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Essay / My Road Trip - 733
Road trips were the highlight of my summers when I was young. It was a ritual I looked forward to in the summer because it meant my family and I would be traveling to other cities and states. My mother was always responsible for choosing the destination, while my father took care of the whole journey. Somehow my father approved of this. Once I knew where we were going, I would immediately start packing, even if we had months to go. I still don't know why I did that, maybe because of all the excitement I had. One day before leaving, my dad made sure our then-2001 Toyota RAV4 was ready to go. This means he was checking the oil, tire pressure, coolant, etc. My two main places my family and I traveled to were Los Angeles, California and Florence, Oregon. One might ask, “What’s so nice about Florence?” Well, it wasn't necessarily the landscape but rather the time spent with my loved ones. During the car ride, my mother played the song “Suavemente” by Elvis Crespo. It got to the point where I memorized every word of the song. Now, every time I hear this song, it reminds me of my mother and our trips to Florence. There were years when my family would just go for the day and sometimes to camp. We were camping in our car even though there were signs saying no camping there, but we did it anyway (don't tell anyone). We walked the trail to the lighthouse and watched the sun set while casting an orange haze above the horizon, lighting up the sky. Maya Angelou describes summer perfectly in this sentence "The faded beige of the past had been replaced by strong and safe colors" (71). Watching the sun go down was a perfect way to end a romantic relationship. This is mainly because my parents filed for divorce around the same time. My sister and I were caught in the middle of it all and couldn't do anything about our parents' divorce. Traveling is still my favorite pastime and will be until the end of time. Expensive, yes, but really exhilarating and you're really surprised by everything. Since my family stopped traveling years ago, I decided to travel with other family members, like my cousin. The most recent trip I took was to Fort Lauderdale, Florida. We had a lot of fun visiting Dave and Busters (arcade place), Zoo Miami, horseback riding, Everglades Alligator Farm, etc. I plan to travel to Europe soon and continue what was once a ritual in my early days.