Jul 22nd, 2011 at 4:30PM:
Sitting in the passenger seat of a lime green Mustang, driving out of the historic center of Savannah, I started to wonder what I'd gotten myself into. A guy in a black suit was taking me, well, somewhere.
I asked where we were headed. "Bonaventure," said Shannon, as he started describing one of the biggest cemeteries in the area and the funerary traditions of Georgia's generations ...Click on a label to read posts from that part of the world.
travelingtheamericanroad posts
In Search of Serendipity in Savannah
Jul 22nd, 2011 at 4:30PM:
Sitting in the passenger seat of a lime green Mustang, driving out of the historic center of Savannah, I started to wonder what I'd gotten myself into. A guy in a black suit was taking me, well, somewhere.
I asked where we were headed. "Bonaventure," said Shannon, as he started describing one of the biggest cemeteries in the area and the funerary traditions of Georgia's generations ...Folly Beach, South Carolina: The Country's Greatest Fourth of July
Jul 20th, 2011 at 12:00PM:
This most recent Fourth of July, on a beach in South Carolina, a guy named Freddie handed me a beer after I took his photo in front of his American flag. He'd just done his best Iwo Jima pose, and as I tapped his email address into my phone, promising to send him the pictures very soon, he insisted I take a turn hoisting the stars and stripes. Road trip tip: Do whatever a beer-toting, ...Off the Road: Kayaking Conway, South Carolina
Jul 18th, 2011 at 9:30AM:
The guy at the marina told us that alligators are usually scared of people, so we probably didn't have much to worry about after the kayaks were in the river. But the Waccamaw flows with what's called black water--water turned dark by tannins leeched from cypress trees along the banks--making it all but impossible to see beneath the surface. If there were gators about, we'd only know it ...The Greatest Road Trip Radio Show in History
Jul 17th, 2011 at 9:30AM:
The best radio station I've listened to on this road trip is Road Dog Trucking on SiriusXM. It's a channel dedicated to truckers, with an ample time for call-ins and opinion-and a plethora of regional dialects, a selective sample that seems to indicate that most of the truckers in this country are white men from the south. It's endlessly fascinating, this window onto an oft-overlooked ...The Country's Biggest Tourist Trap: South of the Border
Jul 15th, 2011 at 9:30AM:
There is a tourist trap in South Carolina called South of the Border. A combination truck stop, motel, roadside attraction, carnival and snack stand, it's high kitsch of the first order, bordering on exploitative with its stereotypically Mexican "mascot" Pedro. A couple days before the Fourth of July, when I drove through, it's also a bonanza for fireworks, all manner of which are legal in ...Staying with Friends: On the Porch in Raleigh, North Carolina
Jul 14th, 2011 at 8:30AM:
One thing you won't find in New York City, at least at my apartment, is a screened-in porch. But in the summer in the south, the porch is the living room, kitchen, dining room and bar, a focal point of a home to rival the greatest of fireplaces. I know because I had the pleasure of enjoying a porch for a couple of days recently in Raleigh, North Carolina. ...Six Reasons to Love the Outer Banks
Jul 12th, 2011 at 8:45AM:
You've seen the stickers. White ovals, with the trio of letters "OBX," an American riff on European nationality decals, they're a sign of allegiance to the Outer Banks of North Carolina. I always found them annoying: How could some mid-Atlantic beach really be that wonderful? And why would you want to brag about your vacation on the back of your car?
Turning onto the beach road in Kill ...The Ultimate Road Trip Detour: Go Kart Racing?
Jul 11th, 2011 at 11:30AM:
At the outset of this road trip, I invited friends and readers to jump in the car with me. After more than a month on the road, one of my buddies finally took me up on the offer, planning to meet me in Virginia Beach after I toured Colonial Williamsburg.
I've known Rob for more than 10 years, and while we get along wonderfully, we love competition. So it being a road trip, there was no ...Inside STS135: The Experience at the Final Shuttle Launch
Jul 8th, 2011 at 2:30PM:
I got to William J. Menzo Park in Titusville at about 3 am, in a bad mood and not sure if the shuttle would even launch. NASA said the odds for departure were only 30 percent. But until NASA officially scrubbed the Friday morning liftoff, I'd be here, set up in a tent with provisions packed in a Styrofoam cooler I'd just bought.
The shuttle's been ferrying people to space for just a ...Colonial Williamsburg: Made in America
Jul 8th, 2011 at 2:00PM:
The last time I visited Colonial Williamsburg, I was about half as tall as I am now. Would it still be worth seeing-or as fantastic as I remembered-now that I'm a grown up? I drove south from Washington, D.C. to find out, without doing a lick of planning or advance research. This would be a visit informed only by my fuzzy memories of hiking around in the heat and talking to people dressed ...How to Navigate Washington, D.C. Without Going Nuts
Jul 8th, 2011 at 11:00AM:
I've been on the road for more than a month, and here's my number one tip: Don't drive in Washington, D.C. Nightmare would be a measure too generous.
As soon as I could park my ride, I did, content to not touch it until I pulled out of the District two days later. And considering the byzantine fare structure and bizarre routing of the Metro, it's something I avoid, too. Here's a better ...Exploring the Baltimore Beyond the Inner Harbor
Jul 7th, 2011 at 5:30PM:
To me, a huge fan of Baltimore but still a tourist, it seemed like a random Saturday in the early summer. But in Charles Village, a neighborhood between Johns Hopkins and the harbor, it was the weekend of the "Pile of Craft" fair at St. John's church. I found out about it by chance, leafing through a copy of City Paper while doing laundry. (One accumulates lots of laundry on long road ...Finding Philadelphia's Hotbed of Creativity
Jul 5th, 2011 at 12:00PM:
Sitting in a kitchen in a loft on Third Street in Old City, talking to one of the most enthusiastic and driven people I've met in years, I began to wonder what would happen if I quit my job, moved to Philadelphia and started my own business. Alex Hillman, wearing a t-shirt that read "I <3 my internet friends," was selling me on the cheekily named co-working space Independents Hall, of which ...Summer Monday giveaway: stay in touch with an iPad
Jul 4th, 2011 at 8:00PM: Nobody loves summer more than your friendly neighborhood Gadling bloggers. It's the perfect time to plan an escape from the mundane trials of daily life, or maximize your adventures in the outdoors. And if you're planning on flying the coop this summer, you're going to need some fun swag. So every week this summer, in celebration of our own road trip, Traveling the American Road, Gadling will be ...Atlantic City Is a Hard Place to Love
Jul 4th, 2011 at 4:00PM:
Somewhere around Indiana and Pacific avenues, I had a sinking feeling. Atlantic City seemed to consist entirely of strip clubs and skin dens, convenience stores and empty store fronts. The beach was a few blocks away, true. But would a sparkling bit of ocean be enough to make the uneasy feeling in my stomach subside? This seaside resort, stacked with casino resorts dwarfed by their cousins in ...Five Tips for Successful Last-Minute Hotel Booking
Jun 30th, 2011 at 9:00AM:
One of the best things about a road trip are the last-minute detours, whether that's stumbling across an antique car club meeting in Western Massachusetts or deciding to speed to Boston to see a million people cheer for a hockey team. Even along my planned route, I don't even have a place to stay for the night when I pull into a city, hotel or otherwise. Sound crazy? With new internet tools ...Naming My Traveling the American Road Ride
Jun 29th, 2011 at 1:00PM:
After more than 1,000 wonderful suggestions, I'm finally ready to take the major step of naming my car. After all, I've already logged more than 2,500 miles on the beast after starting this epic road trip. If not now, when?
There were a number of strong entries. Marylin Thomas had a good suggestion: "If I had a Ford Explorer I probably would name him after one of the famous explorers but it ...Why Plymouth Rock Is New England's Biggest Tourist Trap
Jun 29th, 2011 at 10:30AM:
Have you ever been to a tourist trap? A scam of a site, something over-hyped and talked about until it can't possibly be worth it? The sort of thing you walk up to, snap a photo of and curse as you walk back to your car?
I saw one just the other day. It was Plymouth Rock, the lump of granite that supposedly marks the spot where a ragged band of English religious refugees washed up on ...A Day of Rebuilding at New York's Ground Zero
Jun 26th, 2011 at 11:00AM:
While in New York, I was thrilled to check out the High Line, a newly expanded elevated park that's captivated city-dwellers. But there's bigger and more meaningful construction happening downtown, at the site of the former World Trade Center-and the soon-to-be home of the new World Trade Center.
With my videographer, Stephen Greenwood, I booked a 17th-floor room at the Millenium Hilton ...On the Supremacy of the Bed and Breakfast
Jun 25th, 2011 at 1:00PM:
I've been staying in a lot of hotels. Some nice ones, some not so nice, most owned or at least operated by a corporate parent. There's a anonymous familiarity about them all, which is comforting or unsettling, depending on my mood.
I've also crashed with some friends on this road trip, sleeping on a recliner in a living room in Detroit and an air mattress in an extra bedroom on Staten ...
