Trips to Fripp

 

Remember the Chevy Vega “station wagon?”  That sub-sub-sub-compact-hatch-back from way-back when?

We had one and we’d travel to Fripp Island, S.C. from Ohio for two weeks in the spring in that car.  A couple of duffle bags, baseball mitts, fishing gear, wine and suntan lotion.  We’d pack it all up and, if things went well and we had our wits about us, we’d remember to toss the three young boys in on top of everything.

We drugged them for the trip.  Dramamine, if I recall. Our pharmacist recommended it as a safety measure.  There were no seat belts in the Chevy Vega.

We were able to get several hours of peaceful driving except for one unfortunate situation.  One of the boys always had an adverse reaction to Dramamine.  It wired him.  But at least there was only one asking: “Are we there yet?”  There could have been three.

When we got to Beaufort, we’d stop at the Winn Dixie and buy groceries. We piled a two-week supply of food on top of suitcases, beach towels, and boys. We had everything we needed for our vacation in that little car.  Our family’s footprint on Fripp Island was as small as the children’s on the sand.

Fast forward 45 years:  A recent trip to one of our Island’s beaches introduced me to eighteen wheelers masquerading as cars.

It seems that no one travels light these days.  And what they don’t bring with them, they buy and then apparently leave behind as trash to be cleaned up and disposed of.  Visitors may drop dollars but they and their huge cars/wagons/vans/ SUV’s leave an imprint that doesn’t always bode well for the future.

I must not get the meaning of vacation in today’s world.  I always thought vacations were an opportunity to be open, unstructured and free of “stuff.”  To leave behind encumbrances and just chill out.

But every day, it seems, I get older in my thinking.

Next week my post will probably be delivered by Pony Express.

“One if by land and two if by sea.”

Tally-ho.