Tuesday, June 02, 2009

The Great American Road Trip

Back in the day of un-affordable air travel, my parents and I used to road trip across the country at least once a year. Usually it was to visit some relatives somewhere (like when we lived in Montreal and my dad's family lived in southern California). I can't count how many hours I spent in the backseat of one car or another, begging my parents to play the license plate game or Amboy or Animal Poker. I slept a lot, too, because my parents always said that made the trip go faster.

Here's a shot from the driver's seat of my old blazer on one of our cross-country moves.

But, since airfares came into the non-astronomical range, most of our regular travels (outside of moving, of course) are of the airborne variety. Until now....

This weekend I'm flying up to Oklahoma City to visit my parents on their 43rd(!) anniversary and to see the opening of my dad's new show (The Full Monty). Then, then next day, we're driving(!!!) their car and a rented van all the way to Las Vegas. That's a 14+ hour drive, folks, across some of the--shall we say--less than majestic regions of the country. It's going to be hot and long and very, very flat.

Do you have any good time-passing advice/activities/suggestions to make the long drive seem less ... endless?

Hugs,
TLC

OH. MY. GODS. (now in paperback!)
GODDESS BOOT CAMP (coming next week!)
teralynnchilds.com

10 comments:

Alyson Noel said...

Wow, congrats to your parents--that's awesome!!

We drive to Vegas a lot- but from Orange County- it's only 3 hours, but still, books on tape are a God send, and we're especially fond of David Sedaris ones. Nothing like laughing for 3 hours straight!

Have a wonderful trip!

TinaFerraro said...

Tera, I LOVED the picture of the open road. Those were the days! In fact, my family is going to go the LA/Vegas drive this summer, so I'm also curious what our readers come up with. But I love Alyson's idea of the books on tape. Also, I don't think you can go wrong with an iPod!

Kwana said...

Have fun and congrats to you parents. Portable DVD is the best. Books on CD are so much fun too. Bring a comfy pillow.

Marley Gibson said...

Books on tape?

Have a wonderful, safe trip!

Summer said...

good luck! I used to love my road trips with my parents back in the day. Take pics, that's fun.

Cara King said...

My childhood travels were just like yours, Tera! And full of "Larry hit me!" "No I didn't!" and other fun interludes...

In addition to books on tape, you can have someone in the car actually read a book out loud -- that's fun!

I also enjoy the license plate game, and GHOST, and 20 questions. And I don't know the name of the next game, but I find it very absorbing; it's sort of like a verbal Mastermind:

One person thinks up a word, and tells the others how many letters are in it. Then the others guess a word, and the first person tells them how many letters are correct (order doesn't matter.) My family loves it.

For example, if the word were "books":

A: FIVE LETTERS
B: coven?
A: ONE CORRECT
B: coves?
A: TWO CORRECT
B: maven?
A: NONE CORRECT

etc...

Good luck!

Me said...

Thanks for the suggestions! Although the pillow and iPod are out (I'll actually be doing most of the driving!) the books on tape might be just what the road trip ordered. =)

Cari said...

Audiobooks! They are great and you can listen alone or together.

stephhale said...

MAD LIBS! I used to love doing those! Happy anniversary to Mom & Pop! Be safe!

Heather Davis said...

Wow - cool for your parents and yay for your dad! Is he an actor or director?

Also, on the not getting bored thing -- I, too, would go with the books on tape idea. I had a boyfriend in college that loved to listen to books on tape on our road trips -- it does make the time fly by... ;)