Welcome back to #TravelThursday. 10 days ago – I took a nearly spontaneous day trip over to Lakeland. I briefly considered Lakeland as a retirement location several years ago. It’s a rapidly growing city (and metropolitan area) along I-4 between Tampa and Orlando with all of the big box stores and chain restaurants – and all of the traffic that goes along with it. Located just shy of 60 miles from home near Sebring – some 125,000+ residents call Lakeland home, but perhaps close to 800,000 people live in its metro area.
This short day-trip served a few purposes. I wanted to experiment with a somewhat non-traditional way of driving to Lakeland – by staying on U.S. 98. (My neighborhood is located along the concurrence of U.S. 27 and U.S. 98.) About 14 miles north – U.S. 98 splits away from U.S. 27 and heads westward to U.S. 17 where the two old U.S. highways form a concurrency to Bartow. (U.S. 98 then continues northwestward by itself to Lakeland and beyond.)
It was a nice drive along U.S. 98. I actually enjoyed a late-Breakfast at a popular local diner in Fort Meade. I think I may have driven through Fort Meade on a previous road-trip many years ago. It deserves its own edition of #TravelThursday, as I’d like to explore more of this historic small town – including the Museum presented by my brothers and sisters at the Historical Society of Fort Meade.
(On that day trip of 10 days ago – I ended up taking the more traditional route of Florida State Road 60 eastward from Bartow to U.S. 27 and then southward to return home.)
That day trip served as a “dress rehearsal” of the start of my upcoming retirement road-trip. It’s a road-trip that’s nearly 40 years in the making. I’ve frequently dreamed of taking a long road-trip clockwise around the perimeter of the country at the start of my retirement. I envisioned driving some 10,000 miles from Florida to Texas to California to Washington and then along I-90 from coast to coast across the northern U.S and then down the Eastern Seaboard back home to Florida.
My actual road-trip will be a much scaled-down version of those lofty dreams. I’ll be staying south and driving to and from North Texas via two different routes while mostly avoiding the Interstate. I’ll be journaling my life and times while on the road again. It’ll provide plenty of material for #TravelThursday through the next several months. I hope that you’ll hop along for a virtual ride !
Next #TravelThursday – I’ll write about a couple of historic museums in Bartow Florida. Let’s keep traveling together.
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