Road Trip Report, Day One

(CBS)  CBS News Correspondent Jim Axelrod hit the road to chart pain at the pump. Here's his Web exclusive daily road diary.

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At 7:00 this morning, we filled up at a Mobil station on 42nd and 11th in Manhattan. At $2.79 for a gallon of regular, it cost us $54.01 to put 19.295 gallons in our Dodge Caravan.

With a full tank, producer Mike Solmsen, cameraman Mark Laganga, technician Jake Barlow, and myself set off for Williamsport, Pennsylvania -- home of the Little League World Series.

Every year, friends and family of teams from the four corners of the United States come to Williamsport, which makes it a great first stop to check in and see how the high price of gas is affecting Americans.

We've already met a woman from Owensboro, Kentucky with a slightly aggrieved teenage daughter who has to wait a little longer than she'd like for new sneakers. It seems the extra money spent on gas to drive from Owensboro is eating into the sneaker budget.

We've met three women from Louisiana bunking in at a friend's house rather than getting a hotel room.

And then there's the women who rented a car for the drive rather than take her own SUV. She's astonished that fill-ups still cost her $40 a pop.

Gas costs about a third more now than it did this time last year. Do the math. This isn't a nickel here and a dime there. As the very first people we've met on our cross-country trip have told us, it's changing the way they drive -- and the way they live.

As for four guys caravanning across country, (not one willing to stop and ask for directions) so far, so good. Of course, it's only been a couple hours. We're listening to a group called "The Killers", in a bow to Mike's taste (he's ten years younger -- my taste runs more to Bobby Darin and James Taylor but my American Express card has expired and I'm reliant on Mike for cash -- so "The Killers" it is).

The only other problem is cameraman Laganga's hissy fit about stopping at a Wawa convenience store for breakfast rather than something more full-service. I thought a hardened veteran combat photographer who's made multiple tours of Iraq would shrug this off. But that's just me.

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Click here to read Day Two of Jim's road report.

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