Continuing on the topic of hitting the road, I notice a big difference in perception between the east and west sides of our continent. The whole US eastern seaboard, from Portland, ME to Atlanta, GA and right on down to Key West, is essentially a continuous super-sized set of suburbs. So, one never has far to go. On the other hand, in the west there can be miles and miles between settlements. These differences have made many people 'out west' (where the states are big) more tolerant of long-distance driving. Whereas, people 'back east' prefer to live within a dozen miles of their job, in the west, I know people who routinely commute a hundred kilometers (sixty or seventy miles) each day.
In this 2002 picture, in order for our visitor to see a high school alumnus,
we easily made a 'road trip' a few hundred miles south.