Our primary mode of transportation these past few weeks has been a car. We picked up a rental car from Vienna airport on August 20th and will return it in Dubrovnik, Croatia on October 10th. During that time it will drive through Austria, Germany, Slovenia, Italy & Croatia. Overland travel or bust!
How Do We Pass the Time in the Car?
Doug has the singular responsibility of driving. The car is manual transmission and I don’t know how to drive a stick shift, so there you have it! Doug is an excellent driver and has been maneuvering the windy European roads with the best (/worst) of them. Hats off to our chauffeur, Doogie!
Sarah
When I’m not “back-seat driving” (why can’t I stop myself?!), I mind our queue of podcasts, kids audio books and music. Sometimes I respond to emails or various text/WhatsApp/Viber messages. Sometimes I enjoy the beautiful scenery. Sometimes I doze off (I swear there’s something in the car’s aroma that knocks me out; it’s become an ongoing joke). Sometimes I scope out spots at our next destination. Largely a combination of these things.
P&S: Giggling or Clawing
The girls occupy their time doing one of a few things in the backseat:
Silently captivated by an audio book or podcast: Favorite podcasts of the moment are "Earth Rangers" (animals), "Tumble" (science) and select "Milk Street" (food).
Happily singing along to their favorite playlists: Songs that are on *constant* repeat these days are: Katy Perry "Never Really Over", Taylor Swift "Afterglow", Alesso "Heroes", Bruno Mars "Count On Me", Lil Nas X "Old Town Road" (ugh), Ed Sheeran "Beautiful People", Ed Sheeran & Justin Bieber "I Don't Care" and Robin Schulz "Heatwave".
Playing “store” with our most recent purchases: We’re tight on space in the car, so whatever we buy on the go (i.e. toiletries, groceries) gets placed on the back seat between the girls. All their own doing, their imaginations kick into full gear. They pretend shop from these items, ring each other up at a pretend cash register, hone their math skills with money we let them use to purchase items, pretend pierce each other's ears (current obsession) or style hair, chat over what they’d do with x item in their house, etc. It’s super fun to eavesdrop, and this calm, free play together lasts for hours on end.
Bickering & hitting: Flip side . . . When the girls aren’t getting along brilliantly, they’re annoying the crap out of each other (and us in the front seat). The littlest things tick them off (one has something the other wants, one is looking at the other in a weird way, who knows!) and they get super frustrated with each other. Lately they struggle to know how to constructively deal with that frustration and instead pinch or push each other. Not their finest moments. And not ours either when we’ve had enough of it. Cat’s outta the bag . . . Road trips don’t always bring out the best in people :)
I’d say we’re currently at a ratio of ~70% audio book/music/play time vs ~30% bickering time. Let’s see how this European road trip continues to unfold :)
Final mileage: We clocked 6,130 km on our European rental car! Loads of fun.
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