I am planning to attend the Utica NY road meet on July 18... assuming that nothing with the COVID-19 pandemic causes that meet to be delayed a second time. I'm thinking about taking my time on the drive out to Utica and back from my home in Grand Rapids MI.
This is kind of what I'm thinking:
- Wednesday, July 15: Drive from Grand Rapids MI to Youngstown OH (explore the Youngstown area and spend the night there)
- Thursday, July 16: Drive from Youngstown OH to Ithaca NY (basically my route would be I-80 east to I-79 north to I-90 to I-86 to NY-13... explore Ithaca and spend the night there)
- Friday, July 17: Drive from Ithaca to Utica (NY-13 north to I-81 north to I-481 north to I-90 east to Utica... explore the Utica area and spend the night there)
- Saturday, July 18: Attend the meet and hang out in the Utica area
- Sunday, July 19: Drive part of the way home from Utica... I'm debating whether I should stay in the Buffalo area or the Cleveland area. I'm sort of leaning toward Buffalo at this point which would be nice because I'd arrive in Buffalo around the middle of the day and have plenty of time to explore that area Sunday afternoon/evening before starting my drive home Monday morning. The downside, of course, to staying in Buffalo as opposed to Cleveland is that my drive home Monday would be longer, but maybe I don't care as much if it means I get to explore Buffalo on Sunday.
- Monday, July 20: Drive home.
My original thought was to spend Thursday night in Syracuse but I kind of like the idea of staying in a smaller city that I've never stayed in before. As much as I'd like to add Syracuse to my list of cities to explore in some depth, that might be getting a bit too ambitious so I'm in favor, at this point, of exploring a smaller city like Ithaca that I've absolutely never been to before... let alone spent a night in. (My husband and I spent a night in the Syracuse area in 2018 on our way to New England for a Thanksgiving trip.)
If anyone has any thoughts or ideas about my tentative itinerary, please share!