Spiritual Road Tripping

ABOVE: Amangiri

A road trip can be an adventure, and an inner journey

The car doors slammed closed. I’d just exited the hospital with my first newborn baby. My husband and I had awkwardly strapped him into his car seat. Now, in darkness, for a moment, the three of us sat quietly. The baby, sleeping, didn’t know it, but my husband and I were immensely alarmed. We had no idea what would come next.

“What do we do now?” he asked.
“Start the engine,” I suggested. 
He did, and we drove into the night, a 20-minute trek that was our baby’s first road trip. That jaunt home embodied so many of the reasons I still love to travel by car. In this case, like all road trippers, we leapt into life, pursuing an unknown route, which would likely include myriad wrong turns, detours and dead-ends. Our destination, a vague concept of guiding a child to adulthood, would be less important than the day-to-day adventure. Unskilled parents, we would be spontaneous, make poor decisions, be intuitive, break routines, develop new habits and veer far out of our comfort zone. But, we’d learn as we went. We’d bond, become a team, open our minds to new ways of thinking, experience profound gratitude and make countless memories. As Jack Kerouac wrote: “But no matter, the road is life.”

Since then, we’ve made a habit of road trips. We’ve driven from Texas to Montana, Paris to Vienna, Florida to New Mexico, Zurich to Rome, San Diego to Seattle, Laredo to Mexico City—and everywhere in between. We’ve done it with three kids, two dogs, just the two of us, random combinations of the crew, even alone. We’ve taken dirt roads, run out of gas, slept in cabins and barns, lolled about in presidential suites, stumbled on rare finds not recorded in guidebooks, hiked mountains, eaten local specialties, soaked in hot springs, been massaged with locally made elixirs, met new friends and disconnected from technology. We’ve been luxe and we’ve been lowly. We’ve loved and we’ve fought; we’ve laughed, we’ve cried, we’ve admonished and we’ve supported. Road trips aren’t for the cowardly. They require a willingness to shift something.

A road trip can heal a schism, and it can ignite a fire that never fades. What’s most magical, though, about road tripping is how it nudges places within, stretches and pounds them, as a massage plies the muscles. Sojourns in a car demand more than steering and gas pedaling; they thrive on inner (call it: spiritual) participation.

You don’t have to dig deep into your soul to maneuver a vehicle down Route 66. But, what you’ll find out there on the road is that something begins to happen to you, something that starts as a tickle, an awakened nerve that makes you want to lean in. From a wellness perspective, the driving vacation acts as a tonic for your spirit, urging it into deeper realms. With a map (or GPS) in hand, a course in mind and a vehicle to transport you, the venture evokes excitement for the unknown; it offers the possibility for something undiscovered; and it triggers gratefulness because all the new things you’ve found along the way serve to shake you up, and make you think. They show contrast you need for the sort of perspective that leads to happiness and harmony.

Further, there’s the Zen of it. As landscapes flutter by, as music plays and conversations happen, a meditative mood becomes the order of the day. Your senses seem heightened as you focus on details—colorful leaves on trees, distinctive aromas carried by the wind, the tastes of new foods, the sounds of sonorous bells ringing or wheels crunching gravel. This celebration of the ordinary points out that beauty is always around you. On a road trip, the world’s gifts are palpable and healing. The process of driving, the fact that you can stop or go as you please, the reality of embracing new surroundings, now frees you to walk your own path resolutely, to appreciate what you have. As you ramble, these new experiences become threads in the tapestry that defines you. In a word, a road trip translates to sustenance—soulful sustenance, if one can use two. In The Year of Pleasures, Elizabeth Berg put it this way: “Now, on this road trip, my mind seemed to un-crinkle, to breathe, to present to itself a cure for a disease it had not, until now, known it had.”

What follows is a short list of some meanderer-tested trips, and some spas to reward and enhance your efforts along the way.

Catskill Mountains Scenic Byway

Just two hours from New York City, this serpentine passage wriggles through forests, beside lakes and creeks, amid farmland, and up inclines for 52 miles. A setting that has inspired artists and writers for centuries, known for its ethereal light, it comprises picturesque hamlets, villages, wooden bridges, ski areas and wilderness expanses. With hiking trails, fishing spots, golf courses and bike paths, it draws active types, as well as culinary aficionados for its farm produce, distilleries and breweries.