3,000 Mile Road Trip

I recently completed a Christmas road trip that took me through 8 states in the span of 9 days. I put more than 3,000 miles on my little Mazda 3 and re-established an enormous appreciation of the United States in the process. Nothing can beat the smooth open highways of Virginia or Tennessee's rolling hillsides. We started in Maryland and went all the way to Texas with a detour through Kentucky and West Virginia on the way back. The best part of any road trip however, is the people you meet along the way.

I recall dining at an Arkansas Cracker Barrel restaurant and dealing with a ridiculously friendly waitress who more than earned her tip. Later that night, we were forced to abandon the highway due to severe rain and an upcoming ice storm. I knew this, not only from my Android smart phone weather channel app, but from a friendly, coffee-sipping state trooper at a road-side stop who warned a couple of us drivers that the Interstate was closed about 100 miles south.

At the same stop, I chatted with a fella who claimed to have driven an '85 Chevrolet pick-up from New York without stopping for sleep. He was heading to Las Vegas and planned to push through the bad weather. My little compact Mazda seemed terribly urban compared to his ride and to the massive trucks that took up the majority of the parking lot yet, I knew I was probably more comfortable inside with my mp3 player and telescopic steering.

Further into Texas, you simply cannot help but greet everyone you see and discuss your travels with other fellow voyagers such is the nature of my home state. Texas is just friendly and that's how we are and we genuinely want to know how "yer doin". An older couple just couldn't get over how cute our daughter was and we all remarked upon the hideously cold weather in Texarkana.

This was the first long road trip on which I used a GPS. I was simply blown away at how easy it was to find the next gas station or fulfill a Starbuck's craving by simply searching for the next establishment via the push of a few buttons. I felt super high tech yet, recalled the days when I did the same thing with a simple atlas. Now, I had the GPS plus my Android phone so not only did I know exactly where I was at all times, I also knew the weather and the fact that Abraham Lincoln was born in Kentucky...cool.

The most pleasant surprise was adding two new states to my repertoire; Kentucky and West Virginia. Both turned out to be beautiful and nothing beat the sensation of cruising through West Virginia at night in extreme fog and rain. As scary as it was, I was in a state of bliss testing the Mazda's fog lights, defroster and ultra efficient wipers (aftermarket).

My family was with me as well and they took the whole trip in stride. I was extremely grateful to NOT have been anywhere near an airport as the weather was causing massive delays throughout the country. When you are driving, you simply need to pull off the road if things get bad. I'm telling you, put me in a car any day compared with the hassles of flying. If only there was a decent way to drive to Africa.

top photo: it may be small but the Mazda 3 is comfy, roomy, smooth and fast

middle photo: don't get behind one of these in the rain
bottom photo: that's how we techies do it, no matter how tacky the dash gets