Weekend Assignment #219: Preferred Transportation

A partially gutted building in Magdalena, NM, and my car

This week's Weekend Assignment is a fairly simple and straightforward one, inspired by Kiva's most likely answer. (Apologies to Kiva for asking you to tread familiar ground!)

Weekend Assignment #219: What is your favorite form of transportation, and why? You can choose any means of traveling by land, sea or air, with just one catch: it has to currently exist in the real world, or have existed in the past. No TARDIS, no Star Trek transporter, no flying DeLoreans, all right?

Extra Credit: What's the most unusual form of transportation you've ever taken?

I fully expect to have the most boring answer of anyone, because you see, I like a car. You can take a car to the McDonald's on the corner, or to the major amusement part at the other end of the country. You can leave when it's convenient for you, rather than conform to someone else's schedule. You can decide, in the spur of the moment, to change course and stop for an ice cream, or photograph a sunset, or explore an historic fishing village. You can travel up and down all but the worst roads, or ride a ferry to a nearby island. You don't get blisters on your heels, or bugs in your teeth. You ride in comfort and relative privacy, and in a pinch you can even pull up at a rest area and sleep. Can your form of transportation do all this?

Last week I mentioned that I like to explore. Over the years, some of those explorations have been by motorscooter, others by car. And while the scooter trips to Patagonia AZ, Niagara Falls, Syracuse and a castle outside Cincinnati were definitely fun, they had their drawbacks. I had to get a rancher to haul my scooter away from a steep and rocky back road at dusk on one occasion, and another time I ended up terribly sore after many hours on I-90 in 90 degree weather, with most of its lanes closed for construction. On the whole, my explorations by car have been more successful. I've climbed mountains and crossed deserts by car, found my way to obscure ghost towns, slept on a beach, and driven to a shooting location for a favorite tv show. And just writing this, I find myself longing to throw some clothes in my old suitcase, and take off again tomorrow morning. I won't, but oh, boy, I sure want to do it!

As for the extra credit, which is better, a schooner in San Diego Bay or a tram ride up an Alp? I think I have to go with our whale-watching tour on the schooner Invader. I've taken trams up a few mountains over the years, but only one Alp, I think, overlooking Lucerne, Switzerland. Beautiful place, very.

Anybody know how to fly this thing?

Your turn! Do you like to fly? Drive? Cycle? Sail? Hike? Feet are a form of transportation, too. Whatever your favorite means of getting around may be, make the case for it in your scooter or blog, and be sure to link back here in your entry. Then leave a link to your entry in the comments below. As usual, I'll be back in a week with a roundup of your entries. Avanti!

Karen