Day 29: What would you bring on a vegan road trip?

Ha! This prompt is, shall we say, apt. Like anyone who lives juuust too close to family to justify flying, my life involves a lot of road trips. Getting to my parents’ house in Rhode Island from our place in Maryland typically takes eight hours, give or take. (I prefer take.) We’ve had a few nightmarish trips that lasted 11+ hours — not so bad if you’re expecting an 11-hour trip, but pretty bad when your trip is dragging, you’re stuck in traffic, and you just want to collapse in bed because it’s 2:00 in the morning, damn it! Happily, Steven and I have figured out the optimal times to leave to avoid rush hour, so we’ve got Rhode Island road trippin’ down to a science. When we’re both going, we nearly always drive. If it’s just me, though, I’ll leave our single car in Maryland and take advantage of a Southwest sale (they can be as low as $59 each way!) to enjoy the easy-breezy one-hour flight. Or I’ll take the train, which is about six hours long but is a very pretty ride.

Basically, I have road trip cred. (And I haven’t even mentioned the zillions of other road trips I’ve taken, including a month-long trip around the country with my parents and two siblings!)

Now, an eight-hour road trip doesn’t require a ton of snacks, but let’s get real — snacks are as much to keep you busy as to satiate any growling stomachs. Often, I’ll bake a loaf of quick bread or a batch of muffins ahead of time, then supplement with a good variety of crunchy snacks… and water! Because you have to have water.

I’ve actually talked quite a bit about snacking while traveling in the past, because I like to keep my life full of travel-requiring adventures. Most of my tips are for packing snacks for a long journey by plane, but most of the same principles apply to road trips.

Take, for example, my pack o’ snacks from a trip to Italy a few years ago.

Maybe it’s a bit much for a single road trip, but for international travel? Totally appropriate. I packed even more food when I went to New Zealand this past April — because sometimes you need your “travel” snacks to do double duty as regular snacks, just in case you find yourself with an empty tummy in a vegan desert! My strategy is generally pretty simple: give yourself a good mix of sweet and savory, make sure to include truly healthy options, and love thy bars!