Road trip

I love a good road trip. The kind where you dress in comfy clothes, and pack up a bunch of rockin' tunes, a cooler full of snacks and a good attitude. A real good one lasts many hours, if not days.

I got the road trip urge as I tooled around town on Saturday morning. I ran a few errands to the gas station, library and bank before we headed to Port Franks for the weekend. But as I slipped a Bon Jovi CD into the player, the travel bug bit me. All of a sudden I wanted to fill the tank with gas, grab the GPS and hightail off to parts unknown.

With a road trip, there's not only the joy of the destination, but the sights, activities, food, music and conversation along the way.

Luckily, Michael feels the same way about hopping in the car for long jaunts. In fact, we cemented our relationship with a road trip out west. We'd only been dating a couple months when my beloved little Volkswagen Rabbit diesel blew a piston and was out of commission. Michael and I had both been planning to visit friends in western Canada that summer. With my car woes, he suggested we travel together. After some negotiating about where we'd go and for how long, we were off for 12 straight days together. Although we'd only been together for three months, we got along great and that awesome camping/visiting trip made us both realize we were meant to be together forever.

Now our kids also enjoy/tolerate road trips. Tara went on her first when she was only 10 months old. It was 2002. Michael and I overlapped maternity/parental leave and vacation, packed up our 1978 pop-up tent trailer and went on the road with our four-year old and baby for a month of camping, visiting and site seeing.

On that cool May morning, we started in London to travel across Canada. We went almost all the way to Vancouver via the Canadian route, then drove down through Seattle to Portland and took the second row of states (for the most part) back to London.

We dressed in layers when we left and experienced 100 degree farenheit weather on the way back. We saw the statue of Terry Fox, the corner of Portage and Main, the Rocky Mountains, Mount Rushmore, Craters of the Moon National Park, Old Faithful, good friends, snow, dust, bugs and more. It was awesome.

When my parents escaped to the Florida sunshine for five months every winter, we took advantage of the free accomodation their little trailer provided for a winter holiday. For nine years, we headed down the I-75 to spend two weeks in the warmth of the sunshine state. Except for one year, we completed the trek in 24 hours straight; not only to give us more time to enjoy at our destination, but save money as well. The various states on the drive down offer some varied and interesting scenery (okay, maybe not Michigan and Ohio).

I'm not sure where my next road trip will take me, but despite the urge, I'm not quite ready. My quick Saturday-morning errands left me tired due to my low hemoglobin and the whole recovery process. But one day in the not-so-distant future, I hope we'll gas up the van and grab the GPS to head off on another road-trip adventure.

Tina