What's a long drive for you?

Tereza just posted about commuting over in the new careers thread and it got me thinking: https://permies.com/t/379963/Career#3841919

I mostly grew up in and around St. Louis, Missouri after spending my childhood in southern California. From that background, the idea of driving an hour each way to work was within the range of normal, but something I find quite taxing over time. But on the other hand, getting in the car on a whim and driving a thousand miles to go see something cool was perfectly reasonable behavior. And my honeymoon in 1997 was a 6700 mile road-trip over 17 days.

In the summer of 1999, I moved from Columbia, Missouri into the orbit of Princeton, New Jersey and by the new year I had a job where I was getting to know locals. It turns out, in New Jersey, commutes of an hour are short and I knew people who commuted two hours -- each way, every day, day after day, for years. Simultaneously, just about every one of my work peers wanted to go to Florida for vacation (for whatever reason) and they all thought driving was literally crazy.

This was sort of simultaneously profound and trivial as far as culture clashes go.

I've moved back to the Midwest US and have been in Minnesota for over twenty years. And I'm personally still where I was as a 'kid'. If my wife wanted to circle-tour the great lakes next week, I'd get an oil change and we'd go. It's a ten hour drive to see my dad or her mom in Missouri and we'll have done that three times by the time this year is over...no biggie. I could work in Duluth and drive half an hour each way, but when I have to drive to my current job in the Twin Cities (2-3 times a year) it's about 2.5 hours each way and a real drag.

Commutes and road trips just occupy completely different niches in my brain.

How is this for you?

(ETA: Oh, and when I was young I spent a couple of years driving cars around town -- as a courier and later delivering pizza. That was a fine way to spend my time though I might not think so now. And it's different than either commuting or road-tripping.)

...I grew up mostly in New Jersey. My father bought land on the western border with PA and drove into NYC for a time (90 minutes or more, depending on traffic)-- to drive a truck. I guess for him, since he literally drove all day, it was all the same.

I lived in Rhode Island for a bit, where you can literally reach every point in the state in an hour's drive. People would squawk about how something the next town over was too far! I had a commute of maybe 25 minutes and it was great.

More recently, I used to do client visits and while it wasn't far, traffic here is brutal and i would easily spend 3-4 hours driving each day. I got to know my city really well, but it was horrible (and it was mostly sitting in traffic getting stressed, not seeing gorgeous scenery). I was so relieved to leave that job and work at home, I feel like it affected my health.

Like you say, on the other hand I enjoy driving when I travel- I consider 5-6 hour drives normal (visiting my mother in law takes about that long, we do it every month or so) but most of my peers think I'm insane. I fly the same route for work every so often and it probably takes longer, between airport security, ubers, etc. I'd rather drive.
I've also done some much longer drives, 6+10 hours to get to a national park, another one was 12 hours, most of these trips I've driven because there were good stops on the way.
But when I was a kid we drove from NY to Florida several times, in college I drove from NY to Detroit, Detroit to Tennessee, it was normal.

Great question.  I notice that you used two different measures…. One of miles and the other of time. Both are valid .  But, a one hour trip here in southern Illinois gets me 50 miles or more.  A one hour trip in Detroit might get me less than 10 miles.

In the past 3 years, my longest trip was about 100 miles one way  (which I make around 6 times a year) .  Going back 10 years ago, I thought nothing about hopping in my car and driving 500 miles one way  (a trip I might make 3 times a month.  

So, for long  trip… I guess that now a round trip of 400 miles would be something I would have to seriously plan for.  10 years ago I drove 2400  miles round trip. I considered that long at the time.

Given that Permies.com is a site with international members and traffic, I'm looking forward to input from those raised in other cultures.

Admittedly, I take a 'selectionist' view of US travel habits even as this is not exclusive to the US.  For sure, there will be many who either are or were decended from European and other immigrants who are quite comfortable not having travelled more than 30 - 40 miles from where they were born.  But the 'founder effect'.....that of a founding population that largely saw emmigration and relocation as expedient in problem solving....has left us with the modern day 'travel bug' which we satiate with driving and flying to far-off destinations.  Just a personal pondering at any rate....

I do think this yardstick changes in each individual over time, but not for all.  My wife and a friend of hers are of roughtly equal age.  Wife traveled much more than I did the world over and now in her mid-70s can't imagine driving more than an hour for anything.  Her friend did a roughly equal amount of traveling in her youth and still does this by road or plane.  I was raised with a disdain for staying near home....wherever the 'good job' was, that's where you go.  What started out as family vacations by car of a few hundred miles each way transitioned to early adult days of driving across the US many times for college as well as for visiting friends.  Even if this was done solo, it did not really feel like a challenge or exhausting but with a car full of friends it became an adventure....and often a social experiment to boot! ;-)

So a trip that would involve camping night stops and full day driving for several days was pretty standard in my late teens and into early 30s.  Now, I chafe at having to drive into anything resembling 'rush hour'.  The last time I visited a friend a few years back in Los Angeles I could not help but think how corrosive the experience must be to the mind as well as the soul, but adaptation is what we are known for.  Finally, in the past the very thought of being a home-body on a homestead would have seemed quite imprisoning.  I'm relieved with entering the autumn years and retirement that months can go by now without the grip of wanderlust grabbing hold.

John Weiland wrote:...quite comfortable not having travelled more than 30 - 40 miles from where they were born.

Oh, that reminds me of another thing. At that job I got in New Jersey, my immediate supervisor (who became a friend and we're still in touch) was in the process of moving from the *county* in which he was born and resided for 35 years to the next county over and was finding it stressful because he was having to question who he really is now. It was dumbfounding to me. I had lived on two continents, on both coasts of the US, and in four US states at that point. (I lived in four counties just going to college.)

Hi Christopher,

In the late 80s I was speaking to a girl who commented “I’m not from around here”.        It turned out she was born and lived 12 miles away.

The thought of commuting 2 hours for work is mind numbing to me. 4 hours a day? What a lot of time out of one's life!! The longest commute I've had was about 15 miles I think. I did cycle it once or twice, but it took just a bit too long for me. My husband had a longer commute which took probably 45 minutes, including motorway driving.
If a journey for a family visit took longer than three hours I'd expect an overnight stay somewhere (although did drive that sort of distance visiting suppliers for work sometimes). We used to drive on holidays, usually in the UK, but did drive to Austria once for a skiing trip.

These days my world has shrunk and I have a lovely 20 minute commute walking about a mile to my shop. I rarely leave the glen, and consider the 30 miles to the island capital village quite enough driving thank you very much! I do drive further on occasion, but don't really feel comfortable driving for more than about 3 hours. My husband still loves to drive (although rarely) and will think little of driving South 12 hours or more.