Ah, vacation. We gas up our campers and cars and minivans and SUVs, pile our suitcases and coolers in the back, and hit the highway.  We sit in traffic on the Chesapeake Bay Bridge or breathe in exhaust fumes in the Hampton Roads tunnel to Virginia Beach. 

We grit our teeth and tell ourselves it’ll all be worth it, once we get where we’re going.

When I was a kid, Interstate 95 was still new.  No longer did traveling south to grandma’s house mean driving along a two-lane road.  No longer did we get stuck for five agonizingly slow miles behind a farmer tooling down the road on his tractor.  There were no stop lights or speed traps to hinder us.  It was smooth sailing all the way to North Carolina.

Back then, there was nowhere to eat along the interstate – just the occasional gas station or a rest stop with a vending machine. There were no McDonald’s, no diners, not even a Howard Johnson’s. (I loved HoJo’s. You could get a banana split in a long, glass dish, and spin around on a soda fountain seat until you got dizzy. It didn’t get any better than that.)

No, what we had in the South was Stuckey’s. 

At Stuckey’s, you could get hamburgers and hot dogs from the grill, or you could buy pre-wrapped sandwiches. The bread was always white. Wheat, rye, or multigrain was unheard of. Since Stuckey’s was usually in the middle of nowhere, they didn’t have city water, which meant your fountain Coke was made with well water.  Imagine a Coke that smelled of rotten eggs (sulfur), and you’ve got an idea of just how unappealing those roadside sodas were.

But the thing Stuckey’s was most famous for – the thing my parents loved – were the pecan logs.

The pecan log came wrapped in cellophane, and consisted of a sweet, sticky nougat center, the outside rolled in pecans.  As a kid, I hated them.  I didn’t know one kid who liked them.  It was a mysterious grown-up fixation that I never quite understood but learned to accept.  As long as I could have a Hershey bar instead, I didn’t really care how many pecan logs my parents ate. 

When I was twelve, we traveled to Florida to visit my aunt. Along the way I got my first glimpse – after miles of enticing billboard come-ons – of another American icon, South of the Border.

Located just over the North Carolina state line in Dillon, South Carolina, South of the Border was where sixteen-year-olds went to get married without the bother of parental permission.  It eventually evolved into a brightly-colored (one might even say tacky) conglomerate of restaurants, gas stations, gift shops, gaming arcades, and fireworks stands.  They sold rockets, and mortars, and missiles – all of them legal and all of them transportable across state lines.

When we finally arrived in Florida, new billboards sprang up. Free orange juice! Alligators! Pecans! Orange Blossom Honey! I wasn’t interested in those things – except maybe for the alligators. Nope, what I wanted to see were the palm trees.

We drove deeper into north Florida, and I didn’t see one palm tree… just miles and miles of tall, scrubby pines. I was disappointed. Where the heck were the palms? Where was the ocean? I wanted my money back.

In my teens, a road trip meant piling in the car and driving to Virginia Beach or Ocean City with my friends, the radio blaring Foreigner and Steve Miller and Fleetwood Mac, the back seat littered with suntan oil, beach towels, and Sun-In. No one had heard of sun block. Instead, we slathered ourselves in baby oil or Coppertone and slow-roasted in the sun until we looked like a bunch of skinny pink crustaceans. 

After I got married, I vacationed with my husband and our two boys, James and Jay. While Mr. Oliver drove, the boys argued in the back seat. For a thousand miles. One particularly vicious disagreement ensued when James, the oldest, took away Sigmund – Jay’s miniature troll – and refused to give it back. 

When I asked James to return Sigmund to his brother, he shrugged. “Okay.” He put the troll in his mouth, then took it out and handed it to his younger brother with a smirk. “Here.” 

Of course, Sigmund’s tuft of orange hair was now matted with James’ saliva. This did not go over well. 

“James put Sigmund in his MOUTH,” Jay screamed. 

I’m sure his wail was heard all the way to the furthest reaches of the Outer Banks. I still have inner-ear damage. 

So there you have it. Stuckey’s, South of the Border, alligators, orange blossom honey… and Sigmund the troll. Fond memories of all the holiday roads I’ve traveled.

Hey – would anyone like a pecan roll?

 

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