I spent most of my August on a sixteen-day cross-country road trip, moving Joe from San Francisco to Ann Arbor for his upcoming master’s degree at the University of Michigan. We hit ten states on our adventure (and Joe hit two more as he drove through Indiana to Michigan after dropping me off in Chicago). The trip was filled with national parks, monuments, forests, and the occasional city. I was able to both revisit places I hadn’t been in years and see new places for the first time. Overall, it was a fast-paced, hectic, enjoyable adventure that I’ll be reminiscing about for a long time!
Early August was spent packing and working on my dissertation proposal before the big road trip. With a two-ish-week trip, including travelling through areas of questionable service and wifi, it was important to get my life somewhat together before setting off.
I started the trip on August 8th, a Saturday. I arrived at the airport for an 8 PM flight after attending my trivia team’s biannual Trivia Finals. Attending trivia was especially important to me because I would end up missing family events during the trip (my family’s annual Murphy Fest weekend at my uncle’s cottage and a last-minute funeral on my cousins’ other side of the family). While I really was excited for the trip, I was making some sacrifices for it, and I was glad to not have to also sacrifice time with my friends.
I arrived at SFO shortly before midnight, navigating through the airport and to the rideshare for the first time. Joe has always been good about picking me up at the airport when I visit him, and he planned on picking me up again that night. But his move-out date had been inflexible, and he needed to be out by that evening. He’d also just finished work that day. So between wrapping up his job and moving his items out of his apartment, he hadn’t quite managed to finish packing the items securely for a long-distance move. He also hadn’t had time to empty his storage unit at the U-Haul facility. So he rented a U-Haul truck to store the still-to-pack items from his apartment and booked a hotel to stay in until his packing was complete. Unfortunately, the U-Haul truck got stuck in the hotel parking lot as nighttime guests arrived and boxed him in. Still, after the short Uber ride, he was there to grab my bag and help me settle into the hotel. I was exhausted, and we went to sleep shortly after I arrived, anticipating a busy next day.
My first full day was a continuation of Joe’s packing efforts. We were prepared to start the final stretch of packing right away on Sunday, and he dropped me off at a popular San Francisco bakery to grab breakfast while he got settled at the U-Haul facility. I would walk the few blocks while he finalized the repacking.
Unfortunately, despite Joe’s best efforts, the universe was not working in our favor. He’d been told that he would have access to his long-distance moving container until Monday and had confirmed with the front-desk worker that he’d need access for that long. However, his container had been moved from the facility before he finished packing it. We had to wait until early afternoon before it was returned and we could resume packing. We packed until 5, and again the universe seemed to be laughing at us, because the elevator broke right before we moved our final items. Fortunately, we’d filled the long-distance moving container, so the only things left to grab from the storage unit were the items we intended to toss. We resolved to return the next day, both extending our hotel stay and our rental on the U-Haul truck by one day. We’d spend the final day packing the car, emptying the storage unit, and disposing of everything we wouldn’t take with us.
That night, we caught up with two of Joe’s college friends in Oakland. We got some of the best ramen I’ve ever had at a viby little restaurant and had a lovely evening with some great conversation. We didn’t get back to the hotel until almost 11.
The next day, we finally finished packing. We woke up, finished emptying the storage unit, took the trash items to the dump, returned the rented truck, and began packing Joe’s car. It was too late in the day to set off by the time we were done, so we parked near Joe’s (now former) apartment so I could say goodbye. Then we checked off some of our final “to-dos” in San Francisco. We wandered briefly through the neighborhood, reminiscing about the various restaurants we’d tried and walks we’d gone on.
The one thing I’d insisted on before he moved away was riding in a Waymo, one of the self-driving cars that are all over the San Francisco streets. Despite making frequent trips to the city for the last six years, I had never travelled in one. So we called a Waymo taxi and rode it to dinner. We got dinner at a Pinsa (fancy pizza) place, then stopped in a local church before hopping back into another Waymo for the return journey to Joe’s car. A quick drive to the hotel, and we were ready to turn in for the night. We were already anticipating the departure the next morning.
We officially started our trip on Monday. Our morning began with us stuffing our travel bags into the over-packed car and the repacking that required, continuing right up until the checkout time at the hotel. Then our trip began in earnest.
When departure day finally came, I thought we would be sadder than we were. Joe is less emotional than I am, and he’s gotten pretty good at moving. But a move from a city that he loves after seven years had the potential to be a lot sadder than it was. And transitions are always hard for me. I can always visit, and I’ll have special personal memories of the city of the type that I’ve only had for places I’ve lived. It was a place I loved deeply. But this was an odder transition than some, because it was only partly mine. It was the first city I ever visited as a baby and the family trip I remembered most from my childhood. It was the place where I started falling in love for the first time, got my heart broken, and got it stitched back up as Joe and I navigated distance, mental health, and acceptance. It was a place where I had once imagined living, but now likely never would. And I thought all those complicated emotions would come up as we left the city. When I visited Joe in July, I cried on the drive to the airport because it was the last time he’d be driving me to this airport like that. But on our first real travel day, I never did cry. I didn’t even feel particularly sad, despite anticipating it. We were heading out on a big adventure together, and that was what I focused on.
First, we stopped by Twin Peaks, a viewpoint he took me to during my first visit in September of 2020, and one of our favorite locations in San Francisco for sweeping views. It was a fitting last SF destination and first road trip stop. We took a few selfies to commemorate the start of the trip. Then, we got back into the car, took the long way through the city. We drove over the Bay Bridge, leaving San Francisco at some point halfway across the bridge. And then we were on our way, looking forward to the next part of our journey.
We had big plans for this trip. But beyond the first few days of packing, we really didn’t have much solidified in terms of trip length, arrival dates to destinations, or anything much beyond a vision of hitting as many national parks as possible. And none of those were close enough to hit on the first day of the trip. So it really was an open road for us between San Francisco and the town we wanted to stay in that night. We thought about heading to Sacramento, but we’d just visited the month prior. Last-minute, we decided to stay slightly more west. It would save us time and allow us to see numerous stops along the way. We tried stopping at a museum on an air base, but we arrived just after the last entrance time. We considered visiting another air museum, but this one was closed except for weekends. Undeterred, we stopped at Sacramento National Historical Wildlife Refuge. There, we saw wetlands housing jackrabbits, a coyote, and various birds.
It was a quick jaunt from the wildlife refuge to our final destination, Red Bluff. That night was spent enjoying the comforts of a hotel room before an anticipated day in a national park and a night camping in a national forest. We ate in the hotel room and began what became a through-line of the trip: Joe teaching me Magic: The Gathering (a nerdy card game I’d been interested in learning for quite some time) on nights where we turned in early.
