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Like most of us in the travel blogging world (can I count myself in that if I’ve published only two posts? mmkay), not being able to travel during the pandemic hit hard.
Just prior to lockdown last year I wrote a Travel Bucket List on my kitchen chalkboard. By the end of 2020, I had checked zero places off the list. In early 2021, I began daydreaming about a sabbatical or long trip, something exciting and bucket-list-worthy. A sabbatical at work was not in the cards, but a long trip….that had potential. The company I work at was still working remotely for the foreseeable future, plus I have a flexible enough job that I could take some time off. I could not find a(n affordable) dogsitter, however, which meant the trusty pup would need to come with me. Did I mention Trusty Pup gets terribly car sick and hates people? Despite this, a plan began to form in my mind. A few weeks driving around the US, living that hashtag digital nomad hashtag pnw life.
I began with a trial trip to Leavenworth, WA, in March (which I wrote about here). The dog threw up – of course – and I discovered that she very much did not like hotels with people vacuuming the hallway. Lesson learned.
Throughout the spring, I created Pinterest boards of beautiful roadtrips throughout the west and northwest. I read through my Moon Guide to the National Parks (by Becky Lomax) (Bookshop af link) to see what parks might be dog-friendly and easily accessible. In one fit of pique, I listed every national park, monument, historic site, and national historic park in the left half of the United States, and then google mapped distances between each until I had a list of places to visit that were about a four hour drive apart. My plan was coming together!
Then I sat on it. For a while. The thought of driving that much by myself overwhelmed me. While I have overcome most of my driving anxiety, I was still untested in any trips longer than two hours. Plus, I was afraid of hiking alone in national parks. Most NP trails are not dog friendly, which would mean leaving Ruby home alone while I was on the trail alone…with bears…or mountain lions…or bears. Did I mention the bears? I wanted to visit friends in Oregon, but they would be on vacation. Another friend was moving away from Seattle. Work became busier. My plan stalled.
It’s difficult to point to any one thing that tipped the scales in favor of my trip. Was it President Biden opening up vaccines to all adults by mid-April? Was it the deluge of IG travel bloggers I follow flitting off to parts unknown giving me fomo? Was it my sister saying that she had some free time, could she join me? Was it my boss/friend/mentor in Oregon saying, “do it”?
Okay, it was probably my sister that pushed it over the edge (sorry, WG!). On April 28, I asked her what the chances were that she would be able to join me. At 10:29am (Best Coast Time), the chances were 30%. By 3:20pm BCT the same day, she had priced out flights. By the next evening, she had booked a flight to meet me in Oregon May 9th. With barely a week left, we were off to the races!
The deadline kicked me into gear. Early on, I had used AirBnb’s wishlist feature to save any dog-friendly AirBnb in the towns I might stay in. Dog-friendly accommodations that also have WiFi are tough to find, especially in some of the boondock cities we were visiting. The first leg of my tour became priority numero uno. Most stays were unavailable, sadly, and overall we ended up staying in a Vacasa and some hotels here and there. I would like to say this was a crazy budget trip, but it both was and wasn’t. We needed dog-friendly accommodations with two real beds, plus wifi and a place for me to work. That meant we needed to stay farther from some of the parks, and ruled out camping. (Well, camping itself ruled out camping. I mean, come on.)
Next was a lot of math to figure out places to visit, and places to stay, and driving distances, and times I needed to be in bigger towns for better wifi for meetings. Imagine that Zach Galifianakis math gif here. That is in your head? Great. That’s me, but with pink hair.
In the end, I booked accommodations for the first three locations, and left the rest up to chance. I came up with a rough itinerary for a two-week trip, knowing that it may be longer or shorter depending on how travelling was going. I only took two days off work. I may have some regrets.
Read more about my trip:
- Dog-friendly hikes with Trusty Pup
- Trying to hang out in caves during winter AND covid
- All road trip posts
What I used to plan my trip:
- Moon USA National Parks: The Complete Guide to All 63 Parks by Becky Lomax (Bookshop af link)
- NPS site and app
- Miss Rose’s sixth grade pre-algebra class
- Redwoods and NorCal Pinterest Boards
