Toasts On Tour!

Now that I've received official word from my doctor that I won't be requiring surgery for at least the next six months, I can let the cat out of the bag about the road trip we had been hoping to take in anticipation of this event: Mrs. Toast and I will be driving cross-country next month on a fun-filled vacation to visit relatives and friends in New England. While the high price of gasoline will mean that our fuel costs will be at least double what we spent the last time we made this same journey in 2004, commercial air travel is pretty much out of the question for me due to my continued necessity for supplemental oxygen. So, we'll be gettin' down for a street-level view of the great American landscape.

Frankly, I love the allure of a road trip; I get a great feeling of freedom from cruising down the open highway, listening to rockin' road tunes, seeing new sights, and exploring new places. Our route will generally follow the path shown below, which is the shortest calculated distance between here and our destination according to my trusty DeLorme Street Atlas software:


However, because we'll have three weeks this time (compared to only two weeks in '04), we may alter this route -- which mostly tracks I-81 -- to see some places that we missed before; for example, we could take a northern swing to visit Memphis, Nashville, and the Blue Ridge mountains, or cut due east at Birmingham to go through Atlanta. In this latter case, we might also follow I-85 up through Charlotte NC, and eventually hit I-95 and possibly vist Washington DC or New York City. I plan on keeping things flexible, so if we decide to take a detour somewhere along the way, we won't be locked into a set itinerary. And with my GPS-enabled road atlas software running on the laptop in the car, I'll have a readout of our exact position at all times overlaid on a map that can be zoomed from cross-country down to street view, so there's zero chance of getting lost.

If any of y'all have suggestions about what might be cool stops or entertaining diversions along this general path, please leave a comment and let me know. Or better yet, if any of my Bloggin' Buddies will be anywhere in this general vicinity and would like to meet up for drinks and/or dinner, give me a holla as well. It would be nice to see some of you guys in person after becoming virtual friends here on the blog.

Once we arrive at my sister's place in that bastion of Old Hippiedom, Woodstock NY, we won't be done covering ground. I plan to stop by the old homestead and pay my respects at my Mom and Dad's gravesite in Massachusetts. We also have friends in New Hampshire and Maine that we hope to visit as well, so it's shaping up to be a busy three weeks!

Yeah, it's going to be exactly like that.