Every year, my family attempts a great feat; surviving a family road trip. This summer’s objective was to visit Savannah, GA, drop my friend home and return to Oswego, NY in time to start driver’s Ed. The long road trip gave me feelings of anxiety and curiosity for the interesting events yet to come. The family motto isn’t “anything that could go wrong, will go wrong,” for nothing.
The 10-day, 2720 mile, roundtrip, began after piling 6 people in my fathers 5 person Chevy. My mother broke our trip into 6-hour increments. After getting hopelessly stuck in traffic, my father realized that the air-conditioning unit he spent 5 days repairing prior to the trip no longer worked. We certainly faced death in the clutches of southern heat. After a few more miserable hours, we stopped in Newark, DE, where we stayed with some family friends for the night.
While on the road, we stopped at Chincoteague Bay, VA to see the ocean. We stopped at a local McDonalds next to a horse pen. It was a pleasurable afternoon enjoying the salt filled air, sipping on a strawberry milkshake, and petting some young fillies and colts.
After a long day of travel, we reached Greenville, NC. My father declared the Quality Inn too “sketchy” so we ended up a Holiday Inn Express. The room was quite impressive, complete with a flat screen TV, nice pool view, and delicious cinnamon buns at the continental breakfast.
Our next stop was Savannah GA. About 2 hours into our trip, we made a pit stop in Fayetteville, NC. My sister Shannon jumped spastically out of the car, rolled her ankle, and was cripple the rest of the trip. My mom managed to book a hotel called the Baymont, for $69 a night. Despite the price, the room had 5 star qualities. It had 2 separate rooms; one with a pullout couch complete with a nice TV, the other had 2 queen beds, a flat screen TV, mini fridge, microwave, and granite countertops in the bathroom. I was really impressed, except the cable and Internet were out for the rest of our stay after a freak electrical storm.
On the first day in Savannah, my family and I wandered down River Street. River Street runs along the Georgia River and is peppered with old warehouses converted into delicious restaurants and charming little shops.
One night we went out for dinner at a restaurant called Spanky’s locally known for their chicken fingers. The employees t-shirts depict a chicken with its middle finger sticking up. We inquired about the puzzling gesture. The waitress explained the chicken was giving us the ‘chicken finger’. Clever. Out of curiosity, of my sisters ordered the chicken fingers and they were delicious, especially with the horseradish honey dipping sauce.
A local candy shop called the Savannah Candy Kitchen, had every kind of candy imaginable. We were told that their specialty candy, the Gopher, was like a turtle candy, only better. I definitely agree. What could be better than caramel, pecans and chocolate?
After dropping my friend off in Gainesville, GA, we took the long road home. Looking back, the trip wasn’t as terrible as I expected. I discovered one really could learn a lot about their family spending 10 days in a car with them. However, unless you don’t mind traveling in southern heat with no AC, sitting next to a pouting cripple sister, having a dead I-pod, a leaky cooler, and a car floor covered in food crumbs, I don’t suggest this type of trip, unless you’re flying solo.
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