Routes to travel from North to South

Over vacation, in order to visit my family in the South Eastern part of the United States, my family drove down to Valdosta, GA. Valdosta was only a base though, for we also traveled to Dothan, AL, and neighboring areas. However, to stay interested in the ride, we took different routes each way.

The way down, we traveled on Interstate 95, one of the more popular routes. We left in the after school on Thursday and drove to a hotel on the New Jersey turnpike, almost parallel to Philadelphia, where stayed the night after making minimal stops. The next morning we drove into Washington D.C. and visited the Smithsonian Museum of American History, despite the crowds of schoolchildren beginning their vacation.

That night, after the museum closed, we continued our drive down towards Richmond, where we stopped for the night, leaving D.C. around six o'clock and arriving at the hotel around nine, nine-fifteen that night, after stopping for dinner at Cracker Barrel.

After eating a continental breakfast at our hotel and getting back on the road by about eight-thirty, nine o'clock in the morning, we traveled through the remainder of Virginia and to quote my brother, "The fat part of North Carolina."

As a result of a good advertising gimmick produced by an attraction just south of the North Carolina border with South Carolina, we stopped a a Mexican themed tourist trap called "South of the Border." After many creative signs posted along the highway, we were forced to settle with outrageous prices ($3.25 for a single taco) and crappy food. The one highlight of the attraction, though, was the ability to look out over the highway and surrounding areas from the brim of the sombrero marking the location of the attraction. It cost a single dollar per person.

We then continued our drive until we reached a suggested dining area, still in South Carolina, but near the city of Savannah called Jasper's Porch. It had excellent Southern food and a relaxing nature rock around a little pond. If you ever travel this way and go to the restaurant, I would recommend that you save room for their homemade Coconut Creme Pie.

After dinner, we drove for the final leg of our journey on back roads to the town of Hahira, which is near Valdosta. It would be another week before we headed north again.

Heading north we traveled in the western part of the states. Traveling first through Athens, my mother made a point of showing me the University of Georgia, as I am a ninth grade student. We then Tellulah Falls in Northern Georgia, which is a beautiful look into the natural world. After Tellulah Falls, we continued north.

We were forced to stop before Asheville, NC, which had been our original destination, due to car trouble. You have to be very careful what roads you take with a small car in the mountains and if you are going down the mountain, make sure that you put it in a lower gear, or you might end up with a tired vehicle. We were driving a heavy loaded P.T. cruiser and had to stop less than half an hour after a tiring detour up and then back down a mountain.

The next day, we had intended to travel the Blue Ridge Parkway but were disappointed to learn that the ride from North Carolina to Virginia took about twelve hours and regretfully we did not have that kind of time. So we took the interstate, and to our surprise, the ride was still pretty one, nicer than Interstate 95.

We stopped once that day, at a lodge called Peaks of Otter, a little ways up on the Blue Ridge Parkway near the town of Buchanon, for a country buffet. It was a nice lodge with beautiful views and pretty good food. The drive up and then back down was a good mountain road, but would be easy with an SUV and experienced mountain driver.

That night we stopped in Winchester, Virginia. The next day we headed home with no stops. It was a Monday and we headed up through Allentown, Pennsylvania and then east to the Interstate 287. We crossed the Tapan Zee bridge, bypassing New York and then headed home on Interstate 95 through Connecticut and Rhode Island before arriving at our home in Massachusetts. With several stops, we reached home around 6 o'clock and went about our normal lives at home. My brother even went to his Boy Scout meeting, which started at seven o'clock.