It's not always about the destination.
Unlike my previous posts, I'm not going to talk about a particular place.
As I'm typing this, my eyes are glued to the bougainvillea tree outside of our main door. Sweating under the tropical heat, slumped in the same chair where I spent 50 hours per week working at the same spot. Here I am sitting on the same timber chair that any chiropractor would frown upon, dreaming that I am holding a map next to the driver's seat right on this road.
It is a solid dose of wanderlust that most of you readers are familiar with. The sharp yellow tones of colza fields, a cold spring breeze demanding a second layer of cardigan sweater under a leather jacket were needed, and the small countryside roads that are all woven together that make the journey so worthwhile.
Cross-country Drive from Western France to Germany
My husband and I left our daughter with my in-laws. It had been a long time since we had a road trip on our own.
In my previous post, I mentioned that we drove from the Atlantic Coast of France to Friedrichshafen in Germany to attend an aviation exhibition in 2019. That's roughly around 1,146 kilometers. Even longer in fact because we took the small roads to avoid the toll gates.
That would be equivalent to 12 hours of non-stop driving. We decided to break the road trip into several days. That evening, we stopped over at a Formule 1 hotel for the night without making any prior reservations.
The Roadtrip
Just to give you an idea of our itinerary, here was our route for the road trip.
You might have already read about some of the destinations which were part of this road trip and if you haven't yet, here they are:
I took small clips on my mobile phone of every interesting landscape I encountered and decided to create a short film to take you on this road trip. Play the video and join me on this nostalgic journey.
Let's Get Lost Somewhere
The navigator's voice on the GPS took us to some dead ends. We ended up in someone's backyard and there were times we ended up on a remote farm. One of the highlights of getting lost was when we found this beautiful rainbow on the road.
Saint-Sornin, Auvergne-Rhône-Alpes
"Why didn't you tell me earlier, I should have made that turn." Yohann's voice boomed in the car. I clutched the outdated map that I found in the dashboard, confused by the highway names that didn't correspond to anything on the google map. Besides, the map was too general to track the small roads and all of the interchanges didn't make sense.
(L) The Map and (R) Pays de Clerval,Bourgogne-Franche-Comté
I always played navigator on road trips but this particular one somehow led to many mistakes. Have we lost our inner sense of direction with the dependence on GPS? All of this guessing and getting lost was offset by the respite in rest stops over a warm cup of coffee.
My intention for this post is to celebrate these seemingly small moments such as our favorite road trip picnic meal. That tub of tabouleh is all mine! (evil laugh)
With the help of photo geotags, I was able to pinpoint where these photos were taken.
Deluz, Bourgogne-Franche-Comté
Roulans, Bourgogne-Franche-Comté
Roulans, Bourgogne-Franche-Comté
Baume les Dames, Bourgogne-Franche-Comté
Lunch at a Cafeteria in Baume Les Dames
La Grange Ravey, next to Canal du Rhone au Rhin
Branne, Bourgogne-Franche-Comté
Somewhere in between that, I could hardly remember
Lac du Lit au Roi, Cressin- Rochefort
My Takeway
I regret not savoring these small moments more than I have. They say that happiness is in the journey and in letting go and just driving along an open road we find joy and serenity. There's always something beautiful about discovering paths less traveled. Better yet, this experience is heightened even more when shared with someone for we could always re-live these moments through our shared stories.
I can't wait to travel on the road again. Thank you for reading and wishing you a lovely weekend!
