M is for Matrimony and Motels

We did it! Judy and I tied the knot on 12/13/14, meaning that we’ll be travel partners forever. We were married on a 47-foot sailboat just off Key West as the sun was setting on a most perfect day.

More about that in a later post; this one is about the honeymoon; and specifically, our plan to “not plan.”

Huh?

Let me explain.  When we got engaged and decided that our wedding would be in Key West, we originally planned to take our car – a two-seat Pontiac Solstice roadster -down island so that we could enjoy some top-down motoring in what we hoped would be a weather-perfect setting, even for December. Judy booked us a premium sleeper on the Amtrak Auto Train from Lorton, Virginia, right near our Alexandria home, to Sanford, Florida, (just outside Orlando) with the expectation that would drive down to Key West when we arrived and then meander our way – topless whenever possible –back up U.S. Route 1 for our honeymoon. Thus, staying true to our desire to stay off the Interstates and take the road less traveled whenever possible.

Alas, a bit of practicality set in. While South Florida and Keys weather is darn near perfect in December, there was no guarantee that the rest of the south would cooperate. Furthermore, we realized that we simply had to take too much stuff for the Key West house we had rented for us and our small (four people) wedding party than we could reasonably ask others to bring. (With the top down, the Solstice has room in the trunk for just two small hand bags).

As one-car owners, we did what we often do in cases like these – rent for the mission – in this case, a full-size sedan. Turns out, we pretty much filled the trunk and half of the back seat with clothes for nearly every occasion, a box of booze, party favors and decorations for the house, and more. It felt weird to both of us; if you’ve read this blog from the beginning, you KNOW how much we like to travel light. But this was a special event, after all. We loaded some overnight clothes into an small bag for the train (along with a bottle of wine and some snacks) and let the Amtrak folks load the car and its complement into the back of the train consist. On a cold, dreary day, we headed south.

In doing our research, we also realized that the bulk of Route 1 in this part of the country was so rural that we worried about being bored…or that we might hear dueling banjos. We went “foodie” instead and booked four nights at the chic Andaz Hotel in Savannah, characterized as a “Concept by Hyatt.”

But we still knew that we had to spend one of our honeymoon nights in Florida, somewhere between Key West and Savannah.  For this, we decided that we wanted to stay somewhere that screamed Route 1 tacky – a classic cheesy motel…the cheesier the better. We couldn’t plan this; we would know it when we saw it.

With this “plan” in mind, we bade goodbye to Key West, and headed north.

(Stay tuned for the next installment where we answer the question, what’s fire have to do with it?)

© The World A to Z, LLC 2014