Most students spend their Spring Break on a beach somewhere in Florida getting a sunburn and getting a little drunk.
Last Spring Break, I spent my time taking in the culture of a Mexican border town, walking through historic Tombstone, Ariz. and hiking into the deep of the Grand Canyon.
Don’t get me wrong; I would do sand, sun and a Corona or margarita any day. But three of my closest friends and I opted for a different break from the semester.
We set out heading west on Interstate 10 with a map and a couple of guidebooks, knowing where we were going but waiting until we got there to figure out the rest.
The point was to do something completely out of our comfort zone of normal, planned vacations. We had nine days, and we were determined to see as much as possible.
We traveled more than 3,000 miles through deserts and mountains, cities, historic landmarks and ghost towns. We slept in roadside motels, ate in small town cafes and got up each morning at the crack of dawn to hop back on the road to the next location.
And we documented everything in photographs, on film and in a journal we kept handy.
Before leaving for the trip, we did some research and came up with short lists of the top places we wanted to visit such as Carlsbad Caverns and Roswell, N.M.
However, it the things we did on a whim stayed with us longest, like visiting a breathtaking chapel built into the side of a red rock formation near Sedona, Ariz. or shopping in the congested markets of Juarez, Mexico or driving down a dirt road to a ghost town in New Mexico and staying there until the sun sank below the desert horizon.
I never will forget hiking for six hours into the heart of the Grand Canyon and watching the sun come up over the rim and hearing nothing but silence — which I have discovered is an amazing sound.
But the most important thing I took back from the trip was the knowledge that I did it all with my friends.
We have funny stories about dealing with security in the Petrified Forest (you aren’t supposed to take the rocks), trying to find someone to take a picture of us in front of a cactus near Tucson and trying to figure out how to ask for the check in Spanish.
And we have some not-so-funny stories about how we shouldn’t have driven on a dirt road into the desert at night to look at stars or how you really aren’t supposed to take those rocks.
Many people say long road trips can change you, and this one definitely did.
We brought back souvenirs from this trip — Mexican blankets, postcards and rocks (oops!).
But we returned with a lot more. We grew together and learned about each other’s sleeping patterns and who tends to lose his or her mind after riding in a truck for endless hours.
We had fun together; we got fed up with each other; we bonded. By the time our direction turned eastward, we had been through a lot together.
So, my advice to students for this spring break is to take the road less traveled. Although I would suggest a trip out West to anyone, it’s up to you.
Gather a few friends, flip a coin to choose your direction and hit the road. But be warned that things don’t always go as planned, and you should be prepared for anything.
As for my three road trip friends and me — we’re plotting our next route already. There still is a lot of country out there for us to see.