One of these days I’ll do a Blue Highways.

Blue Highways, by William Least Heat-Moon was published in 1982, and I read it soon afterwards.
In 1978 the author, having lost his job as a teacher, packed his life in a van and started a 13.000 mile round trip through the USA, following rural roads and stopping in small towns.

Subtitled A Journey into America, the book chronicles his travel and describes the people he met.
Just that, nothing very complicated.
It was one of the first travel books I read, back when I was in the strange limbo between high school and university. I read it back-to-back with Robert M. Pirsing’s Zen and the Art of Motorcycle Maintenance.

Blue Highways was written and published before the idea of “reality show” took the real out of reality, and it is an illuminating read. Reading in 1985 (more or less) this 1982 book about what the author really accomplished in 1978 felt like being plugged in into something that was happening right then, something that could be done, and would be significant.

And really, the idea of taking to the road on my own, off the beaten tracks, talking with people and writing about what I see, has been a dream of mine since I first read Blue Highways.
Go to those places where people does not feel like they have to put up an act to be like the guys in TV advertisements.
If still such places exist.
A fun way to do it would be touring Italy using local trains, stopping in small stations, in small towns.
Eating a sandwich in the local bar, talking with the people.
Or, maybe, touring on a bicycle.
Travel, not vacation.

I suggested Blue Highways to my friend Lucy, a few nights back, when she told me she’s planning a long bicycle trip as soon as her current job expires.

Anywhere in the world, such an adventure would make for a great blog, and a great book – people would line up to read it.
And it would be fun – Lucy’s an excellent writer, and should she decide to blog about her trip, who knows, maybe Blue Highways could provide a good template, suggest a style.

There’s another book I suggested to Lucy, once again about traveling light and meeting real people – but we’ll save that for another post.