I love to travel. I'm still not a huge fan of flying. Not on principle, just on actual execution. I know the fear is irrational (especially when compared with the higher likely hood of being in a car accident) but it's still there. But sometimes a plane is just necessary, or way more efficient.
Any how back to my love of travel. I grew up in a family big on vacations. We would take 2-week driving vacations every summer. We would do lunches at rest stops on the highway, eating out of a cooler/suitcase of food we'd pack. There was usually an option of some sort of canned tuna/chicken/ham or PB&J, string cheese, crackers, chips, green pepper slices, mini tomatoes, granola bars, etc. There was also usually a half gallon of milk, a pitcher of ice tea, and a pitcher of lemonade in the cooler too. We did cereal for breakfast. And the tea/lemonade was the powdered stuff, so we could easily make up a new batch whenever we needed any. There are some foods I can't eat without thinking of sitting at a picnic bench.
I loved those vacations. I realize that Manda and I would sometimes fight in the back seat, and sometimes we'd spend a little too long in the van in a day, but some of my best childhood memories are from those trips. We went to DC, Colorado, Maine, Gettysburg, Tennessee, Wyoming, and Montana. One of the last major roadtrips we did as a family was to Alabama my senior year. We drove down through Nashville and saw the Grand Ole Opry, which was my part of the deal. The rest of my family are big golfers and were excited to gold a Bobby Jones course in AL, my payment for doing that was an Opry concert. :) We played games on the road. The license plate game taught us that Louisiana folks didn't leave the state much, unless they were headed to Hershey, PA. We loved playing Mad Libs and reading a bunch of books.
We've always been a close family, but looking back I realize how close we had to be to survive 2 weeks in a minivan like that. I would do it again in a heartbeat. Those trips really sparked the traveling bug in me. And I think they brought us closer too. Reminiscing about those trips is a little bittersweet though as they remind me of my grandpa, who came along with us on a few of those trips. Sadly, my family and my grandmother had to say goodbye to my grandpa last July. He always got a kick out of those trips. I'm glad I got to spend that time with my grandparents. Those are memories I'll cherish forever.
Maybe it's time to make some new memories too. Anyone up for a family-style roadtrip??
Any how back to my love of travel. I grew up in a family big on vacations. We would take 2-week driving vacations every summer. We would do lunches at rest stops on the highway, eating out of a cooler/suitcase of food we'd pack. There was usually an option of some sort of canned tuna/chicken/ham or PB&J, string cheese, crackers, chips, green pepper slices, mini tomatoes, granola bars, etc. There was also usually a half gallon of milk, a pitcher of ice tea, and a pitcher of lemonade in the cooler too. We did cereal for breakfast. And the tea/lemonade was the powdered stuff, so we could easily make up a new batch whenever we needed any. There are some foods I can't eat without thinking of sitting at a picnic bench.
I loved those vacations. I realize that Manda and I would sometimes fight in the back seat, and sometimes we'd spend a little too long in the van in a day, but some of my best childhood memories are from those trips. We went to DC, Colorado, Maine, Gettysburg, Tennessee, Wyoming, and Montana. One of the last major roadtrips we did as a family was to Alabama my senior year. We drove down through Nashville and saw the Grand Ole Opry, which was my part of the deal. The rest of my family are big golfers and were excited to gold a Bobby Jones course in AL, my payment for doing that was an Opry concert. :) We played games on the road. The license plate game taught us that Louisiana folks didn't leave the state much, unless they were headed to Hershey, PA. We loved playing Mad Libs and reading a bunch of books.
We've always been a close family, but looking back I realize how close we had to be to survive 2 weeks in a minivan like that. I would do it again in a heartbeat. Those trips really sparked the traveling bug in me. And I think they brought us closer too. Reminiscing about those trips is a little bittersweet though as they remind me of my grandpa, who came along with us on a few of those trips. Sadly, my family and my grandmother had to say goodbye to my grandpa last July. He always got a kick out of those trips. I'm glad I got to spend that time with my grandparents. Those are memories I'll cherish forever.
Maybe it's time to make some new memories too. Anyone up for a family-style roadtrip??
Aww this is so All-American! Whenever I read anything like this it makes me think of Bill Bryson's stories in Thunderbolt Kid - similar sort of thing. Driving all the way to Disneyland, etc. My family holidays were to a wee town up north called Portmahomack, where we'd stay in my uncle's caravan for 2 weeks and spend most of our time wandering down to the post office to buy sweets and kiddy magazines or digging huge holes on the beach or making epic sandcastles with moats.
ReplyDeleteThe sad part is that it's like a 3.5hour drive, and we thought that was an E-TER-NET-Y. Makes us sound like total bitchsquealers when you guys would drive so far and see so much on the road!