Rambling on about finding laughter, cake, and a little adventure in the travel plans we never saw coming…

I don’t know that any of my travel experiences were bad enough to be called “the worst.” Rather, I’ve traveled into some mighty interesting circumstances, usually the kind nobody puts in the brochure and nobody remembers to mention until you’re already in the middle of them.

When I was a child, we went to Florida often. On one particular trip, I was riding the waves on a float when a heavy wave flipped me over. I scratched my face on the ocean floor and came out with what we called “ocean rash,” which was pretty much road rash with better scenery. That put an end to my swimming for the rest of the trip, but Aunt Emmy and my grandparents came to the rescue. I spent my afternoons at the dog races in Daytona and shopping. At eleven years old, that didn’t feel like a consolation prize. That felt like winning.

When I was about twelve, my grandparents took me on a road trip to the Tennessee mountains. Back then, you packed a picnic and stopped at a roadside park instead of pulling into a fast-food restaurant. While we were admiring the view and exploring a trail before lunch, a bear wandered in. My grandmother screamed, grabbed the chocolate cake, and headed for the car. We followed her wisdom, if not her speed.

The rest of our picnic was, to put it politely, a bust. But we had cake. We sat safely in the car, laughing and watching the bear enjoy the rest of our lunch. Looking back, it was less a ruined picnic than an unexpected wildlife presentation, with dessert.

Then there was the trip to Colorado in a rented motor home. We were testing the waters to see whether motor-home travel was something our family really wanted. The vehicle had air brakes, and while we were coming down a mountain, my dad looked over at me and said, “We have hardly any brakes. Don’t say anything.”

Well, we made it down. It was a fairly memorable way for a fifteen-year-old to learn that grown-ups sometimes share information in the calmest voice possible, even when the information is not especially calming. And, believe it or not, we bought the motor home after that trip.

Another time, I went to visit my sister for a long vacation and ended up in the middle of a hurricane. We spent four days without power, with trees scattered across the roads and food becoming harder to find. To make matters worse, the generator had a faulty fuse. It was not exactly the restful getaway anyone had pictured.

Still, we had a good time. We talked, laughed, and remembered old stories and the many other incidents life had tossed our way. When the lights are out, and the roads are blocked, you might as well enjoy the company you’ve got. Besides, there is something about sitting around in difficult circumstances that makes a person suddenly remember every funny family story ever told.

I suppose what I’m saying is that the worst travel experiences in my life were never really the worst. They were trips that went off the rails a bit… waves, bears, mountain roads, hurricanes, and all. Yet somehow, the rescue became a new adventure, and the inconvenience became a happy memory.

Life is like that. It is full of turns, detours, and the occasional roadblock placed directly in your path when you were sure you knew where you were going. We can’t always choose what happens along the way, but we can choose how we handle it. Sometimes all you can do is grab the chocolate cake, get safely in the car, and wait for the bear to finish lunch.