AAA projects 38 million Americans will take a road trip over Labor Day weekend…
These are snapshots of a world that opens to you on a road trip. Ten-foot walls of snow beside and canyon of blacktop before us, we ascend the road to Glacier Point, high above Yosemite valley on the first Spring Day it opens to vehicles.
Sandwiches at roadside stops hidden beside waterfall and alpine flowers; pink Mountain Pride and yellow Butterweed. Seals in San Francisco, dining with my daughter on Pier 39, summer hailstorms and the best build-your-own salad stop ever outside of Visalia (thank you Yelp!).
My first car was a white AMC Hornet, an oblong piece of
steel with a steering wheel and crisscross olive upholstery that my dad
purchased at a L.A. County used car auction. You could still see the shadow of
a circle on the doors where the county emblem had been peeled off. To seventeen-year-old
me it was the portal to adventure. It was a straight shot down the boulevard to
the Hollywood Hills (cue Bob Seger), Ventura Freeway took me to the canyons
and onto the coast. Always wondering what was beyond the bend. And so it began.
A warning about road trips. They are a doorway to adventure
and a catalyst to heated arguments. The best man at my wedding nearly jumped
out of the passenger door while we were driving through East Texas. My wife and
I had our first fight (on our honeymoon) because of a wrong turn. Cooped up in
a small space necessitates your ‘shot-gun’ and you get along better than most. Friends
that require lunch at noon and dinner at five, the always sober and serious, those
who choose schedule over serendipity will not be accompanying me.
The idyllic Instagram moments won’t happen if you stay
attached to your phone. Ironic. Leave the highway. Look out the window. Eat at
hole-in-the-wall places. I was first introduced to Peanut Butter whiskey at a
roadside stop. I’ve had the best beef-barley soup ever off the beaten path, and
the best breakfasts. Yes, you risk having the worst Tex-Mex meal of your life
but it’s well worth it for the story.
Solo trips are worth it. Great bonds can be formed with family
and friends. Don’t be the guy that won’t pull over until the destination. Plan
for the big things like where to sleep but buffer that Google travel time for sightseeing.
Take the old highway. If a girl at a roadside shop asks if you have neat
handwriting; help her letter the sandwich board.
Sir Richard Burton once said, “The gladdest moment in human
life, me thinks, is a departure into unknown lands.” Departure begins at the
end of your driveway or at the car rental booth at the airport. If you let it,
I promise you, the road will bring you to magnificent beauty, sumptuous road
side stops and unique encounters with other human beings. Gas up the car!
