I got this text message recently: “Gonna be a long drive. Any advice, road warrior?”
And I thought yes, yes I do have advice about road tripping.
That’s actually a thing I have extensive experience with. A lot of experience. My road-trip was driven by a cross-country move. Yours might be for a vacation, for educational purposes, or to visit family or friends. Any way you swing it, I think I have some insight or best practices from my 3,000 miles on the road.
Traveling alone, although not for the faint of heart, allows
you to get started when you feel like it, stop when you feel like it, fart
whenever you like without shame, be in complete control of music selection, and
allow for uninhibited car-karaoke. Take some of my tips below to optimize your
solo road-trip, or keep your buddy road trip in the not-suck-too-much zone.
Route Planning:
1. Know your budget. If you’re on a higher budget, you can
afford to be more lenient, and pick places to stay/hotels as you see them. If
you’re on a lower budget, you need to plan ahead and carefully scout the areas
you’re planning on staying in order to find inexpensive hotel deals (compare
prices, and be sure to ask about things like AAA discounts, corporate
discounts, and frequent traveler programs. I stayed completely at La Quinta
Inns, and by the end of my trip, my rooms were free, and I never paid more than
$90/night).
2. Block off your driving time by picking a lunch/midday
location and a dinner/evening location. This’ll give you about 4-5 hours of
driving time in the morning and 4-5 hours of driving time in the afternoon.
3. About 4 hours is about the maximum time you can go without
peeing.
4. Any single person driving more than 10 hours a day might
quickly go crazy.
5. Write out your list of midday/evening locations (on paper,
with addresses). You can check the driving time between these using Google
Maps.
6. Research tourist attractions and local food specialties for
each midday/evening stop. Try to have planned one thing to do/check out
everywhere you stop (if you don’t make it to everything/get too tired, no
worries!). However, if you see something awesome beside the highway, stop!
7. I planned my route around how much I felt like driving on
any given day, and this was a good call. You might add some mileage, but you
get to explore more and feel better.
Gear and Entertainment:
1. Buy a car phone charger. They tend to be inexpensive (I got
mine on Amazon.com). This is particularly important if you’re also using your
phone as your GPS.
2. Figure out in advance how you’re going to listen to outside
music/radio. Local stations get weird/unreceptive in small towns, so know in
advance if you’re going to an Ipod hookup/XM radio app, and double-check that
you’ll be able to comfortably plug everything in (get a car adapter splitter if
needed – these are also pretty cheap).
3. If you’re in for a really long haul, consider a few
different sources of media: music, audiobooks, podcasts – different genres.
Otherwise the hours blend together and get really trippy. My favorite is ‘This
American Life’. NPR records a lot of original content – it sounds dorky, but
you get into it. The best rule to stick by is that if you’re driving for 10
hours, you want about 30 hours of potential entertainment. Options feel good. I
never had to listen to the same thing twice.
4. Pack some extra plastic bags in a variety of sizes – trash bags,
sandwich bags, freezer bags, shopping bags, etc. Don’t ask, just do it. You’ll
be thankful.
Car Setup:
1. Things to keep within arm’s reach:
Place to put trash
Napkins or paper towels,
Snacks
Sunglasses
Hand sanitizer
A baseball cap
A zip-front sweatshirt or front-button
cardigan
Cash in small bills and change.
Water
2. Road change for tolls: EZPass is awesome where it’s
accepted, but otherwise, it’s advisable for every day of driving to have $5 in
singles and $3 in quarters.
3. If there’s any possibility that you’re driving into a sunset
or in a high-sun/heat area, you need both sunglasses AND a baseball cap.
4. To effectively pack a car, first fill up the empty seat-feet
wells. Then place large or rigid items first, then fill up empty space with
other things.
Snacks and Drinks:
1. If you’re trying to minimize pee breaks, only keep 8 ounces
of water or less nearby for any given 4-hour stretch of time (this method means
you should aim to drink a lot of extra water at night, otherwise you’ll
dehydrate and get headaches).
2. Water bottles with sippy tops are preferable to water
bottles with twisty tops. This is a general statement, but it’s a serious
preference for road trips, where using two hands to do something is dangerous!
3. You want a variety of snacks and snack
types. Honestly? You will get sick of eating junk 24/7. You’ll feel less like
self-hatred if you pack some healthy options.
4. All fruits and veggies need to be pre-washed, and cut up
into individual sized pieces. Also, keep these in a cooler or fridgepack.
5. Food items necessitate the trash can. Be sure to empty this
nightly or you will learn the olfactory glories of having a banana peel rot in
your car for 3 days in the sun.
6. Wash your hands with Purell or antibacterial hand gel after
eating something sticky.
7. Single-serving packages are superior to large packs. If you
spill a single bag of crackers, could be worse. If you spill a large bag of crackers,
you’re in FUCKING CRUMB CITY AND YOU WILL NEVER RECOVER.
8. If you bring something chocolate or
chocolate/yogurt-covered, it will melt and become disgusting and inedible.
Limit your chocolate fix to M&M’s, or post-driving treats. Dessert is an
excellent opportunity to check out local bakeries.
9. Snack if you need help staying awake. It’s okay. Just remember
that salty/sugary snacks might make you thirsty, so prep for extra bathroom
breaks
10. Every morning, take advantage of fast food stops/hotel ice
machines – fill a large, widemouth water bottle with ice. Use this to keep
fruit/veg cold in the morning, and then use it as a source of cold water in the
afternoon.
Good veggie options: cucumber slices, celery sticks, baby carrots, bell
pepper strips
Bad veggie options: whole butternut squash, raw eggplants, corn on the
cob
Good fruit options: grapes, berries (stems pre-cut-off), apple slices
(drizzle lemon juice on these to keep them looking fresh), bananas, mango cut
into sticks
Bad
fruit options: oranges, whole pineapple, coconuts
Good
protein options: toasted chickpeas, edamame, shelled nuts or seeds, cheese
sticks, turkey jerky
Bad protein options: turkey legs, gallon of milk, live cow, peanut butter + spoon
Good carby/salty options: Single-serving chips/snack bags (plantain
chips, veggie chips, Popchips, Triscuit), granola bars (Kashi are my favorite),
PB&J wrapped in a paper towel & tin foil.
Bad carby/salty options: Microwave popcorn (unless you have a car in your
microwave), breakfast cereal (hard to eat), pita & hummus
Good sweet options: Gummy candy
(NOT THE KIND COVERED IN THAT AWESOME SOUR SUGAR STUFF. IF YOU SPILL THAT
STUFF, YOU WILL NEVER GET IT OUT OF YOUR CAR), pre-packaged brownies/cookies
(No Oreos – crumb problem), jelly beans, dried fruit
Bad sweet options: Ice cream,
pudding, candy bars, any baked goods not in pre-single-serving-sized packages.
Tips To Not Feel Like Crap:
1. Every time you stop driving, do 25-50 jumping jacks and then
stretch a little. Stretch the body parts that will feel the most repetitive use
and joint stress from sitting all day: reach out to the sides and then
overhead, return to neutral. Then, move your arms behind your body and try to
hold your own hand to stretch your shoulders and chest a bit. With straight
legs, reach over to touch your toes, then slowly try bending one knee at a
time. Stand up slowly, rounding your back. Raise one knee up towards your
chest, then press your knee and leg a few inches to the right and to the left –
as far as you feel comfortable going, then rotate your foot in a few circles in
each direction. Then do the other knee. (What’s happening here: the jumping
jacks warm up your body a bit so that stretching is a little safer, and then
you’re stretching out your arms, shoulders, chest, legs, back, hips, and
ankles). Stretch every time you stop. Really. Otherwise you’ll get to your
final destination at night and feel twice as tired, stiff, and shitty.
2. Sunscreen any bare skin – face, arms, neck, shoulders, and
legs. Otherwise you’ll have a terrible surprise
at the end of the day when you roll the window up and discover that you’ve
partially turned into a lobster. Even if the windows are up, the glass will not
save you.
3. This is the time to wear PJ pants, sweatpants, yoga pants,
leggings, and gym shorts. Do not wear anything you wouldn’t wear to a
Starbucks. Be clothed while driving, but be comfy.
4. Good driving shoes: no flip flops, no clogs, no heels, no
winter boots. Sneakers work well, sandals with some kind of ankle-strap work
well, comfy ballet flats work well, and moccasin-type shoes tend to work well.
Car and Auto Maintenance:
1. Get your vehicle checked out by a mechanic about 1-2 weeks
before leaving on your road trip. Do you know how many horror films start with
a car breaking down in the woods somewhere strange? The quick-fix: DOUBLE CHECK
THAT YOUR CAR WON’T BREAK DOWN.
2. Refill windshield washer fluid before you leave.
3. Refill your gas tank before it hits ¼ full. In Bohunk,
NoWheresVille there is only one gas station every 100 miles. Don’t chance it.
4. At every gas station, clean your windshield. Otherwise, the
dead bugs dry out and get hard to remove.
Safety:
1. If you are traveling alone, make sure at least 2 people know
where you are staying every night, and be sure to check in with them regularly.
These two people should also know how to contact one another.
2. Bring pepper spray. Or a taser. If you’re male or female.
The only true rule of the road is that there is someone out there bigger and weirder
than you are.
3. Only leave in your car what you don’t mind getting stolen. During
the day, every time you leave the car, keep high-value items with you in a
small backpack or big purse (Besides wallet, phone, keys… “high-value” includes
your: passport, social security card, vehicle title, GPS, and any nice
jewelry). Every time you leave your car, hide or remove proof of electronics
(shove GPS/Phone mounts or cables into glove compartment). I unpacked my car
every night, and repacked it every morning. Things it’s okay to leave in your
car: trash can, paper towels, snacks (nothing you need to refrigerate). Call me
paranoid, but I like my stuff.
Staying Connected:
1. Know in advance how you’re going to stay in contact with
people you might meet on the road. I figured out which e-mail address I was
comfortable with sharing and now I have some pretty awkward pen pals.
2. Tell your friends you won’t be able to answer text messages
as consistently on days you’re traveling. Don’t text and drive.
3. Make voice memos of things you see or think about while you’re
driving. When you’ve stopped, take pictures of everything – even dumb things. Share
the details with friends.
4. Know your budget for souvenirs and stick to that. You don’t
have to buy something everywhere you stop, unless you’re aiming for those
50-states magnet collection. Buy things that will remind you of a place you
stayed or explored that you can also use in everyday life – coffee mugs, apartment
decorations, tee-shirts, etc. If you buy random crap, you will end up with
random crap. No one likes pencils and you probably don’t need another keychain.
Road tripping is awesome. Everyone should do one at one point during their life.
On the personal side of things, turns out I don't know what poison oak looks like. Holy fuck I'm dying. Can I scratch my legs off?
