Along with St. Patrick’s Day and March Madness, there is another very, very important holiday that comes along this time of year. Spring break—especially for college students—is a time to take a breath from school and spend an entire week relaxing. From sunny beaches to wintery destinations, we can all agree that there is nothing like a good spring break adventure to put in the memory jar. And if you are really feeling adventurous, a road trip sounds like the perfect way to travel. Here is what you get when you combing endless snacks, great tunes, and a storage unit of memories wrapped up into one road trip article.
Hour 1:
The excitement is high! You are road tripping on spring break and it feels like you are on top of the world! You finally have started to “adult”, and it is equally fun and terrifying—but mostly fun for this part.
Hour 2:
You are still going strong! The current mentality is still that road trips are a blast. You’ve probably already taken about 7 snap chats documenting the experience and letting everyone know how much fun you are having in the car with your friends. (there have probably been some where you are all singing off key to Fergalicious and not caring)
Hour 3:
The road trip enthusiasm has severely died down. Now you are probably out of any city in sight and are left with flat, open road. The “jams” playlist has run its course and instead the vibes are more relaxing as the reality sets in that you are going to be in a car forever. Most likely you are going to fall asleep. Or start thinking about what kind of food you can eat from the snack box that you significantly over packed.
Hour 4:
You wake up in the backseat to find that the car is stopped and there are strange red and blue flashing lights in your rear window. A guest appearance in this article is a cop! And he is pulling you over because you were going 40 miles an hour in a 35 through his small town of jurisdiction. Thankfully, he doesn’t give you a ticket and just leaves you with a warning and an increased heart rate.
Hour 5:
You are halfway done! This is both exciting and saddening news because while you have finished half of the trip, you still have a whole other half to go. Plus, you just hit a suicidal bird that decided to fly in front of your car that was going 85 mph. So that was fun. (I am also very sorry Mr. Bird)
Hour 6:
The calm before the storm. Everyone is getting a little sore from sitting in the car for so long, and the conversation is drifting in and out of focus. You tried to designate that the only person sleeping will be the ones in the back seat, but the passenger ends up falling asleep too. Which can be a good thing because it gives the driver an opportunity to play whatever kind of music they want.
Hour 7:
Time to change up drivers (again). It’s your turn and although this means you do have control of the aux chord, you cannot take a nap anymore and have to actually pay attention. Sometimes if you are one of the lucky few (like I was) you’ll get the rare chance to drive through a storm in the middle of the night on a highway with no lights!
Hour 8:
Since you live in the age of technology, there is always going to be, without fail, a directional error caused by faulty GPS. You might be wondering where the heck you are before you realize that you have been in a different state for 45 minutes.
Hour 9:
The entire car starts to get hangry due to the fact that when you tried to stop for lunch, the only thing around was a Burger King and a run down local gas station. Finally you give in and stop for an unsatisfying, sketchy meal that leads to many regrets and returns to the snack box.
Hour 10:
You try to keep the moral high with some fun road trip games and interesting
conversation. At one point you literally watch a lady pick her own nose and eat the findings. You also get perfect opportunity to get to know your friends better. You’re stuck with them in a car for however many hours, and even though you might have differences, you find out something you would have never known before!
Hour 11:
It’s the home stretch! You’ve come so far and there is only an hour left. Now the only thing keeping you awake is EDM blasting through the radios, excited chatter about the first thing you guys are going to do once you get out of the car, and the bag of m&ms you devoured to keep your blood sugar high. (also to make up for the lack of restaurants you invested in on this road trip)
Hour 12:
Sweet, sweet victory. Siri’s “you have reached your destination” is like music to your ears. Your neck is probably stiff as a board and you probably lost all feeling in your butt but that is totally fine because for once you are walking! On solid ground! Not only did you survive the spring break road trip, but you made lasting memories with your friends that you can reminisce on even when you are too old to be in a car for 12 hours.