“Hey, hey, easy kids. Everybody in the car. Boat leaves in two minutes. Or perhaps you don’t wanna see the second largest ball of twine on the face of the earth, which is only four short hours away.”
Yup, I’ve got a bit of Clark Griswold in me. You know, the original king of the road trip movie, as so epically portrayed by Chevy Chase in the 1983 classic, “National Lampoon’s Vacation.”
Well, I channeled my inner Griswold recently on our annual summer trip, this time a road trip to Colorado with stays in Fort Collins, Boulder and Colorado Springs.
Since our littles were, umm, little, my wife and I have prioritized travel.
We’re firm believers in and practitioners of the “experiences, not stuff” mantra. The list of our adventures by planes, trains and automobiles is long and there’s few parts of the US we’ve not experienced.
I believe you have to experience the people and places in your country first if you’re going to understand your place in the world. Travel certainly helps.
However, traveling as a family takes some work. And, road tripping can be doubly tough. All is not always as it appears on the perfectly curated world of social media. It means daily group decision making that doesn’t always come to consensus easily.
It’s going with the flow and realizing my Clark Griswold-style dreams don’t always match reality.
It’s being EXTREMELY appreciative our two teenagers still enjoy traveling with us.
It’s feeling grateful your wife is a talented driver who can pilot the minivan up and down the 19-mile road to the 14,110-foot summit of Pikes Peak without missing any of the 156 turns and plunging us into certain doom.
And, it’s confirming that after another great time in Colorado: John Denver was right.
I’m Wester Wuori, I’m still coming down from that Rocky Mountain High, and that’s my Perspective.