Buckle up for an Insane Road Trip

First off, I want to tell the man of my dreams Happy Birthday! I love you so very much.

Hubby is retiring sometime after August 2027 (more likely January 2028). While that seems like a long time off, in the greater scheme of things is really isn’t. So we decided to do a little homework.

We’ve been talking about either Texas or Tennessee for a while now as our retirement destination. We’ve pretty much settled on Tennessee. For our family vacation this year instead of taking a 16-day cruise somewhere we decided to take a 16-day road trip. The trip was two fold. We got to see place we’ve never been before, and we got some first hand experience of life in the south. Late July and early August were the perfect time to travel. The south is famous for humidity in the summer, making it the absolute worse time to be a tourist in the deep south if you aren’t already from the south. If we are serious about moving there (and we are) this was the perfect time to be there, seeing the South at her worst. I thought I knew what humidity was, I was wrong.

We’ll get into all the details in future posts. Right now I’m still sorting through the 100 or so photos taken every day. Heads up, we typically don’t visit touristy attractions when we vacation. You won’t find us spending much on Broadway in Nashville or riding a roller coaster in Dollywood. We are more the science museums, historical sites, living history types. Those are the experiences I’ll be sharing.

Like smart travelers, my guys left work early on a Friday so we could get the first 500 miles behind us. If you have ever driven down the center of California along HWY 99, then taken 58 over to Barstow at Bakersfiled, you know just how boringly stressful that can be. It’s hot crossing the Mojave.

The landscape is dry, holding no real interest. Then there’s congested highways, and all those people driving like fools. The only surprizing moment was when we passed a small airplane on the back of a flatbed trailer just tooling down the interstate. Naturally, I had to take a picture.

Over the next few weeks I’ll share our adventures through the Petrified Forest in Arizona, the Museum of Nuclear Science in Albuquerque, Route 66 in Texas, memorials in Oklahoma, and some mountain views in Arkansas. All before reaching Tennessee. And there’s return trip home – Alabama, Mississippi, Louisiana, the lower half of Texas, different parts of New Mexico to avoid as much as possible repeats of the outbound route. Yeah, it was long, but the experiences were amazing.

Hope you enjoy the travels.