.com/p9QXVJO.jpg?1) [this](http://potdrum.com/wp-content/uploads/2015/09/Fairy-Medows.jpg). I’d love to take my motorcycle there! > [@thelurkinghorror](#): > > More recently, like the OP, a dirt road somewhere east of Virginia City, Nevada. This is my neck of the woods, so to speak. Lots of good/scary stuff! The added bonus of unmarked mineshafts to fall into. > [@Backwater\_Under\_Duck](#): > > In America, I offer you [Hell’s Backbone](https://scenicbyway12.com/the-byway/scenic-backways/hells-backbone-road-scenic-backway/) in Utah’s Grand Staircase-Escalante National Monument area. Thanks for that link! I just planned my next vacation! 😃 ---
**Author:** ![Lamar\_Mundane](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/l/85f322/32.png) [@Lamar\_Mundane](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Lamar_Mundane)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2017, 12:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-worst-scariest-road-youve-ever-been-on/793348/32 "2017-08-13T00:57:07Z")
The Moki Dugway in Southern Utah. It goes straight up the side of a cliff for three miles and 1200 vertical feet. It’s a dirt road with no guardrail. And 180 degree switchbacks every 100 yards. > **[Moki Dugway is a graded dirt switchback road with breathtaking views in UT](https://www.dangerousroads.org/north-america/usa/783-mokee-dugway-usa.html)** > > Part of Utah Route 261 Mokee (or Moki) Dugway is a staggering, graded dirt switchback road carved into the face of the cliff edge of Cedar Mesa. It consists of ---
**Author:** ![The\_Vorlon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/d07c76/32.png) [@The\_Vorlon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/The_Vorlon)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2017, 1:03am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-worst-scariest-road-youve-ever-been-on/793348/33 "2017-08-13T01:03:41Z")
Hanna Highway, Maui. Drop off on one side. granite on the other, two lanes, maybe, wide, and helllo bus! ---
**Author:** ![ratatoskK](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ratatoskk/32/2987_2.png) [@ratatoskK](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ratatoskK)\ **Post date:** [August 13, 2017, 9:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-worst-scariest-road-youve-ever-been-on/793348/34 "2017-08-13T21:23:58Z")
A dirt road (I think) during an ice storm in Vermont going over a mountain. It looked fine on the map, but in reality, was a knuckle-biter! ---
**Author:** ![Bullitt](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/bullitt/32/5725_2.png) [@Bullitt](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Bullitt)\ **Post date:** [August 14, 2017, 5:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-worst-scariest-road-youve-ever-been-on/793348/35 "2017-08-14T05:47:10Z")
> [@Lamar\_Mundane](#): > > The Moki Dugway in Southern Utah. It goes straight up the side of a cliff for three miles and 1200 vertical feet. It’s a dirt road with no guardrail. And 180 degree switchbacks every 100 yards. > > [Moki Dugway is a breathtaking Utah off-road adventure](http://www.dangerousroads.org/north-america/usa/783-mokee-dugway-usa.html) That looks neat! In dry weather, definitely not in wet weather. ---
**Author:** ![Chefguy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chefguy/32/138_2.png) [@Chefguy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chefguy)\ **Post date:** [August 14, 2017, 1:58pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-worst-scariest-road-youve-ever-been-on/793348/36 "2017-08-14T13:58:28Z")
> [@ftg](#): > > As far as paved “real” roads go, there’s one in SW Idaho near the Oregon border an uncle took me on years ago. Very narrow, twisty, built high on a canyon wall. A solid wall on one side and an amazing drop off on the other. Guardrails? Forget those! > > Of course people “straightened out” the curves by driving over the line. Without a good sight line of course. > > Fortunately not many vehicles. But several of those were dump trucks. Ooooh. > > My uncle stopped and showed us a car wreck (one of several you could see) deep down in the canyon. That was where a friend of my uncle and a girl died. When a car went off that cliff, it stayed there. That sounds like what the locals call The Rattlesnake, which goes from the Snake River at the Lewiston-Clarkston area over the mountains into Oregon. I drove it in a 27’ RV and left finger indentations on the steering wheel. Switchbacks, drop-offs, no guard rails and no shoulders. As for Chaco (sorry for the previous misspelling): no, it’s not scary, just rough as a cob. ---
**Author:** ![BlankSlate](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/blankslate/32/80_2.png) [@BlankSlate](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/BlankSlate)\ **Post date:** [August 14, 2017, 2:07pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-worst-scariest-road-youve-ever-been-on/793348/37 "2017-08-14T14:07:27Z")
The Cross Bronx Expressway. ---
**Author:** ![CalMeacham](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/calmeacham/32/35_2.png) [@CalMeacham](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CalMeacham)\ **Post date:** [August 14, 2017, 2:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-worst-scariest-road-youve-ever-been-on/793348/38 "2017-08-14T14:18:37Z")
I’ve driven on several roads in Utah that were scary in one way or another (I ultimately turned back on one of these, even though it wasn’t immediately dangerous, when I reflected that I was out in the middle of nowhere, there was no traffic on it, and no one knew I was there), but the scariest drive I ever had was going up the road to the top of Big Cottonwood Canyon, not far from Salt Lake City in Utah. If you know the area, you might think “_That’s_ not dangerous! Sure, you have to watch out for fallen (not fall_ing_) rocks, but it’s paved and well-travelled. What’s the big deal?” Well, I was helping the new managers move into the ski lodge, and we only had six hours on the rental, so we had to do it in the dead of night. Three trips, up and back, with loading and unloading. This was before the Olympics came and resculpted the Salt Lake area, so the roads weren’t newly paved, and there were no guardrails – and there’s a pretty mean plunge off the edge into Big Cottonwood Creek. Oh, yeah – and it was in a heavy fog. You couldn’t see more than ten feet in front of you. So you had to drive up the switchbacks (including the infamous “Stairs”) keeping an eye on the edge, when you could see it, and while watching out for debris that might have fallen from the rocks above, and do it on the way up and on the way down. In your rented U-Haul. Lots of white-knuckle driving that night. ---
**Author:** ![racer72](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/racer72/32/3075_2.png) [@racer72](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/racer72)\ **Post date:** [August 14, 2017, 2:59pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-worst-scariest-road-youve-ever-been-on/793348/39 "2017-08-14T14:59:19Z")
A couple from New Zealand come to mind. The first is Lees Valley Rd. About 10 miles of scrabble and gravel. Many switchbacks and much of it one lane wide. Had to back up about a quarter mile to let another vehicle pass. The other was the Crown Range Road near Queenstown. Was told to avoid that road, lots of accidents on it. Had no problems, didn’t ride the brakes overheat them. ---
**Author:** ![Ravenman](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/ravenman/32/2929_2.png) [@Ravenman](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ravenman)\ **Post date:** [August 14, 2017, 6:55pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-worst-scariest-road-youve-ever-been-on/793348/40 "2017-08-14T18:55:40Z")
> [@The\_Vorlon](#): > > Hanna Highway, Maui. > > Drop off on one side. granite on the other, two lanes, maybe, wide, and helllo bus! Same. Me in rental car going 10 mph, bus of locals wants to overtake doing 35 or something crazy. Not doing that again. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-worst-scariest-road-youve-ever-been-on/793348.md?page=1) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/whats-the-worst-scariest-road-youve-ever-been-on/793348.md?page=3)