8/6: It really is very convenient, driving a car. Being able to decide yourself where to go and when to stop. Having grown up in Stockholm with a single mom with a license but no car and a remarried dad with a car but no license, made me feel that public transportation was freedom. I didn’t see the point with driving, it’s just bad for the environment. That’s why I didn’t get my license until two days before I turned twenty-four.
But now I see it. While traveling in a foreign country, or maybe more correctly, North America, there really isn’t any other way of transportation that is more convenient. Because, how else would we have been able to come around a turn in the road, be blinded by the setting sun and simply stop at this random northern California beach to enjoy the mist softened beauty?
After three days on the road, the driving felt completely natural too. We were just enjoying ourselves immensely, Hanna and I.
Just before dark, we arrived in Arcata and found a motel to stay at for the night. It was funished as if it hadn’t been updated since the seventies, with a lot of brown and a huge fat TV. But we slept well.
Katja Malmborg 