LONG STORY SHORT By Kristine McGowan We ventured into our second U.S. state of the trip this week, and to be honest, we were not looking forward to it.
Don’t get me wrong. We very much looked forward to our end destination—Great Basin National Park and its famous Lehman Caves—but we weren’t excited about the drive. We were leaving from Mammoth Lakes, which meant we had to cross the entirety of northern Nevada to reach Great Basin. In other words, it would be a long drive.
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LONG STORY SHORT By Kristine McGowan While waiting for our tour of the Lehman Caves in Great Basin National Park, Jason and I noticed a group of about 15 kids lining up nearby. They ranged anywhere from 7 to 10 years old. And they were concerningly close to our waiting area.
Another guest—an adult—wryly said what we all were thinking: “Lucky us, going on a tour with kids.” LONG STORY SHORT By Kristine McGowan  Steve has towed a lot in his young life. Despite being a 2022 F-150, he’s already towed our trailer more than 1,500 miles, including our journey down the Oregon coast and through California earlier this year before we hit the road full-time.
In all our towing, Steve has never struggled. We’ve never had a problem towing over mountains, along interstates, and through triple-digit heat. Steve is only a half-ton truck, but he’s always seemed more than capable of doing the job. LONG STORY SHORT By Jason Clark It took many road trips for me to learn that an ultra-efficient itinerary does not necessarily produce the best vacation. It's a difficult mentality to overcome—some places take a lot of effort or money (or both) to get to, so why shouldn't we get the most out of our time?
The answer is energy. An ultra-efficient itinerary is often ultra-draining, and spending a week hopping from place to place to "get the most out of your time" is a great way to ensure you have zero energy left for the remainder of the trip. Given how much we put into planning The Big Trip, I wanted to ensure we wouldn't be burnt out a week, a month, or even a year into it. That's how we ended up spending a full week at an unremarkable campground an hour east of San Francisco... sort of. LONG STORY SHORT By Kristine McGowan One morning during our second week of life on the road, I woke up feeling sad.
Yes, I missed our family and friends. But that wasn’t at the forefront of my mind when I rolled out of bed, plodded to the bathroom, and eyeballed the bird’s nest of hair atop my head. I felt worthless. LONG STORY SHORT By Kristine McGowan Ever since we bought our trailer, I’ve caught myself thinking the same thing over and over again: “I can’t believe we’re doing this.”
The emotion behind that thought largely depends on how the day’s going. Sometimes it’s followed by a grin. Other times, it’s followed by a sore back and sunburnt hands wiped across a sweaty forehead. LONG STORY SHORT By Jason Clark Anyone who has seen our route may notice that it looks a bit funky—it’s not the most efficient point-to-point trek across the country. It did start out that way, but several factors forced large and small adjustments over time. Here’s a look at the steps I took to build our route and which considerations led to the final version.
 On a tour of the high bay with family—because JPL is the kind of place where your family asks to come to work with you. LONG STORY SHORT LONG STORY SHORT By Kristine McGowan  Kristine and Catsby attempt to warm up in front of the faulty heater. After all our initial planning was said and done, there was only one thing to do: save, save, save.
LONG STORY SHORT By Kristine McGowan  Jason, planner extraordinaire, takes an MLB the Show break while Catsby assists. We decided to dub our pretirement the “Big Trip.” Because we’re just that clever.
As usually happens with anything we do, our planning began with a spreadsheet—or, I should say, Jason’s planning began with a spreadsheet. I cannot convey how little I contributed to this part of the process. I just concocted—or really, happened upon—the original idea. Jason took my idea and sprinted with it. |
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