In my mid twenties, I had a job as a government auditor at USDA. It was an exciting job because I had to travel a lot, maybe as high as 80% of the time. I got to go to big cities and small forest towns. It was for work, and eventually I had to quit that job after 5 years because of my growing family. This job allowed me to see many parts of the US that I never knew existed, and I decided that I love to travel. Then I got married to someone who didn't like going places, and I had four kids to home-school and they sucked up all my funds. Needless to say, traveling was not a high priority during those years.
As the kids grow older, they go places with their friends, of course. When I invited them to go somewhere with me, they often were too busy. After I went through years of recovery through CR, and began to ponder the possibility of traveling alone. Why not? My kids are finally older, and since no one shared the passion of traveling, why not go by myself? Then I started doing "Jesus retreats" once or twice a year, normally short weekend trips and not very far from home. I loved it. I love that I can schedule it at a time most convenient for me, and I can leave home anytime I am ready. I am the only early riser in my family, so often I leave home super early on many of these trips. I love seeing the sunrise at the horizon as I drove on the open road, wow....so breathtaking. I remember once I took a trip to Monterey and decided that I was going to drive down to Big Sur early. So at 5am, I checked out of the hotel and drove down to Big Sur. It happened to be a beautiful clear day, and I got to see the sunrise at the Big Sur coast. What an unforgettable moment!
I wrote more about Jesus Retreats in one of my blogs if you want to go on one yourself.
https://www.mysuccessgodsway.com/1465710_jesus-retreat-a-mini-retreat-with-jesus
I love those but I wanted to go on longer ones and explore further. I was scared though... basically because I had not done it before. I remember the first time I did it, I rented a car and bought all the possible insurance because I thought I was going to die and something terrible was going to happen. I had to drive through a huge desert area through Vegas to go to Zion National Park. I pictured in my mind the worst that would happen, like the movies, where my car was out of gas and I was stranded among the cactus dying of thirst with vultures circling above me. But nothing like that actually happened, and surprisingly I had a great time and came home safe and sound. My friends told me to push through the fears and do it afraid, which I did, and I felt stronger and braver after.
Then I bought my Prius 2018 that saves gas and is super reliable. I decided to go on as many road trips as possible. I am glad I did then because I decided to move to Taiwan 2023. I was thankful I got to see as much nature as possible in the US. Most were wonderful but there were a few close calls and I was scared. Somehow, I remember those times so much more vividly because of the negativity bias of the mind. But each time I learned something that I can use the next solo trip.
Once my cousin's family went to Yellowstone National Park and wanted me to join them there because they stayed in a big Air-B&B house. I was working at my accounting job then and I was in charge of payroll which means I needed to be back by a certain day to get payroll done. People tend to not be happy when they don't get paid on time. So I only had 4 days for my trip. Yellowstone was 15 hour drive from me (one way). I decided to do it. One of the reasons that I decided to do that was recently my favorite uncle had a successful surgery. Happily, I got to talk to him on the phone, and I told him I was going to visit him once Covid was over. Then he died shortly after that phone call. I was devastated. So I decided that I was not going to miss seeing my favorite cousin and her family. I split up the 15 hour drive into 10 hour and 5 hour trips. You should have seen my messy car, I didn't stop for meals, but I bought all kinds of snacks and ate as I drove the entire way. I discovered what worked well for me on long trips are two things: exciting Audio books and pumpkin seeds. Actually, I usually borrow from the library some kids' audio book CDs. I love those because usually there is something to be learned through the stories and they are clean (no sex/violence). The stories kept me engaged so I don't fall asleep. The pumpkin seeds are time-consuming to eat, so I eat one at a time. It takes skills in my mouth to remove the shell and eat the seed. Again, it keeps me alert and also not too many calories. Yay!
I got to Yellowstone safely and had a wonderful time. But when it came time to drive home, a snow storm was brewing. I drove out anyway, but soon I lost the signal and didn't know which way to turn in the mountains. I took a wild guess and thankfully I ran into a small town and stopped to reset my phone and got phone reception again. Thankfully, I was not too far off, so I took screenshots of the route and turned back to where I took the wrong turn. Eventually I arrived home safely. The lesson learned was that if I were to travel to a remote area, then I needed to take screenshot of the google direction or have it printed out because cellular connections can be lost at critical moments.
Another trip I drove to Eagle falls, ID to visit a friend. I didn't pay much attention to the route and didn't know that I had to cross a huge area of wilderness with no gas station. At the time I entered the wilderness, I had half of a tank and I didn't think to fill up. Oh, boy, it was a very long stretch of deserted towns and tumble weeds. Every turn I was hoping to see a gas station, but it seemed like the wilderness stretched out to the ends of the earth. I prayed and prayed to Jesus. and He heard me and rescued me! At the time when I was about to run out of gas, I saw two self-service pumps at an abandoned town. Oh, I was overjoyed! I didn't care how much it was, I was saved by those two pumps. Lesson learned. I need to study the map for potential long stretches without gas and fill up before entering.
Another time I drove out to this National Park out in the middle of nowhere that I never heard of. I was at Reno at the time and didn't think it would take that much gas but because it was uphill the whole time, it used a lot more gas than I anticipated. Again, I miscalculated the gas needed. I almost got stranded again, but God was with me and He was merciful, and there happened to be a gas station once I went through the National park to the other side. I guess I should have studied the topography of the area that I haven't been to and bring an extra container of gas just in case.
Once I took a solo trip through Oregon mountains and for some reason, I discovered that my tire pressure was very low. I didn't see a gas station in sight so I drove slowly forward assuming that there was no nail in my tire. It may just be the fact that I was driving for a long time in below freezing temperature. Thankfully again, just at the right time, on the top of the mountain, there was a tiny gas station. I was saved once again. Since then, I traveled with a portable tire inflator. I didn't know there is such a thing. You just hook it up to the cigarette lighter and it pumps air into your tire when needed. Amazing what technology can do!
I sure am glad that God is with me in all of my solo trips. There were some dangers and scary moments, but I lived to tell the story. I am much more prepared now when I go on those trips and I love it. It's so worth it. I still love traveling with companions but I also enjoy traveling on my own whenever I get back to the U.S. One of those days, I'd like to take my time and drive across the US to the East coast and back. 😀
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