Our drive from Google Map. We drove through the southern path and returned through the Northern one.

One of the days during the 2nd week in April, I happened to walk into a conversation between our elder son and my wife. Our son was going to get his second dose of vaccination and was planning on a  long road trip to visit some national parks. At the end of it all, the trip turned into one that my wife and I would also accompany him. Our younger one had work to do so he couldn’t. All three were fully vaccinated by then and we were excited. Our son had it all planned and it was supposed to be for a couple of weeks, so there was not much for me to do.

We love such road trips and visits to the parks. We have done them a few times. In 1983 my wife and I (poor grad students) drove from NY City down to Florida and back, stopping on the way at all sorts of interesting places and staying with friends or Motel 6! Similarly, we did a trip in 1984 going from NY City to California and back over 5 weeks. We saw a few events at the LA Olympics that year. Subsequently, we had flown to Denver with the kids and drove around some of the parks in Colorado, Wyoming, South Dakota etc. and a few times to California and drove around in CA, AZ, NV etc. They are just a lot of fun.

I was suggesting that we rent a car rather than drive our own, to avoid any issues along the way. Soon I came to the realization that if we were to rent a comfortable car it was turning out to be too expensive (it almost looked like the rental car companies were overcharging to recover lost revenue from COVID). Besides, one of our cars is very comfortable and had only 30K miles on it, so we decided thats what we will go with.

There was mutual understanding that we all will mix in a bit of work on days when we had planned long drives and no visits to parks or other sightseeing. I have a Verizon MiFi which could be used for WiFi connectivity in the car and we had our laptops in case we need to use them. However, there was a small problem. We needed to charge three phones and needed a way to charge MiFi and a laptop if needed. We could manage the phones because the car has one cigarette lighter and two USB charging ports, but not MiFi and a laptop. Certainly not my MacBook Pro requiring 96W.

After researching whats out there, I ordered a 200W charger from Amazon Prime for next day delivery. Had NO IDEA such powerful chargers for cars existed. 4 USB ports and 2 AC outlets. Though we used our laptops sparingly while driving, this was a comfort that was well worth it. And we followed the instructions carefully by turning it off when we stopped the car, to avoid the car battery being drained unnecessarily or even pulling it off completely.

We were pleasantly surprised by the availability of cell signals most of the way during our trip. For me, this was important not necessarily for dealing with emails, but in the event we are stranded, I wanted to make sure we can get in touch with someone. We drove almost 20-25% of the time through the parts of the country where there was no signal or feeble signal! It would have been pretty scary to be stuck with a car problem there. I was thinking about our trip in 1984 when we had none of these communication facilities, but, we were young then and far more adventurous (and stupid)!

Anyways, thankfully, the car performed admirably and was very comfortable. We enjoyed the sceneries and the sheer vastness in many parts of the country. I even remarked that we are spending billions of dollars to find ways to inhabit other planets when we have so much uninhabited land on earth. Why wouldn’t we invest in creative ways to settle people here. But then, realized that it may be easier to do it elsewhere than on earth because of all the politics…

Google Maps was perfect in routing us, but when we had no signal, this was an issue. I wish Google Maps incorporated the cell signal availability along the routes for the different providers and preemptively downloaded the route maps for offline use. Somewhat like Waze or Google Maps warning of traffic jams.

We saw several national parks that we have not been to before and a handful that were repeat visits. We also stopped in several other places and had excellent food all along the way. Based on what I had been reading in twitter and other news, I had a different impression about adhering to COVID protocols in some parts of the country, especially in the South. We were happy that it was not the case. We saw that majority were wearing masks and socially distanced. We drove through some of the local roads, stopped at coffee shops and supermarkets to load up on water and snacks. Everywhere we went, it was no different than what we see here in CT or MA. Of course, our sample was insignificant given the vastness of states like Texas, but it was heartening to see such adherence where we went.

It was a memorable and enjoyable trip. We went to New River Gorge, Great Smoky Mountains, Big Bend, Great Sand Dunes, Mt Rushmore, and Black Hills and Badlands. We stopped in many other places including Taos, New Mexico and the UFO museum at Roswell, NM. But it is the sheer diversity of environment from one region to the next, the vast expanse, the lack of civilization for miles and miles that you get out of such driving trips that you can’t experience otherwise… I just love that.

Next trip – pack the golf bags and play a few rounds of golf in courses in each state. When ? I have no idea…