Tuesday, November 12, 2013

The Background Music to Our Early Adventures

Before kids, COW and I had the best adventures.  We would start out on a Saturday, our only firm plans being the direction we would go.  We'd drive on back roads, stopping whenever something caught the eye of one of us.  Wherever we were on Wednesday was our turnaround point, and we headed home using a different route.  Reception on the radio was spotty at best, so we brought our small stack of CDs to play all week.  We know every word to every song on those CDs.  When Jen challenged the Twisted-Mix Tape crowd to come up with "Epic" songs which tell a story, I immediately thought of those fabulous vacations wandering all over the US.





Our first trip we ever took was around Lake Michigan.  We stopped in Holland to see the windmills and the candle makers and the wood shoes.  We stopped in Mackinac Island in the Upper Peninsula.  One memory that sticks out from that trip was our search for a hotel one night.  It was pretty late in the day, and there weren't many places to stay.  We had found a chain hotel, but they were booked solid.  The only other place we found (Remember, this was back in the day before cell phones, let alone smart phones.)  was a little motel that advertised $25/night.  We weren't exactly excited to stay there, but we didn't have much choice.

We walked into the office and were greeted by the sweetest elderly couple you ever could meet.  We stood and talked with them for a good long while.  If we were hungry, the wife would be happy to MAKE a pizza for us.  There was a big blueberry patch in the back, and they told us to make sure we loaded up any container we had before checking out.  Once we got to the room, there were little signs all over it telling us what to do if we needed more towels, alerting us to the free donuts and coffee in the morning, and the channels which came on the TV.  The notes were all in the woman's handwriting.


On our second trip, we headed west from Indiana.  We made it all the way to Oklahoma City that year.  It was quite soon after the bombing, so the day there was quite emotional.  The fence was still up, adorned with all of the signs, stuffed animals, balloons, and other things mourners had left behind.  It was the first time I had ever seen anything like it, and the images have stayed with me.

We had loads of fun being our usual, silly selves through the rest of the trip, though.  We stopped at the National Cowboy Hall of Fame, got stopped by cows (and eventually buffalo) crossing the road when we went to the buffalo preserve, and we saw the arch over St. Louis for the first time.

One stop was in a tiny, tiny town where the first Native American Heisman Trophy winner was from.  COW wanted a photo in front of the man's childhood home.  When we got to the site, there was a sign sitting right in between two houses.  With all of the historical places we've been to, we assumed the log cabin was the home we were looking for.  We got out, COW struck the Heisman pose in front of it, and we drove to Main St.  COW thought my dad would love a postcard from there, so he went on a hunt along the road.  It was pouring down rain, so I stayed in the car. 

I watched him go in the store, come out and run across the street.  A few seconds later, he came out and ran back across the street to a new door.  He did this same thing three or four times while I watched and laughed my head off in the car.  Finally, he came back without a postcard.  He said each place he went suggested another one. 

I laughed and laughed and laughed.  You know all of those people were messing with him.  In a town that small, surely everyone on the street knew who did and did not carry postcards.  They just kept sending him from place to place so they could make fun of him at the next town meeting.

Oh, and the house?  COW did ask at one of the places he stopped.  It wasn't the log cabin.  We had to go back and take another photo.



Our last vacation before kids took us south.  I was actually almost 7 months pregnant with Phoenix at the time.  Our last hurrah if you will.  We took the Natchez Trace for part of our trip, and had a lovely time stopping at places along the way.  We managed to make it all the way to New Orleans, where we spent all of 5 hours.  We took a fantastic 3 hour tour, just us and the tour guide we met in the back of a little café area.  There was a little bit of everything on that tour, from architecture to food to history to voodoo in the cemetery.  When in New Orleans, you can't leave without tasting the local fare, so we had some lunch on the patio of a little local place.  Delicious.



Once the kids started coming, we had to give up the purely adventurous trips.  There is no way we were going to be hunting for a hotel at night with four kids in tow.  However, we have kept that adventurous spirit.  We usually leave a day early for vacation in order to give us time to stop along the way and explore the places we drive through.  You never know when you are going to come across a park called Balls Falls.

Feel free to jump in with your own Epic songs!

My Skewed View

Have a lovely day!


28 comments:

  1. v cool. the road trips as much, if not more than the music itself!

    Your Post describes how road trips should be, long on random, short on careful planning and anticipation.
    I assume that the process of getting to and from New Orleans, on your last vacation before kids, took more time than you actually spent in the target city. I use the expression, 'touching hands'* in reference to that approach to travel and tourism.

    There *is* a Balls Falls! ( I looked it up...I know, what a surprise.)

    *after a long forgotten kids game called touching hands, i.e. to see who was most daring and adventurous investigating abandoned and/or scary buildings

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    1. Thanks!
      We were living in Bloomington, IN, when we went on that last trip. It took us 4 days to get there. :)

      Yes, sir, there is! We drove 40 minutes off the beaten path to find it and take a photo. I was short on time writing this, so I didn't include the photo. I'll try to find it and add it to the post.

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  2. I like the way you weaved the songs into your road trip stories.

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  3. What a wonderful story.. Wished we could have done trips like that as newly-weds..

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    1. Thank you! If not as newlyweds, perhaps as empty nesters? :)

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  4. Road trips with the parents were the bane of my existence as a kid and I still avoid them when I can. But yours sounded so adventurous and fun! Great soundtrack you included to accompany our trip with you.

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    1. Ha! Do your parents often ask you to join them on road trips?
      I want to enjoy my vacations, and long, long stretches in the car with wiggly kids is not fun. We get out to do things for our own sanity. :)
      Thank you!

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  5. I LOVE this post. First because I saw that you traveled in my former neck of the woods, northern Michigan and I have been to all of those same places. :) Second, the music just rocks. You have excellent taste. :) And third because my sis and I do these little road trips all the time. I recently moved back to Idaho so our road trips - minus kids because they're all gloriously grown and on their own.. Lol.. - take us primarily, for the moment, in the north west.. My ultimate road trip is Alaska via Canada.. I'm ready. My sis is not.
    GREAT post. Thanks for stopping by my place. I appreciate the comments. :)

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    1. Yippee! I'm glad.
      Ah, northern Michigan is a beautiful area...in the summer. Did you move because of the miserable winters? :)
      Thank you!
      We've never made it farther west than Oklahoma. Some day... I would love the trip to Canada. My sister used to live in Canada, then moved to Florida. She had to make that drive with only her baby while her husband had flown there to start her job. I don't think she would go with me on that road trip. I hope you get your chance to go!

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  6. A great story and fab music, the Eric Clapton one is one of my favourites, I just love that guitar melody.

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    1. Thank you! I tear up every time I hear that Eric Clapton song. It's a special one for us.

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  7. This is awesome. Wonderful Tonight! Of Course! Another one I didn't even think of. I love your story too, especially that little motel, I here there is a place like that up in Viroqua Wi, I want to go visit and look forward to staying somewhere people actually care.

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    1. Thanks! I know as I go through other people's posts I'm going to be thinking the same "How did I forget that one?"
      It was such a nice little place. Too bad they were older when we were there. No way they are still in business after these 20 years. I'd love to go find it again.
      Good luck getting to that motel!
      Thanks for hosting such a fun hop.

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  8. What a great story! Love how you inserted the songs. And Balls Falls? That's terrific.

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    1. Thanks! I have got to find that photo of Ball's Falls!

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  9. You're on a roll! Keep it going and you'll have a letter done in no time ;)!

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  10. Clapton...nice! That is SO cool that you guys used to do that! I love it. Those are the best kinda memories. And road trips will really test a relationship. The fact that you guys could travel all over the U.S. really shows you are best buds. We drove to Colorado one year WITH the boys. It wasn't awful, but they were old enough to play with handheld games and watch movies, so that's why it was possible. No diapers or crying. Unless you're talking about me.

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    1. Is there a song of Clapton's that doesn't tell a story? He's just plain fantastic.
      I'm glad it comes through. We always have been the best of friends. In fact, our parents used to say (in denial of us actually dating) when we were dating all through high school, "Oh, they are just really good friends".

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    2. You married you High School sweetheart? Wow. not many people can say that! Awesome!

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  11. It's funny that we took some of the same trips - we went around Lake Michigan with our pop-up trailer when our kids were young. We went to Mackinaw Island and the UP. Jim and I drove the Natchez Trace a few years ago. There is so much to see in this country!

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    1. I'm telling you, we are the same people. I can't understand people who always go to the same place for vacation each and every year. There is so much to see and do, I don't think I'll be able to see it all in my lifetime!

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  12. Sounds like you two really had a blast on those trips! D and I do books on tape when we road trip, but our adventures are pretty similar to yours otherwise! Little planning and lots of surprises.

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    1. We did. We've never tried books on tape (Could we age ourselves anymore by saying "on tape"?). We enjoy singing these songs at the top of our lungs too much.
      Lack of planning is what allows the fun to happen!

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  13. Ah yes, Wonderful Tonight! Another one I didn't think of...

    Nice list and great way of weaving them in throughout your stories. :) ..makes me reminisce about my own "before kids" life..

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  14. Very cool. I loved your stories of your road-trips :) And how awesome that you found a place called 'Balls Falls'! There's a place not far from here called 'Sandy Balls'. They have a famous golf course, and a camp site.

    I still think the Bermuda trip's my fave, though the little hotel does sound adorable.

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  15. I love road trips! And I love the mental picture of COW running from one shop to another, looking for postcards.

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Thank you for taking the time to tell me what you're thinking!