You are between 5 and 10. You are going on vacation (or moving). What form of transportation was used to get there? Did it take long? And what did you do to entertain yourself while traveling?
We went on holiday every year down to Wanaka for a couple of weeks. We would pack up the boat (as I got older, that became one of the things I would help with) & then the car & then head of for the 5 to 6 hour car ride to Wanaka. It was the middle of summer & stifling hot. There was no air conditioning or climate control in those days but winding down the windows. Of course then you had the problem of that horrible reverberation thing that seems to happen when certain windows are down & other are up. It was a long car ride. There were no seatbelts in the back seats so my sister & I would constantly be fighting about who had what on who's side of the car. I don't know how my parents put up with it. I know that we listened to dad's cassettes of country music & sang along to the songs. We did have our christmas presents to amuse us some of the way, Father Christmas always seemed to know that we would need them LOL. There was usually a dot to dot, word find or colouring in book. Sometimes we would play I Spy or the number plate game where we tried to be the first person to get from A - Z off car number plates.
In those days the trip to Wanaka nearly always had a stop at Lindis Pass, not for the toilet or for sightseeing, but for roadworks. They took what seemed like years to complete the road through the Lindis Pass. I remember the road was a gravel one way road & one year as we were going along we met a car, that must have left the other end late, going the other way. There was barely anywhere to move plus we were towing a boat behind us, I was very frightened as i thought we would be going over the bank.
Another year on our trip down to Tekapo our boat trailer got a puncture almost in the middle of nowhere. It was all farmland, I was dying for the toilet, the next town, Fairlie, was a good 3/4 of an hour away & we were stuck with a puncture. While Dad looked at the damamge mum suggested I go in a field however there were cows in the field so there was no way I was going in there. Somehow it all ended up that we got to Tekapo & had the latest recorded "Francis lunch". Francis lunch time has been known to be as late as 2:30pm but this one beat that. At 4pm we finally had lunch. I must have been starving or maybe I had a whole lot of wine drops left that I ate.
All my holiday memories are of travelling to Wanaka in a hot car towing a boat for a very long time.
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4 comments:
Great vacation memory. How did we survive without air conditioning in our cars back then?
You were lucky to have a boat but I can't imagine towing it anywhere. It is all I can do just to drive a car much less tow anything!
Isn't it weird that when you traveled years back, that it didn't matter that there was no a/c. Now today, I wouldn't get in a car without it!!
ohhhh the memories, everywhere we ever went was in car, i remember we moved across country and had to spend 2 or 3 days travelling, yes, thats right, i dont know how mom and dad held it all together. i guess we were fairly good travelers as kids, my sister and I.
one time we got lost after a road detour because of construction, and then ran out of gas, we ended up at a farm, the old man and his wife were so nice, they gave us kiddies a snack, and gave dad gas, and of course would not accept money for it, we got to go to the barn to see the piggies, and even held a baby one. the farmer gave me fresh cows milk in a jar and told me to shake it til it made butter, i shook til my 8 year old arm nearly fell off and then gave it to mom to take a turn shaking...
some of my fave memories are of the fun we had on those trips. playing games, having picnics, counting volkswagon bugs, counting white horses, playing "I spy" and the "plate game" or "sign bingo" i still love to travel, and go everywhere by car.
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