One Tank Trips: The New Addition to Our Vacation Planning Jargon
Americans are in a state of shock over the price of gas to fuel our cars, as well we should be. Our entire infrastructure of highways was built, way back in the day, to facilitate our exploration of this huge country. Now, we’re wondering if we can get to work and back. We used to think nothing of packing up the family for a four-day weekend holiday to some faraway destination. The cost of gas was hardly considered.
Now, we find ourselves seriously curtailing our vacation plans to accommodate that thirsty and expensive gas tank. As a result, the media has coined a new phrase. Travel agents now hasten to come up with "one tank trips". So what is a one tank trip? It’s certainly a weird phrase, but when you take a moment to think about it, it’s a phrase that describes a getaway by car, which can be accomplished on a single tank of gas.
It’s odd that this gas crunch should force us to take a magnifying glass to the map within a 100-mile radius of where we live. In the days of gas freedom, we looked far afield to such places as National Parks, hundreds of miles away, to construct a vacation adventure. Now, it’s not so easy. Sure, the Grand Canyon is spectacular, as is Yosemite Valley, Lake Tahoe, the Adirondacks and the Black Hills, along with so many other lovely U.S. destinations. The price of gas has made our focus quite narrow. Now, it’s more like, what’s close by, a one tank trip?
Perhaps this is a blessing in disguise. You might live in an area for a lifetime and yet not see or know anything about the lovely scenery and attractions that are virtually outside our back doors. Americans love to travel to exotic destinations. In our understanding of exotic, there is a hidden agenda. How could there be anything of sufficient interest just down the road? Think of the one tank trip like this: your sister in New Jersey longs to see Klamath Lake, visit the quaint artsy town of Bandon and go on a kayaking adventure down the Rogue River. You live close to all of those, and yet have never seen or experienced any of these natural wonders. So there you go. Your fabulous one tank trip is within your reach.
Now is the time to get out the map of your state and get online to find local attractions that you wonít have to bust your wallet to visit. Just pretend that they’re far away from your usual environs. The one tank trip can be the trip of your dreams!
Here is Northeast Ohio, Neil Zurcher has been reporting on one tank trips (from his 1959 Nash Metropolitan) for over 25 years. Here is his latest offering:
And here are some others from around the country:
Category: Travel & Tourism