The long winter is about over. The even longer pandemic is coming to an end. More things are opening up. Most of us are excited and ready to embrace freedom. The freedom of being able to go places that were not available this time last year. Right now, is a great time of year to start planning a road trip, or two, for the last part of spring or for summer.
Why a road trip?
Listen to your own jam(music).
There are many reasons for a road trip. It’s an opportunity to enjoy your music out on the open road. (This is a lot easier if you’re alone in the car.)
When I was growing up, the rule was whoever was driving got to choose the music. I’m the 7th of 10 children. There’s a lot of people older than me and they always wanted to drive. So, me having the opportunity to listen to my music was very rare.
My oldest daughter went to school in southern Utah in Cedar City. It was not one of my favorite drives. And after doing that a couple of times every semester, it did start to wear on me. But the one thing I really enjoyed about it was, after being with her for the day or the weekend, I would drive home alone at night (my favorite for that drive). My home is about 3 hours from Cedar City. I took this opportunity to listen to my favorite music at the loudest possible volume, I could handle. And, also, for me to be able to sing the loudest that I wanted to. Good times!
Less worries about money
One of the benefits of a road trip is that there’s less stress around money. Filling up the gas tank takes a lot less than flying somewhere, plus you miss out on all the scenery along the way if you fly. (I’m talking about flying in the air not low to the ground-high driving speeds.)
Slower schedule
When you’re on a road trip the schedule is as fast as the speed allows.
I do have to say that I am one of those people that generally doesn’t go on a road trip unless I have a specific destination in mind. I’m not one to just hop in the car and drive just to drive. My dad loves to do this! He’s OK to go out and drive for 6 hours just to drive. This is not me! So, when I say that the schedule is slower, I mean that the car can only go so fast and to enjoy the slower pace while you are riding in the car.
See some new vistas
A road trip allows you the opportunity to see new things or new places that you’ve never seen before. I am reminded of the time that my husband and I took a trip to Wisconsin (from Utah). On the way back we came down through the bottom half of South Dakota and into Wyoming, through Thunder Basin National Grassland. In Wyoming I had only ever seen Cheyenne and whatever else is along Interstate-80. But on this particular Sunday morning, we were in the northeastern part of Wyoming. It was beautiful—rolling hills and fields of grain. It made for a very peaceful Sunday morning. So soothing.
Family Fun
In my family we all like to travel together. Whenever we go somewhere we rent a large van. As our family has expanded, we are now to the 15-passenger van (also known as the “prison van”.) We do this because we all like to be in the same vehicle. We shared this idea with my brother and then he started doing that with his family. He called it Forced Family Fun. Meaning the time together was going to be fun but sometimes can feel forced because you have to coordinate with other people’s schedules. Also, not everyone wants to see the same things.
I remember our trip to Yellowstone one spring. One of my daughters was just like “oh will this ever end?”. There was so much road construction in Yellowstone that it did make it a little less exciting and took us a lot longer to get places. I remember when we drove by the sign that said “halfway to the equator” (not the first time, but the second) and I had a great aha that “we are in an awesome place”.
Road trips give lots of opportunity to talk with each other and to reminisce about previous road trips (where we may have been lost) and to talk about future road trips.
Husband time
One of my favorite things that I like about road trips is the time that I get to spend sitting next to my husband (he is driving). I like sitting next to him no matter where we’re at, but I do enjoy our time together in the car. We don’t always have to be talking. I like being with him and holding hands. We may even get in a little flirting and beyond 😉.
Road trips…
My mom and dad were big on road trips. With ten kids it’s really all you can afford. They loaded us all up in the station wagon for a ride and off we were to drive and drive and even more driving.
One summer during a two weeks’ time period, my dad and mom took us all the way to North Carolina (from Utah), up to New York State, and then we made our way back home. Before we left on this trip, my parents asked each one of us kids what we wanted to see along the way. On our journey out we hit some of these spots and on the way back we finished the rest. One of my memories from this trip is the fantastic lightning and thunder storms in the Midwest. Nothing is more beautiful than a lightning and thunder storm in the Midwest. It is amazing! We don’t get that kind of lightning and thunder storms where I live. Another favorite memory from that trip was the lighting bugs or fire flies. They were so beautiful to see. Again, we don’t have those where I live. This is one of the beauties of a road trip. Seeing unfamiliar landscape, cities, towns, and cultures.
God created a very beautiful earth for our enjoyment.
Start burning up the road😊
What are some of your favorite road trips? After being in quarantine for the last year where do you want to go?
Let’s talk about it!