Baltimore bound

I’m going to drive to Baltimore on Tuesday. The trip will take a while and traffic may slow me down some. Still, it wouldn’t be such a big deal if I wasn’t starting from my home in Southern California.

My daughter Regan, the 24-year old, recently moved to Philadelphia because she wants to live in Boston (don’t ask). She didn’t want to go alone and her roomie was interested in an adventure, so they shipped their big stuff (beds, bikes, tables and stuff) and drove the roomie’s Honda east. Now Regan wants her car so to enhance her job search capability.

My original plan was to make the drive in July when I might have a co-driver but that had to be scrapped when Regan decided she needed the car earlier than my plan called for.

The car, a Chevy Aveo, is prepped and ready. The car’s four Goodyear Eagle GT radials have been inspected, rotated and inflated for maximum performance. I have a Trip Tik supplied by the Southern California Automobile Club to keep me on the route, a GPS device to supply a vocal co-driver, a cooler for all the sodas I’m starting out with and a bunch of stuff Regan left at home but can no longer live without.

Oh, and I have a new cellphone. This one holds a charge. My last one held a charge the same way a flour sifter holds water.

The one thing I could not plan for has been the nature-related destruction along my intended route. I’m driving to Flagstaff, Arizona the first day (there are wildfires in Arizona right now), then stopping in Amarillo, Texas next. Joplin, Missouri was supposed to be next but the terrible damage caused by the storms there have forced the suddenly homeless to live in area hotels. I saw the same thing when I visited the South recently.  Anyway, the hotels in Joplin are full and I am still working on that portion of the trip.

The sharp reader will note that I am driving to Baltimore despite the fact that Regan lives in Philly. I found a flight home from Baltimore for $130 less than the cheapest flight from Philly and, since our son Sean, the 29-year old, lives with his wife, Mindy, near Baltimore, Maryland became my destination of choice. Regan will take the train to retrieve her car.

The only camera I’ll bring with me will be will be a small digital. I don’t want to be standing still with a camera in my hand when the wheels on the car could be rolling. I’ve left plenty of time for the trip, but I want to get the driving done. Still, the chance to see both our kids at the same time demands that I record the moment.

In my adult life, I have visited 31 of the 48 contiguous states. I would like to see the complete 48 before it’s all said and done and I’ll see two new ones on this trip, Missouri and West Virginia.

In all the traveling I’ve done, this will be the first time I’ve driven all the way across the continent. Our family drove from Los Angeles to Alabama a few times when I was a kid and Dad and I drove from LA to Indianapolis the day after I got my Drivers License. I’ll probably blog along the way, assuming I can stay awake long enough to write.

Thanks for reading.