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2025-04-17
VA, MD, WV, PA
Today I finished the trip home. Not much to say about it other than there are a lot of trucks on I-81. I thought starting at 7:30 would make it easier going, but it was crowded even then. I guess everyone dislikes I-95 as much as I do. On the way down, I-81 had a lot less traffic on the weekend, especially in the morning. YMMV.
Let's look at some of the numbers:
- 19 days on the road
- Traveled through 12 states, albeit some of them briefly (i.e. WV, GA)
- 4392 miles driven
- Took 1597 pictures with my camera (plus a few dozen on the phone). Kept 706 pictures.
- 7 Museums visited, including 2 of 3 remaining Saturn V rockets
- Hiked 3 Alabama State Parks out of 21; probably puts me ahead of most of the residents of Alabama
- 6 National Park Units visited
- Caught up with 3 old friends
- Visited 5 caves including ones containing a lake, a waterfall, and a restaurant. Have to love the variety.
Of the 12 states visited, only 2 were new to me: Alabama and Mississippi. Not coincidentally, that's where I spent most of my time. Most of the driving was on surface roads, so I got to see quite a bit of both states. They are fairly similar, and honestly not that different than the area of rural PA where I reside. Admittedly I did get hassled for my Clemson hat a couple times in Alabama which is unlikely to happen elsewhere. That takes me to 49 states visited, which isn't bad considering I was at 29 states in 2018.
This trip also featured a lot less planning. Sometimes that worked well for me, sometimes not so great. The key thing that made it possible is that my vacation is not time-limited, but I expect that to more or less continue. The thing that hits you is that some stuff must be reserved in advance; whether that's an entry to a National Park, a ticket for an event, or a visit with a friend. At times I was stressed out by the lack of planning, and at other times thankful to be winging it. I definitely should have done a little more detail work in advance though; for example, I didn't have opening/closing times listed for all the the attractions that I was considering, nor did I have the correct details for the Blue Ridge Parkway. Having a navigator to work on some of this stuff on the fly would have helped. Sometimes the answer is to stop early because the destination is booked and I won't look that up while driving.
Along the same vein, I haven't figured out how to deal with weekends. They are still crowded, or campsites require two nights, or tickets are limited, or some other inconvenience. Although it would be a reprieve from the school field trips that most of the museums had, I'm guessing it would be a tradeoff with later openings and/or bigger visiting crowds. Maybe just parking someplace for a couple days and doing laundry and reading a book or something might be a good idea.
Camping didn't work out so well for me this trip. There were a number of city stops where hotels were expected, but I only got one actual camping night. The weather started off pretty nice, but a cold snap that hit while I was in MS kept me from camping on the northern leg. It's also harder to tent camp in the east without planning ahead. There are plenty of RV parks, but many of them don't have tent sites. Out west there's Bureau of Land Management (BLM) and Forrest Service land that is free to camp on, but in the Midwest and especially the East it is not so prevalent. I remain undaunted though; next trip I will try again.
I have now visited the command modules for the last three Apollo missions (15-17) on my road trips. I still have Apollo 11-14 to visit to get all the moon missions. If you're a real completionist, you can visit 6-10 as well. You can make a pretty decent road trip just visiting those, although the one in London would require a bit of extra work.
Here's a few pictures because that's always the best part. Not everything is needed to tell the story, and I don't want to overdo it, but even unrelated pictures make the post better. Thank you to everyone who vicariously came along on this trip with me as well as the people that I was able to visit on the way.
