Avoid Corona Road Trip to California
How to get to California when you don’t want to deal with the petri dish of international airports?
A road trip, of course!
This weekend, I hopped in my car and started driving west, with San Francisco—eventually—as my target. My planned route is roughly through southwestern New Mexico, into Arizona, and then less clear. If COVID-19 turns into a zombie apocalypse-style pandemic, I can hide away for a month in a remote haunt in the Southwest.
My trip’s main goal is to reconnect with my friends and network in the Bay Area. I spent a month in San Francisco last year at this time and found it incredibly productive. If you’re around over the next few weeks, reach out and let’s grab coffee, a drink, or a meal.
Road trips are unfamiliar territory for me and, so far, has been a source of stress. My plan was not to plan, such that every morning I’d get up and figure out where I was headed that day. That kind of freedom can be stifling. Normally, when I take a trip, everything is in Google Calendar. Where to go next? No worries! The only decision is whether to take an Uber or walk to the next appointment.
Lack of structure has been a theme during my sabbatical. Since there’s no external force, “laziness” loses all meaning. Since I’m not supposed to do anything, everything that I do is “right.” Is it lazy to sit around and read Tolstoy for a day? To binge watch season 1 of Jack Ryan? To go to the gym? To write a blog post?
Freedom does have advantages. On Sunday, when the weather was awful in Silver City, NM, I made the decision to drive into sunny Arizona, scrapping plans to explore the Gila Wilderness.
One way I’ve dealt without a clear plan is to have some kind of larger intention. Mine is to hike as much as possible.
My first hiking stop on Saturday was the Magdalena Mountains in New Mexico. The Magdalenas are about an hour-and-a-half south of Albuquerque, part of the Cibola National Forest. During a 10-mile hike to the top of North Baldy, I didn’t see a single other human being, just a few lonely cows, a skunk, an abandoned mine, and a mysterious skull. Though I wish that more people would discover New Mexico, there’s something special about having a trail all to yourself.
On Monday, I did an even more ambitious hike to the top of Mt. Kimball in the Santa Catalinas. This was a 14.5 mile hike (added 1/2 mile at least, thanks to route-finding mishaps) with about 5,000 feet of vertical gain. From a saguaro forest at the bottom to pinon/juniper at the top. Turns out that the desert isn’t dead at all.
The solitude of hikes, of being on the road (even though I have David Yergin’s The Quest, an excellent book about energy, to keep my company) and of writing in a coffee shop in an unfamiliar town—all of these are part of the independent, unplanned spirit I hope to capture.
I should have some good stories for you when we meet up in California.
(Follow my adventures on Instagram.)
