A busy day

Not our car but same model and color

My daughter, who is 20 years old, is engaged to be married. They have set no date yet because she is still in college and her fiance only has a part-time job. But they are working toward the day when they can get married and make their way through life together. We are very excited because he is a wonderful guy and we know they will be happy together. After Christmas, she went to spend a week with him and his family (his mother and sisters). The one problem is that he lives in New York and we live on Cape Cod. Another problem is that he has no car. Another problem is that my daughter doesn't have a driver's license. How did she get there? How is she getting back?

Her fiance has taken the bus here a few times. But our daughter is not ready for something like that. So, the answer is for us to drive her there and come back home and then, when it is time for her to leave, we drive down to pick her up. We do this all in one day and today is the day she is returning. It's approximately 460 miles round trip. That's not a lot for some people but it's a lot for us. Plus, there is always a ton of traffic and a lot of delays. So, while Google Maps says it should only take about 8 hours round trip, it always takes much longer than that.

Add to that the problem that we must take our dog along this time. Our son is working today and we can't leave the dog outside all that time or inside all that time. We have taken our dog on long trips to Vermont and New Hampshire before but this will be longer than those and we no longer have the car we used then. We sold our Ford Escape and bought a Chevy Bolt EUV - an electric vehicle. While we learn how to use commercial charging stations, we are not quite ready for that this time. And the back trunk/hatch area of this car is not quite as large as the Escape's area. So, we are taking my late mother-in-law's old Buick (the same year and model shown in the image above). That means when the three of us (my wife, my daughter and me) are in the car, someone will have to share the back seat with the dog. This is going to be an adventure. Fortunately, it is not snowing. It is raining but not heavily.

I notice that on Google Maps, you can have it show all the EV charging stations along the route but, as I say, we're not sure enough about doing that for this trip. But it bodes well for future trips.

This brings up a couple of subjects for future posts. As the parents of someone getting ready for marriage, we are learning a lot about that and I should be able write about that. Also, we are very excited with our new car. There is a lot to write about that, too. Stay tuned.