Everyone knows that Covid has upended our world and travel especially. Of course, when you have a travel addiction and everyone is doing school and work virtually, you can’t pass up that chance. Why did we need to stay in Michigan to keep doing all the work that we were doing virtually anyway? We didn’t need to stay. But where to go? We can’t leave the country because everything is closed in fall of 2020. We want to be outdoors and somewhere warmer, but I really don’t like Florida.
There are a couple of places that Michigan snowbirds go in the winter, Florida and Arizona. I’m thinking that National Parks and the great outdoors are calling from the desert Southwest. And this is how my decisions on how to travel get made in the time of Covid. Or really, any other time.
I get a wild hair, a feeling, and then run with it.
We decide how far we want to get in a day in the car and then look at stops in the area that we can stay at for at least several days so that disinfecting the room will work to our advantage and we have time to complete school and work.
With the stops aligned, we can look at things that we want to do on the way and in the area. Our first stop is Litchfield, IL. We decide to stay in between Springfield and St. Louis so that we can do things in both places, but Springfield is essentially closed because of Covid once we get there. We have a cute AirBnB and then hit the St. Louis Arch, take a cruise on the Mississippi, and head out to Ulysses S. Grant’s farm that’s in the area next to the Budweiser Clydesdales. In looking at things to do, we find out that there is a traveling exhibit of the Sistine Chapel where all the panels are large and very detailed. So, that gets added to the list because Springfield is not an option.
This turns out to be a trip that needs a lot of fluidity because of new Covid restrictions that pop up in different places that we are traveling and was the best example ever of the need to be flexible. When you sit down to figure out a trip, everything is not going to happen according to plan. Something will go wrong. Just like in life. Let me say that again. Things will go wrong. I haven’t had a trip that has ever gone exactly as I planned it. Life is about being able to adapt and cope when things don’t happen the way that you imagined.
We would have never gone to Grant’s homestead if Springfield hadn’t closed. We found new things to do because we were to and that made the trip even better in some ways. I believe the world is filled with interesting things if you keep an open mind and look around. So, I encourage you to look around yourself and try to cultivate the flexibility and adaptability that life requires.