Road Trip comfort level

[Colleen27]

I was waffling on this question when my mom got sick and ended up hospitalized (not with covid), and that ended up tipping the scales. I'd been going back and forth long enough that I don't think I'd have done it anyway - our destination would be a state with no mask mandates and terrible numbers/trends, and even though our activities tend more to the outdoorsy, we would have been dining out (takeout or patio), grocery shopping and otherwise coming into limited contact with the local populace. But with my mom sick, I'm not going anywhere with higher virus levels than we have locally or risking any high risk activities, because now that she's out of the hospital and home from her rehab stay in the nursing home, I'm going over there 2-3 times a week to do dishes, laundry and other things she can't yet manage for herself.

Fortunately, Michigan isn't a terrible state to be stuck in. Mom might even join us on our last-blast up north trip before DD18 goes back to school later this month; she's happy to knit on the patio of our rental and enjoy the peace & quiet while we go adventuring. It'll be our third in-state hiking/kayaking road trip of the pandemic, all to different parts of the state, and it really hasn't gotten old yet.

 

[EACarlson]

I usually spend my summers umpiring softball tournaments around the country. So far this year I've done two, both in Cincinnati. One in June and one in July. I drove from Northeast WI for both of them, stopping in Lafayette, IN. My plan, which seems to have worked was to avoid stopping near any large cities. I stopped at an Oasis in IL, where masks are required and have been almost since the beginning. I stopped at a truck stop 30 miles south of Gary, my Hotel in Lafayette and a truck stop halfway between Indianapolis and Cincinnati. Only at the truck stops was I closer than 6 ft from anyone for longer than 30 seconds, and that was two minutes at most.

 

[Mrs. Ciz]

Ever since I read about this event in China, I've been scared to ride in an elevator during the pandemic. The concept of toilet plume has made me want to avoid public toilets as much as possible until the pandemic is over. Until the pandemic, I was pretty laid back about such things.

I’ve heard of the toilet plume issue before. At the beginning of the pandemic, I read a story that said during the first SARS outbreak a guy with explosive diarrhea infected a majority of his apartment complex this way. So yucky!!!

 

[penn19]

I’m moving one of my kids into college in a few weeks. We are staying overnight. I’m a little nervous but forging ahead.

 

[pwdebbie]

The only reason we traveled in July was because my mom had to go into a nursing home and subsequently died. We made two trips to their home which is in a resort area, stayed four nights (while she was in the nursing home) and five nights (because of the funeral) in a hotel. It was not my choice to travel at this time, but now that the trip is more than two weeks behind us and we are both okay (as is everyone else that came from other states), I would say that maybe my concerns were a bit overblown. We did eat in a few restaurants but they were all doing a good job of following the guidelines. We did not do any "vacation-y" type activities so our exposure to others was very limited. And we did bring our own pillows (but we always do that, this hotel's pillows are the worst!).