The 3 Day Vacation

Weekend Trips to a New City: How we get around

When Homegirl and I are traveling to a new city by air, we very rarely (if ever) rent a car. Our lifestyle is predicated on being able to take many short trips, which means we need to keep them as economical as possible. Saving the cost of the rental car, particularly post-Covid, helps us stay on budget. Also, rental cars are a hassle. That’s up to an extra hour (potentially more) at the airport on both ends of the journey. When we land, all we want is get to the hotel, drop our bags, and hit the town. When we’re leaving, we’re probably hungover and really REALLY don’t want the hassle of returning a rental. Even more importantly, don’t forget the name of this blog, we’re delinquents. That doesn’t mean, or ever excuse, being irresponsible. We do drink, but we never drink and drive.

When we get to the airport on a Thursday afternoon in our departing city, vacation starts the moment our car is parked in the garage. Why wait until tomorrow for a vacation that could be started today? A short security line means we have time for an extra termie (read: airport beverage, again h/t to the Wonton Don over at Barstool). 2 hour flight, why not make it a two drink flight? (Check out our upcoming Vegas blog for a great in-flight power-hour tale, you won’t want to miss).

Delinquent Planet tip: if you like to indulge while you’re airborne, and its only one or two of you, get the aisle seat. Don’t make an innocent bystander suffer by having to get up and down 5 times for your own recreational purposes. Also get a seat close to the back and make friends with the flight attendants (we've gotten quite a few comped drinks just by being kind).

Basically, if you like to drink and travel, a rental car is out. If you like to do a little indulging while you explore a new city, a rental car is out. If you like to bar hop downtown, a rental car is out. So public transportation it is. Ubers, Lyfts, taxis, shuttles, buses, trains, monorails, whatever will take us from the airport to our temporary home, that’s our play. Once we’ve landed and dropped our bags, all recreation and destination decisions hinge on one question: Can we walk to it, do we need to get an Uber to get to it, or does this city offer another option? This leads to a controversial topic: bike and scooter share programs. Admittedly, if I lived in a city that had a half dozen scooters strewn about every street corner, I may not be thrilled with this new mode of public transportation, but as a DP'er these programs are our go to. Many cities in the USA have had to tackle this problem in recent years, and determine how to regulate them so they disrupt day-to-day life as little as possible. One of the ways they've done this is by putting in geo-grids that will limit the use of their equipment to a certain downtown radius. Others restrict parking, pickup and drop offs to set locations, reducing the overall clutter and chaos of the system. For the weekend travelers, like us, the bikes and scooters are a wonderful way to extend our exploration range without calling an Uber. The Apps are typically easy to download and easy to use, the equipment is reliable and safe, and we can see more of a city in less time that we could on foot (not to mention they are so fun!). We highly recommend for your next weekend adventure!

This brings me to my final point for today, the importance of an intelligently planned city. Example, if you stay downtown in Austin, TX, a short walk south (<10 minutes) will take you right through the day-drinkers paradise, Rainey Street, and down to Ladybird Lake, an awesome destination for flat water-sports enthusiasts. If you stay almost anywhere in Boulder, CO, you’re within less than a mile of the city’s extensive walking/biking trail network and likely within 15 minutes of the wonderful Boulder Creek, an amazing early-season whitewater kayaking destination that runs right through the city. Nashville’s Broadway Street runs steadily Northeast (more importantly for the bike-renters downhill) from Vanderbilt University through the tons-of-character neighborhood of the Gulch, right to the most well-known stretch of three-story live music bars before it intersects with the Cumberland River at Nissan Stadium. We’ll have separate blogs for all of the above, and more, but the point is that a well-designed city, with many different types of recreation all located in close proximity, is the Delinquent Planet’ers dream. With new modes of transportation available each year, you can cover more ground, see more, experience more, all hopefully with a drink in your hand and a smile on your face.

In current event news: we just got back from our first AVP Beach Volleyball Pro Tournament in Fort Lauderdale, Florida. It was another Thursday-Sunday trip for us, so we’ll have all the highlights in our next blog post.

Until then, DP’ers, we love you all.

-Chris & Lindsay-