I was driving in Los Angeles, a few miles from the ocean, on the farthest-from-home stretch of a five-week road trip.   I kept glancing down at my fuel light, which first flickers to life when I’ve got about two and a half gallons in the tank. The light had been on for a while, probably too long, so I went to the nearest station.

The price for regular: $2.07. I was in shock. It was September 2003, and it was the first time in my life that I would pay more than $2 for a gallon of gas. (In the United States, anyway.)

On that trip, I’d been averaging about $1.65 to $1.85 for a gallon. My car, fortunately, tended to get about 39 m.p.g., even with the air conditioning on, even in states where the speed limit was 75. Still, the two-buck threshold meant that my trip home was going to be pricier.

Within a few minutes of putting the cap back on the fuel tank, however, my fears eased. Not far down Santa Monica Boulevard, gas was still under $2. I had just had the misfortune of filling up in a spendy neighborhood. I made it all the way back to the Midwest without paying $2 again.

I’m thinking of all this because oil reached its lowest price in four years yesterday — about $36 a barrel, down from $145 just this past July. That’s not long after we here at Roadguy tried to have a “when will gas hit $4 in the Twin Cities” contest, which had to be canceled after the official AAA price topped out at $3.996 on June 12 (details here).

If you remember the first time you paid $2, or $3, or even $1 for a gallon of gas, or if you have a new guess as to what year gas will pass the $4 mark — or drop below a buck — please jabber away for us in the comments below.

This entry was posted on Friday, December 19th, 2008 at 6:06 am and is filed under Main. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. Both comments and pings are currently closed.