Macster

I notice the same thing up here in northern CA. But trust me, if I head out to the central valley or points east -- I seldom head out in other directions -- the car collects bugs, oh yes it does.

The 3nd worst experience -- years ago and not in a Porsche -- was in the desert of all places heading east on I-40 between Barstow and Needles.

Driving across that stretch of freeway and the air was filled with small light/pale yellow butterflies. The front of the car had a fuzzy texture to it from the butterflies' wings stuck to the bumper.

The 2nd worst experience was again on I-40 out in the Texas panhandle or somewhere in the general vicinity driving east late at night with lightening flashes off up ahead in the distance. I like to drive in the rain and was looking forward to encountering some rain.

I had a hand held CB radio on and listening to truck driver chat when I heard a driver ask "what was that?".

Another driver asked "what was what?.

Then the 1st driver said "there's another".

What had happened was a truck off several miles ahead of where I was had run into a swarm of grasshoppers, I guess they were flying ahead of the oncoming rain storm. In a few minutes I was in the swarm and hitting these things left and right. I knew enough to not turn on the wipers -- a truck driver reported he did and it just smeared the remains out so bad he had to pull over cause he couldn't see well enough to drive.

I slowed down of course but kept pressing on and in not too much more time ran into the rain. Thankfully the rain hard enough and lasted long enough to almost water blast all remains of the grasshoppers off the car.

Worst experience was I was out chasing tornadoes near KC Mo late one night in the spring. Driving east of KC and north of the Missouri river on a nice road that ran through the low flat land next the river. The road was very wet from the just ended rain storm (which I had heard reports over the radio storm spotters had seen a funnel cloud in the rain clouds).

As I was driving along I thought I could see the road moving a bit. I thought my eyes were playing tricks on me and I slowed down and then I saw what I thought was debris on the road left by the wind from the rain storm was instead almost all made up of tiny frogs. As the car was moving along the frogs would become active in the headlights maybe because the headlights attracted flying insects. I slowed way down and tried to pick a clear path through the frogs but I couldn't avoid them all.

I didn't get many frogs on the front of the car but I had to really rinse the under side with a hose the next day to remove all the stuff that collected on the parts of the car's underneath surfaces.

Anyhow, get outside of the major metro areas of CA and you'll be amazed at the bugs the front of the car can collect. Drive I-44 from Oklahoma into Missouri anytime at night beween Easter and Halloween and then spend hours the next time you wash the car removing bug remains. Or drive down through Arkansas through Tekarkana into Texas over into Dallas/Ft Worth in the summer at night and the same thing.

Sincerely

Macster.