It is not the decision to come home early when a family member gets sick that is hard. It’s the decision about what to do once you are there, months before you expected. Months that your condo is occupied by a tenant, months when that car your sold right before you left would’ve come in handy, months when the prospect of finding employment again looms large.
It took a few weeks of visiting friends and family, sorting the piles of mail that awaited us and fielding the endless questions of what we were going to do with ourselves before we made the conscience decision to treat these months as merely the next part of our year around the world adventure. Same trip, different itinerary. Instead of southern Australia, New Zealand and Fiji, we’d continue to travel in the US and Canada. And we’d start immediately, two miles south of the home I grew up in, at the George Washington Bridge.
It might sound strange, but in the 30 years that my mother has lived in that same house, I had never once walked across this iconic bridge. Sure, I’d driven across it a million times, admiring the views of the Manhattan skyline and the Palisades cliffs while sitting in traffic. I’d watched joggers out on their morning runs, commuters walking briskly to the other side, bicyclists rolling along the narrow pedestrian walkway, and think to myself that one day, when the weather is fine, I should do that. That day arrived on a relatively cool, clear June evening.
We waited until the sun started its western descent and hit the road, arriving at the bridge to catch the end of rush hour. We parked, grabbed the camera and wandered down to the pedestrian entrance on the 
Fort Lee side of the bridge. In between snapping pictures and convincing security who were less than thrilled with our picture taking that we were just tourists out for a stroll, we laid out the tentative plans that would become the route of our US and Canadian road trip.
Amidst the scent of car fumes and the grit of debris that lined the walkway, we allowed ourselves to fall back into travel mode. Destinations that at the same time seemed close to home but that we hadn’t yet made it to swirled in our heads. Mt. Rushmore. Glacier National Park. Banff. Victoria. Anywhere not as hot as summer on the east coast!
It’s not the adventure we had originally planned, but if we’ve learned anything during our 9 months abroad, it’s that nothing ever goes as originally planned. And yet everything seems to work out for the best. That’s the beauty of travel, and so the adventure continues.
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It’s all about keeping your chin up and taking it as it comes…and it meant that we got to see you!! Yay!
Tough decision but it sounds like you put a lot of thought into it. If you head farther East into Canada I’m more than happy to offer recommendations.
Ayngelina – thanks for the offer, not sure we will make it this trip but being in Philly it is likely we will make it up there at some point.
Can’t wait to see you guys and hear all about everything!! Your picture and story of the GW Bridge made me think of the Bridge Climb in Sydney. Which prompted me to look at your awesome Australia pictures…and then MY Australia pictures from 3+ years ago…so thank you for that!
Enjoy everything and we’ll see you soon! xoxo