Setting our minds to take a trip like this is only the first step, now comes the part that I pride myself on, the plan! I have learned that I am not a very spontaneous person, no I am actually off the chart in terms of needing a plan. I never really knew that until I got older, I always liked to think that I was at ease in jumping into things and thinking about them later, but in reality spontaneity scares the living daylights out of me! For instance, back when Tony and I were first dating, he thought it would be a great idea to get a few guys from work and go to a Braves game in Atlanta for an overnight trip. I was all for it, the guys, my boyfriend and I catching a game of my favorite sport (but least favorite team)! Then came the discussion about where we should find a hotel to stay in. That's when it hit me, I really am a woman who needs a plan. They would have much rather gotten in the car and headed out throwing caution to the wind. Not me. I started my research, finding a hotel that was not only "nice" but also was close to a MARTA station. Once I presented my plan to them, they all looked at me like I had three heads, who in this world would put so much thought into a one night stay in a city four and a half hours away! Me, that's who. After it was said and done, and the guys got to ride a MARTA train back to the hotel and could indulge in quite a few more brewskies at the park, they were all thanking me for my careful planning! Yep, thank you very much, it was an awesome trip. Well, up until the standstill we met on the interstate 20 mins from home, who plans for that?
So what does it take to plan a trip of this magnitude?
First of all, it takes time, and plenty of it. Not only to actually drive this far (a little over 5,000 miles round trip), but also to make a plan. So to start, we have set aside 21 days to make it to California and back, sounds like a lot of time, especially when you could jump on the interstate and drive from Chicago to LA in four days, but this trip is not about making good time across the country, it's about having a good time. Unlike most destinations, or road trips, you can't just set the GPS for Santa Monica and ride along the interstate until you reach your destination. You can't even pull out a Rand McNally map (do they even still make those?) and follow road signs. See when Route 66 lost it's official designation as a US Highway on June 27th, 1985, it also lost it's place on the map. In some places, where the rejuvenation has started to happen, you can find a road sign, and even find it on Google Maps, but it is not complete by any means. What that means is, that it is out there, we just have to find it. In order to find it, we need the knowledge of those who have gone before us. Namely a guy named Jerry McClanahan.
Jerry is one of those guys who has made it his life's work to help others get their kicks on Route 66. He is the Author of the EZ Guide for Travelers as well as the Here It Is! 8 state map set, both of which we own. They are really amazing, turn by turn, sight by sight. *A little disclaimer here, I have read and studied the EZ Guide and Maps, but we have yet to try them out on the actual road, so once they are actually used, I may have a slightly different feel for them.
So, first things first, Tony and I decided where to begin. We decided to start not in Chicago, but in St. Louis. One reason being, we know that we could never start at the beginning and make it to the end and still get back home in those 21 days. After deciding that, we had to plan our return trip. Driving out there we know which states and cities we will be going through, but we wanted to take a different route back, why not? So we sat in front of Google Maps and plotted out destinations that were less than 7 hours from one another to make the return. We settled on Las Vegas, Nevada, Moab, Utah, Colorado Springs, Colorado, Dodge City, Kansas and Columbia, Missouri. Then came the fun part. Trying to figure out how we were going to make it there and back in those allotted days. That was extremely hard. The problem was, we knew when we would leave, and when we needed to be back, but the how was the question. This took the greater part of three weeks to figure. The way we started was that I went line by line through the EZ Guide alongside Google Maps and plotted the route turn by turn. The interesting thing about Jerry's guide, is that he gives you tons of side trips and sights to see along the way, so just plotting a course took a long time. About a week after I started, and learned the limitations of Google Maps as far as how many points you can plot, and learning that I absolutely despise the new generation of their mapping system, I finally had a set of my own maps!
As I was feeling quite accomplished, since I had plotted the course to the west, then it hit me, where in this world were we going to stop each day? How long would the first leg of our journey really take? Can't really plan how long we would be where until we got those maps, but fitting all this in...Will it work?
Boy, once you think you have a plan, then you realize that you have only scratched the surface.
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