Grandkid Road Trip 2026 - Final Thoughts

Before we could officially declare the Grand-Kid 2026 Road Trip complete, we still had three wonderful days together back home in Lancaster. The scenery changed, but the fun certainly didn't.

Katharyne and Grand-mère enjoyed some well-deserved "girls' time," making pottery, visiting the nail salon, and tackling a variety of craft projects that required considerably more creativity than I could have contributed.

Meanwhile, Whit and I headed in a different direction—straight to the golf course. Over two days we managed to squeeze in 36 holes, and I was genuinely impressed by how much his game has improved. He even received a quick lesson from the club professional, and it showed almost immediately. Watching my grandson begin to understand not just how to hit the ball, but how to think his way around a course, is more rewarding than sinking a long putt myself.

Only then did it feel like our adventure had truly come to an end.

But, every road trip does eventually run out of highway.

Ours began in Abingdon, Virginia, with a night at the Barter Theatre, where we learned that during the Great Depression people could literally trade vegetables for entertainment. From there we crossed Cumberland Gap, followed the footsteps of pioneers, like Daniel Boone, into Kentucky, wandered horse country around Lexington, explored French Lick, watched the Cardinals under the lights in St. Louis, stood beneath the Gateway Arch, cruised the mighty Mississippi, walked with Abraham Lincoln through Springfield, paused at Decatur's moving 9/11 Memorial, and finished among the airplanes—even a TIE Fighter—at the National Museum of the United States Air Force.

That's a respectable amount of history for one week.

But here's the funny thing about travel. Twenty years from now, I may have to look up exactly how tall the Gateway Arch is, or which three states comprise Tri-State Peake. What I won't have to look up is the sound of Whit's laugh, Katharyne's quick wit, or the conversations that somehow bounced effortlessly from glaciers... to baseball... to whether Grandpere really knows everything he claims he does. (For the record, I wisely declined to answer that last question.)

I've discovered that traveling with grandchildren is different from traveling with adults. Adults worry about hotel confirmations, the next charging station, and traffic. Grandchildren wonder whether a tram inside the Gateway Arch qualifies as a ride, whether Lincoln would have liked smartphones, and why anyone thought paying for theater tickets with chickens was a sound business model. Honestly, those are the better questions.

If one were to ask me why I enjoy these trips so much. The answer is simple. Places are interesting. History is fascinating. But the greatest destination has never been a point on the map. It's spending uninterrupted time with two remarkable young people who are curious, funny, kind, well-behaved, and genuinely enjoyable to be around.

I never grow tired of that.

Someday they'll have adventures of their own, and perhaps they'll remember a few stories about their grandfather who wanted to stop and read every historical marker. If they do, I hope they'll also remember that the real purpose of the trip was never just to see the World.

It was to see the World... together.

Never tiring of adventure, we've already started planning a trip for next year.  So, until the next one, thanks for coming along for the ride.

Grandkid Road Trip 2026 Jun 27

 

Grandkid Road Trip 2026 Jun 26

 

Grandkid Road Trip 2026 Jun25

 

Grandkid Road Trip 2026 Jun 24

 

Grandkid Road Trip 2026 Jun23

 

Grandkid Road Trip 2026 Jun 22

 

Grandkid Road Trip 2026 June 21

 

Grandkid Road Trip 2026 - June20

 The Grand-Kid 2026 Road Trip officially began today in Abingdon, Virginia, where I met up with my daughter, Dawn, and my two youngest grandchildren, Katharyne and Whit. This, like every great expedition begins with a carefully crafted plan, and the experienced grandparent knows that the plan will survive only as a shadow of what we actually end up doing.

Our first destination was the Barter Theatre, one of the true cultural treasures of Appalachia. The timing seemed appropriate. We had barely assembled our traveling party before finding ourselves seated for a performance of Guys and Dolls, a musical featuring gamblers, hustlers, and romantics. 

The Barter Theatre owes its existence to one of the more creative business plans in American history. During the depths of the Great Depression, actor Robert Porterfield returned to his native Virginia with a simple observation: people in the mountains might not have much cash, but they still had chickens, eggs, vegetables, and country hams. In 1933 he opened the theater and invited patrons to pay for admission with farm goods. His famous slogan was, “With vegetables you cannot sell, you can buy a good laugh.”

Thus the Barter Theatre was born.

Imagine explaining that business model to a modern MBA program. “Our revenue projections indicate strong growth in sweet potatoes, two dozen eggs, and a suspiciously large number of hams.” Yet somehow it worked. Local farmers received entertainment, actors received food, and the theater survived. In an era when many institutions were collapsing, this one quite literally ran on barter.

The production of Guys and Dolls was excellent. The cast delivered enough energy to light a small city, and the audience responded in kind. Watching a Broadway classic in a historic theater founded on the exchange of produce for tickets felt like a uniquely American experience—equal parts entrepreneurship, optimism, and refusal to quit.

I found myself thinking that this trip is really about the same thing. We are not crossing mountains in covered wagons, nor are we paying for admission with livestock. But we are investing something valuable: time together. Ten days from now, the mileage will be forgotten, many of the meals will blur together, and I may not remember every road we traveled. What I will remember is sharing the journey with Katharyne, and Whit.

That seems like a pretty fair trade - a good barter.