editor’s note
THE TRAVEL BUG TEXT BY DEBORAH WYATT FELLOWS
PHOTOS: TOP: DAVE WEIDNER // INSET: COURTESY DEB FELLOWS
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elcome to our first issue where every feature is devoted to a great Northern Michigan road trip. We could not be more excited about this, as our shoulder seasons are perfect to explore the North during a slightly quieter time and, of course, what is better than gearing up for a summer road trip filled with fun at each stop... This theme is near and dear to my heart as I am a road tripper from way back. My mom spent her twenties driving around the U.S. on summers off from her work at a school. Then she loved nothing better than throwing her four kids into her convertible Olds 98 to head north or south. In those days we were footloose in the car, roaming its seats and foot wells at will, sometimes held in place by ridiculous amounts of groceries she’d packed so we’d be prepared when we arrived. Or, if we were going to my dad’s family in southern Illinois, we were all piled on a foam pad in the back of the station wagon at 4 a.m., untethered toddlers curled up like kittens; at least for a little while. Then it was endless games to keep us occupied, lots of songs and, as I can still slightly recall, squabbles. I never understood why they left for Illinois in the middle of the night until I had children. As we got older, there were harrowing trips to Florida through the Smokies
when it was still two lanes and each of my three siblings and I learned to hold on to the wheel and drive on through. As soon as I could, I was on the road myself, back and forth across the West and, since my parents moved south my freshman year of college, many, many straight through trips south. Hands down, some of my favorite tales are of things that happened on those road trips. Not a single one was the same. As soon as I moved Up North in my twenties, weekends were filled with
exploration: Driving to new places in the region to ski, hike, bike, eat, view, you name it. I married a man who could put everything he owned in his Honda Civic and fully expected some version of that to always be true. Road trips were music and an intoxicating sense of total freedom. Then we had kids. Four of them. Our era of parenting included car seats. Thank heavens for safety, but it came with its own challenges of children
harnessed in for long periods of time. I can now admit that on one road trip when our oldest was an infant and very, very unhappy with the amount of time he was spending in a car seat, I took him out somewhere between Florida and Atlanta. It was so unheard of, unthinkable really, that I can still conjure up the feelings of terror I felt during those minutes. Never did that again. Given our history, it was only natural that road trips would be a huge part of lives with our kids. Singing, yes. Some games. But, absolutely, books on tape. We drove through Colorado and Wyoming listening to a fantastic audio performance of Star Wars. Peter and the Starcatcher got us to Williamsburg. And thank you, Harry Potter. From trips in Northern Michigan to the West, we had endless hours of watching the landscape drift past like a painting as we rode, lost in life at Hogwarts. It was not at all uncommon for us to arrive home from a trip and stay in the car a bit to hear the last of a chapter of a book. Our road trips were like a traveling cocoon, all together, sharing a space and a time that I knew was exceedingly precious. But as they got older, there was one more thing that contributed ultimately to an ongoing joy of road trips. When my kids were young, we made the decision not to have Nintendo or Xbox in the house. You can only imagine how4
Traverse, Northern Michigan’s Magazine |
APR ’19
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