As many of you already know, during my 35 years or so living in California, I made over 40 round-trip drives across the USA to visit friends and relatives in Massachusetts, Virginia, Tennessee, and Florida. One of the most freeing experiences for me is to be out on the open road, listening to my music and stopping wherever I choose to sample the local cuisine, take a hike or a swim, or visit some local attractions.
Continue reading “The Virtual American Road Trip”
After a peaceful drive filled with countless vistas of snowcapped mountains, I arrived in Salt Lake City by late afternoon; the surrounding mountains looked like they’d had powdered sugar dumped all over them. I couldn’t believe it was actually early May and all I could see was snow.
Continue reading “Bison, Bears, and Bighorn Sheep: A Wildlife Safari at Yellowstone National Park”
(Please note: Photo captions can be viewed by clicking on each individual photo!)
After my first three weeks on the road, I’d managed to see and visit with a total of almost 30 people. As wonderful as it had been to spend time with so many good friends and family, I was now looking forward to a much quieter second half of my trip as I headed west to wander deserts, mountains, and forests and be alone with my thoughts. Leaving Memphis on a Sunday morning, I had two rather long days of driving ahead of me to get out west where I planned to focus my time. The first day I drove to Oklahoma City, and the next day to Albuquerque, New Mexico, each about a 550-mile journey.
Continue reading “From Arches to Goblins to Canyonlands: Utah”
It had been almost a year since I’d taken any significant trips, so the combination of my itchy feet and the prospect of taking my new car on its first road trip, caused me to decide that it was time to hit the road again. Unlike the days when I was living in California and made a couple of cross- country trips each year to visit friends and family back east, these days my time is pretty much my own, so I can just meander and go where I want without being on any type of schedule. When I learned that my friend Joanne had planned to take her 93-year old mother, Norma on a road trip to Florida to visit relatives, I suggested we coordinate our plans to rendezvous first in Virginia Beach, then in Florida where we’d celebrate Norma’s 94th birthday together.
Continue reading “From Massachusetts to Virginia, Florida, and Tennessee: And That Was Only the Beginning!”
Today is September 11, 2022, 21 years since the horrible day that changed our world forever. Back in October of 2001, I actually made a pilgrimage of sorts to Lower Manhattan, as I simply had to see what had happened to New York after the events of the prior month.
Recently, in a desire to find some peace and solitude and to avoid the ever-increasing prices of even a modest hotel room, I spent a week in the mountains of eastern Tennessee and western North Carolina.
Continue reading “A Tale of Two Cabins: Tennessee and North Carolina”If you’re like me, the LAST thing you probably want to read about at this point is anything related to COVID. And yet, we also all know that it is an unavoidable topic of conversation, whether we like it or not. Rest assured that this will ultimately be a travel blog, but I really can’t tell the tale without bringing up the pandemic.
When I made my initial decision to move out of California almost two years ago, it seemed like an eternity before I would actually be leaving. But time sneaks up on us, and in the strange time warp that the COVID crisis has created, weeks and months have run together and made a lot of us lose track of time. I should have used my time more constructively while I was sheltering in place to clear out my apartment after 29 years of living there, but I procrastinated and due to the crisis, I kept pushing back my date of departure from May 31, to June 15, to June 30, to July 7 and that gave me the sense that I had all the time in the world. All I can say to those of you who have lived in one place for a long time and are thinking of moving anytime within the next 50 years, is “Start TODAY!” Let me be your cautionary tale.
For the 10 or 15 years I’ve driven cross country from San Francisco to New England (making many stops along the way) every summer and every Christmas. If you’ve read some of my other road trip blog posts, you already know that these trips are probably some of the happiest times I’ve ever experienced…
I recounted by eastbound road trip in On The Road Again, and my beautiful New England Christmas in My 12 Days of Christmas, so technically, this is Part 3 of a trilogy! Hey, it’s not Lord of the Rings, I’m not Tolkien and I’m not a hobbit… but this IS about a great travel adventure, so…
MATT: AT HOME IN THE WORLD 