Thursday, June 12, 2008

Un-cool car in a cool place

I got off the plane feeling pretty cool with life: Got car reserved, a cheap hotel room waiting, and a presumably nice drive in the morning through a part of the US I’d never visited. Like a good vibe black hole, the rental car agent sucked all that joy away in a moment.

“We’re out of compacts, so I’m putting you in a Town and Country.” Somehow, my mind heard that as a bigger, nicer car than what I had reserved. Then it began to dawn on me, “A Town and Country is a ding dang minivan.” Ack. The movie in my mind involved me zipping around the great forests of the Northwest in a zippy little car. It just didn’t work if you took out the Focus or the Mazda 3 and replaced it with a minivan.

“Surely you have a car,” I implored imploringly.

“Yes, we do,” she answered hopefully. “It will cost you $10 extra.”

“Ten bucks for the whole rental period?” I asked stupidly.

“Per day,” she responded with triumphant finality.

Lacking extensive blogging experience, I don’t know if it’s good manners to say the name of the rental car company. Suffice it to say, even if you’re really trying to be thrifty (wink wink, nudge nudge), I’d still advise renting from Enterprise.

The next morning I drove my decidedly uncool car out of Seattle into some of the most beautiful geography I’ve ever seen. It inspired this photo essay called, “Un-cool Car in Cool Places.”


Daring white minivan at Deception Pass



Mild-mannered minivan with fierce fighter plane



On the ocean with a Town and Country

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