Thanks to all of you who submitted your best road trip to our competition. We are happy to announce the following winner and three runners up. First prize is an Oz Experience bus pass and the runners up win a copy of Rough Guides’ Ultimate Adventures. Have a read of the winning road trips below or if you have plans to travel Australia, check out our post on the best Oz road trips.
Your little story hit a nerve with us because it’s so easy to forget that the world really is your oyster. Be spontaneous! Go to Chicago – or wherever else you can drive through the night – for breakfast. What have you got to lose…
Renee’s best road trip:
Chicago for breakfast? Why not! As a freshman at university, a friend and I realized that we could leave at midnight and reach Chicago by sunrise. On the way we drove through thick-as-mud fog rolling off the Great Lakes, made car dance party memories, bought our first out-of-state lottery tickets, and left our mark on a Chicago cafe. After which we promptly hopped back on the highway. That “why not go to Chicago for breakfast?” road trip set the standard for impulsive trips to come with good friends, car snacks, classic tunes, and the open road.
Renee has won an Oz Experience bus pass up to the value of €397!
Mark H painted us a dramatic picture of Canada’s Icefield Parkway. Anyone heading to the region for a ski trip in 2011 would do well to take a break from the slopes and experience the landscape along one the world’s most beautiful stretches of road…
Mark H’s best road trip:
The scene features towering snow-tipped mountains, glaciers draped through the valleys, vibrant waterfalls plunge into flooding rivers and turquoise lakes sparkling against the forest backgrounds. Elk munch at the lush shoots on the verges. Mother bears nervously shepherd their cubs away from the roadside. The snaking drive from Banff to Jasper along Canada’s Icefield Parkway is one of the grandest road trips in the world. With jaw-dropping scenery every few miles each sight seemingly tries to outdo its neighbour for natural beauty. Familiar from travel brochures, nothing prepares you for the grandeur, the bracing mood and the vibrancy of nature.
Mark H has won a copy of Rough Guides’ Ultimate Adventures!
Everyone loves a hero who overcomes every hurdle against all the odds. Kate Corleison and her little yellow mini conquering the New Zealand hills around Taupo, there’s a film in that surely? Soundtrack written and produced by Everclear…
Kate Corleison’s best road trip:
I have this vivid memory of our little yellow mini pushing itself to the limit up hills on the way to Taupo, New Zealand, December 1997. Shouting out, “Lean forward!” Joking that it would help us up the hills! We had the ‘discman’ pumping with the windows down enjoying the unusually hot summer, singing along to Everclear “…bom bom, I am still livin’ with your ghost…”. Driving over the Desert road and hearing splashing like we were driving through water… It was the tar melting from the heat on the plateau. Thirteen years later, I still clearly hear that sound!
Kate Corleison has won a copy of Rough Guides’ Ultimate Adventures!
We’ve heard our fair share of frustrated traveller stories – “boo hoo I’m stuck in some godforsaken place” during the ash cloud disaster. But a teeny weeny part of us said “ummm, free holiday, duh!” So it was with great delight that we read Tes Forshaw’s account of how she overcame the ‘glass half empty’ attitude and instead made the most of the journey home…
Tes Forshaw’s best road trip:
My road-trip was an accident, in Easter break two friends and I went to Switzerland and Austria and got stranded in Vienna because of the ash cloud. No flights or trains and buses were full or expensive, so we hired a car and extend our trip by eating drinking our way back across Europe. The first main stop was in Munich for Bavarian sausage, Stuttgart for Stuttgarter Stäffele, Dijon, France for mustard, and Epernay and Reims to visit champagne houses. We dropped off the car in Paris, ate pain au chocolat and Eurostar’ed it back to England.
Tes Forshaw has won a copy of Rough Guides’ Ultimate Adventures!
Thanks to C. G. P. Grey for the image off Flickr!
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