Down the Mississippi #7

Not infrequently, when we tell people what we are doing, we get peppered with questions about the experience. We figured that since we’re becoming road tripping “experts,” we’d share some of our trial-and-error, exercise-in-patience, and exercise-in-tolerance moments.

Don’t you get exhausted from all of the driving?
Nope. We don’t go very far each day, and we stop at most scenic overlooks and every historical marker, visitor center, and anything else that looks interesting. Plus, we walk 3 – 4 miles every day, mostly along the river.

Who drives?

For the most part we are only on the road for about two hours a day. I drive and Rebecca navigates. The front seat is filled with state maps, tourist guides, and two smart phones, one for the Great River Road map, and the other for Google Maps.

The deal is simple. As long as I do not get tired, I love driving. At any point that Rebecca wants to drive, the wheel is hers. So far, it is working perfectly.

 What do you listen to?

Each other. We have bags of CD’s and lists of podcasts. Instead, we listen to nothing except the sounds of the road and each other’s thoughts and observations.

 Aren’t you sick of each other?

Why would we be? Fact is, we are having an incredibly good time together! (And when we have our moments, we make sure they only last a few seconds.)

 What are your biggest challenges?

1) Remembering what hotel room we are in. 2) Finding healthy food in a world of deep fat fryers. 3) Keeping track of the date.

Where do you stay?

We have made a sort-of pledge not to drive after dark. We start looking for a place sometime between 3:00 and 4:00. The other night, the places we looked at were so shitty that we didn’t find a place until 6:30.

Staying in name-brand places would be easier … if any are nearby, which is pretty seldom. But since we won’t eat at a Friday’s or an Applebee’s … and certainly not at fast food joints … we try to avoid chain motels and look for family-owned privates instead. (That said, we are batting 1.000 so far on this trip with Super 8’s! The one in Bemidji, where we ended up staying for 4 nights, even washed and folded all of our laundry during the night shift for $2!!! But we have also walked out of a couple of Super 8’s too because they were just too crappy.)

Here’s the drill: We try to avoid motel hunting in the bigger cities. They are too expensive. Instead we hunt for smaller towns that we think might have some privates. When possible, we stop at Chamber Visitor Centers to see if they have any recommendations, and we always Google-map the town to see if anything shows up. Most of the privates don’t show up because they have little or no Internet presence. As we drive by, Rebecca checks out the curtains and exterior while I check the parking lot. If the curtains are reasonably straight, the place is reasonably well kept and clean, and the parking lot does not look abandoned, we stop.

Assuming we have cell service, we check Google, Hotels.com, and Bookings.com to get a sense of the going rate for where we are. Then we go into the office, jawbone the desk clerk for a few minutes, and inquire about rates.  As long the desk clerk doesn’t spook us and the place doesn’t stink, we ask to see a room. If the quoted rate is higher than what we found on the Internet, we are shameless.

When we check out a room, we each have our assigned tasks. I check the firmness of the mattress, the condition of the bathroom, and the general cleanliness. Rebecca checks the bed and linens and the general cleanliness. (A number of years ago, we stayed at a Rodeway Inn along I-80 in Davenport, Iowa with Rebecca’s son and daughter-in-law that turned out to be a whorehouse complete with plastic covers on the mattress. We learned a good lesson!)

If the room smells or fails any of our tests, we bolt. Usually, we get lucky pretty quickly, but I wouldn’t be surprised if we didn’t have to break our “don’t drive after dark” rule at least once or twice on this trip if everything we find flunks our tests.

So far, we are doing really, really well, and some of the places we’ve stayed have been red letter … and mostly in the $60 – $70 price range.

What do you eat?

Gaining weight and eating poorly are just not options on this trip!

Rebecca brought about 10 pounds of her world-class, homemade, gluten-free, Vermont-maple-syrup-sweetened granola ($10 per bag if you are interested). She has it almost every morning along with banana, fruit, and kefir. I have it some mornings, and on the others, I generally settle for Kellogg’s raisin bran and fruit from the hotel breakfast nook. Once in a great while, we go out to eat, when we split a breakfast skillet.

We only have lunch when we are visiting people. Otherwise, we have leftovers from the night before or we eat fruit, mostly apples. If we’re starving during the day, Rebecca might eat a Larabar; we always have a few bags of nut/fruit trail mix; and Teddy’s crunchy peanut butter on a rice cake is pretty-much unbeatable.

For supper, we have realized that we are best off eating something ethnic and local. We’ve had some amazing Indian, Thai, and Mexican food, and now that we are getting farther south, we’re anticipating some kick-butt barbecue. We’ve also had some really horrible Mexican (one step below ballpark food). We generally avoid Chinese, mostly because of Rebecca’s gluten intolerance.  Al-in-all, Rebecca’s inability to eat wheat is a wonderful gift for the both of us.

More FAQs as we think of them.

 © 2017 Kenneth Mirvis