Why a road trip across the country in a 55 year old car? 56 years old by the time I make the trip in the summer of 2022.

At first I thought it was due to COVID-induced cabin fever. Upon reflection, I’ve been no stranger to travel since March of 2020. In October of 2020 I drove from the Tampa Bay area to northern Michigan to sell my condo on Mackinac Island. 1500 miles each way, three glorious days – and my last as a property owner – on Mackinac Island, then a drive from St. Ignace north to Sault St. Marie – aka the Soo – to sign documents at the title company.

From there over to Paradise and Whitefish Point, introducing my 17-year old son and lady friend to the wild splendor of Michigan’s Upper Peninsula and a way of life foreign to anyone living in a big city or suburbia. The Whitefish Point museum and the story of the Edmund Fitzgerald, a stroll on the sandy shore of Lake Superior and gazing out on the sun-drenched waters, east with Canada in view, north and west to the vast beyond across the waters of the lake the Ojibwe called gichi-gami, or Great Sea.

The next day it was over to Tahquamenon Falls, followed by the trip back to metro Detroit to visit the siblings and family, drop off the girlfriend for her flight home, and the long drive down I-75 to Tampa Bay sharing the driving with my son.

In June a few months before I flew from St. Petersburg, FL to Flint, MI, rented a car and drove to St. Ignace and spent nearly two glorious weeks on Mackinac Island. Normally the condo is rented at that time of year, but tourism was not allowed due to the pandemic and only residents were allowed on the island. Being a property owner, I qualified. I would have stayed even longer but I was paying for a rental car to sit in a parking lot and that made no sense.

 

So a reluctant farewell to that magical island, a drive downstate to visit family and friends before the return flight to Florida.

That fall trip was nearly a year ago. Has the wanderlust bitten so hard in so short a time? It was even less, as for New Year’s I flew to Phoenix where we burned up miles of Arizona highway visiting the Grand Canyon, then the airplane museum in Tuscon, followed by a trip to Sedona. In the next few months a couple of trips to LA.

It couldn’t be lack of travel, I’ve done more travel in the last year and a half than the previous several years combined. It might be cabin fever from working at home, I can’t deny that.

 

Why not take the trip? Why not do something just for the hell of it? Why not see all the sights of Route 66? Anchored on both ends by two of America’s best metropolises, Chicago and LA? With all kinds of Americana in between, connected by The Mother Road. Highways and byways and stoplights, big cities and small towns and the endless expanse of America.

There’s a certain symmetry to driving the whole of Route 66 at age 66. No, I’m not retired with endless free time on my hands. But there’s more of this life behind me than in front, and there’s still a whole lot I’d like to see and do. Route 66 is on the bucket list, and what better way to do it than in celebration of my 66 years (and counting!) of life?

While I’m at it, let’s make that symmetry even more complete and do it in a ’66. A sports car, something to feel the road, experience the road. American sports cars of that era are few. There’s the Corvette, there’s the Cobra coupe, there’s the Mustang. Don’t want a muscle car, cross-country is not what they’re designed to do. The Cobra coupe replica would be fun but that’s a brutal car to drive 2,500 miles. That leaves the Corvette and the Mustang. It’s got to have a stick shift, because that’s the kind of guy I am.

A nice ’66 Mustang GT convertible runs upward of $50K, nice fastbacks a tad higher, which gets into the Corvette price range. That’s a dear penny to pluck from somewhere, so unless someone sponsors this trip and money is no longer a consideration, it’s the Mustang coupe for half the price.</p>

So a Mustang it is. Route 66 in a ’66 Mustang while I’m 66. The adventure begins.