Twelve hundred miles on the American highway...

For our first really big road trip, we drove out of America. It was Canadian Thanksgiving last weekend and friends invited us to celebrate. They offered good music, excellent food, and wonderful company - how could we refuse? There was the small matter of how to keep two grown-ups and two children happy for 1200 miles, but where there's a will (and a full tank of gas) there's always a way.

Had we been in England, which is roughly 400 miles long, we'd have had to drive the length of the country at least three times, but in American terms the trip wasn't seen as remotely excessive. Here, the roads just keep on going. We've a map of the United States pinned to the wall and a thirst to see as much of this country as possible. Reflecting on the weekend, we've put together a survival guide for the big American road trip.

1. Get a Sat-Nav...

I love maps. I really love maps. I like understanding where roads go; I like the aesthetic of reading strange place names out loud and exploring different possible pronunciations; I like the intellectual challenge of taking unplanned diversions and still arriving where I want to be. I also love driving.

I don't, however, like being a passenger and Nathan doesn't like map-reading. If you find yourself lost in the mist on the side of a bleak mountainside, you would do well to have Nathan beside you. He's the kind of man who can take compass readings, do funny little equations to account for North not quite being in the north, and work out where to go from studying which side of the tree has moss on it. Put him on a highway (or any kind of signposted thoroughfare) and you might wish for an alternative navigator. I'm training Maya up but, in the meantime, we hired a sat-nav which got us to Canada and back, but expressed increasing irritation whenever I tried to take a short-cut.

Sat-Nav: In 300 yards, turn left.
Zoe: I'm not turning left. The traffic isn't moving there. I'm sure I can take a short cut by turning right.
Sat-Nav: Turn left.
Zoe (turning the wheel to the right): No.
Sat-Nav: Recalculating... recalculating. At the next intersection, do a u-turn and proceed 0.4 mile before turning right.
Zoe: No. I don't want to do a u-turn. I want to see what happens if I go up here.
Sat-Nav: Recalculating... recalculating. At the next intersection, do a u-turn and proceed for 2.2 miles before turning right.
Zoe: Now, I'm fairly sure that if I take a sneaky left here, I can skip a junction... Girls, there's a sign there for Herkimer. Shall we go take a look?



2. ... and avoid traffic jams
I tried to take quite a lot of short-cuts because I don't like traffic jams. There seems to be no logic to the sudden traffic jams which occur on American freeways. One minute everyone is merrily speeding along, bumper-to-bumper, undercutting and overtaking with joy and abandon... and the next minute, the traffic squeals to a halt.

Everyone sits in their cars. Children read books, cuddle teddies, play complicated games on their Nooks, and tell the same joke over and over and over (Iola: 'What's a ghost's favorite food?' Maya: 'I don't know, what is a ghost's favorite food?' Iola: 'I SCREAM!' And how we laughed for the first seventeen times we heard the punchline). Grown-ups fidget with their stereos, telephone those mysterious people they don't know whose names are somehow stored in their mobile phone's memories, and eat all of their children's sweets. The sat-nav shows that one's estimated time of arrival is slipping slowly away... it had told you that you would arrive at tea time but the minutes slip away and it seems that you might not arrive before your own bed time.

Then - as if by a miracle - the traffic zooms away. I have been unable to understand what makes the traffic stop, and what happens to make the traffic move again. Nathan thinks that there might be a possible equation for this in Chaos Theory - it's the kind of thing you hypothesize when you're sitting on the tarmac for an hour.

3. Visit people you love...
The drive wasn't that bad - not even with the occasional traffic jam - but even if it had been terrible, it would have been worthwhile. We spent Friday night and Saturday morning in Guelph with our friend Meg who plays the piano endlessly for the girls while they sit at her feet, wide-eyed and adoring, then allows them to make chocolate chip cookies in their pajamas before serving up pancakes for breakfast. (You can get a taster of Meg's music at Meg's website, but you'll have to just imagine how good those cookies were!)

The rest of Saturday and Sunday was spent with other friends - Linda Dawn, Beth, Shannon, Violet and the new grandpuppy, Peggy - in Toronto. We were so busy eating traditional Canadian Thanksgiving fare, enjoying the company, chatting about Beth's next novel and my attempts at my first, and chasing children and dogs around the park that we didn't manage to take any photos for our blog. The memories, however, are beautiful.

4. ... in places that you love to visit
Guelph is quirky and filled with independent shops, a bustling farmers' market, and a strong hippy vibe. We never have enough time there, and we're already planning our next visit.


Linda Dawn lives in my favorite part of Toronto - just by the University of Toronto, close to Chinatown and on the doorstep of Kensington. As part of the sleepover, Iola found herself in a house filled with toys and more adoring grown-ups, while Maya, Nathan and I spent the first few hours of Sunday morning walking around Kensington, fuelled up on good coffee and cakes from Moonbeam Coffee Company, and enjoying the street art. 


5. Plan good places to stop...
The girls' Auntie Jess has introduced us to the glories of American diners and barbecue joints. With a little bit of forward planning (and a word or two with the sat-nav), we found great stops all over upstate New York. 

Nathan is tall and slim, once described by a Jewish waiter in the Upper East Side as a 'tall drink of water', but his appetite is colossal. There are not many people who can eat an entire 'Trainwreck' (as Nathan's epic meal was affectionately called), but Nathan is part of that elite (he went a bit pale when we suggested dessert).

6. ... and better places to sleep
By Sunday evening, we were completely exhausted. Our cheeks ached from smiling, our mouths had nearly (but not quite) run out of words, we'd listened to the entire CD of the first Harry Potter book, and we felt that our bodies were beginning to resemble the shape of our car's seats.

Niagara Falls is conveniently situated somewhere between our house and our friends' houses, so we found ourselves a room with a view and spent the evening watching the light change color across the Falls.

It was a great trip and we have much for which to give thanks. American Thanksgiving is here soon. We just need to decide where to go....