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Two documented examples show how a slow road corridor and anchor site work
Five shapes that slow road trips take, what each one asks of a driver, and two documented examples showing how a corridor and an anchor site actually work.
What to take away
- No trips are reconstructed here from memory or interviews. These are five documented shapes.
- The corridor pattern strings sites along a highway, so the road does the organizing for you.
- The anchor pattern hangs a region on one interpretive site, which sets the timing of the day.
- Loops, connectors and remote out and backs each ask for a different kind of preparation.
Slow road trips take a small number of shapes. Recognizing which one you are planning tells you most of what you need to decide. What follows is those five shapes, with two examples taken from published agency descriptions rather than from anybody's holiday.
Pattern one: the highway corridor
The corridor is the easiest slow road trip to plan. Sites are laid out in order along a road. The BLM's page for the Canyon Pintado National Historic District in Colorado describes more than 16,000 acres of public land along fifteen miles of State Highway 139.
The name comes from 1776, when Fathers Dominguez and Escalante recorded numerous examples of ancient rock art as they traveled through the Douglas Creek valley.
The district is day use only. It begins about three miles south of Rangely and continues for fifteen miles.
Fifteen miles of paved highway with sites along it is an afternoon, not an expedition. The corridor pattern suits short days, families and anybody who wants to stop often.
Pattern two: the anchor site
The anchor is a single substantial destination that a region organizes itself around. The BLM's page for the National Historic Oregon Trail Interpretive Center describes a facility near Baker City in eastern Oregon, seven miles east of the town off Highway 86, presenting the westward journey of nineteenth century pioneers.
An anchor changes the shape of the day. Its opening hours set your timing, and the driving fits around it rather than the other way round.
The other three patterns
Pattern three: the loop with a base town. You sleep in one place for two or three nights and drive a different loop each day. Cheapest in fuel, easiest on the packing, and best where one town has services.
Pattern four: the connector. An unpaved route used to travel between two paved days, with services at each end. Removes the return leg and gives the rough section a purpose.
Pattern five: the remote out and back. A committed run into country with no services, driven with a fixed turnaround time. The most demanding shape, and the one that needs the most margin.
Choosing between them
Best for
- Corridor
- Short days, frequent stops
- Anchor
- Weather, families, interpretation
- Loop with base town
- Cost, comfort, flexibility
- Connector
- Making a rough route useful
- Remote out and back
- Solitude and long views
Main risk
- Corridor
- Underestimating how long stops take
- Anchor
- Opening hours and seasonal closures
- Loop with base town
- Repeating the same first few miles
- Connector
- Committing before checking conditions
- Remote out and back
- Everything, if the margin is thin
Where to go next
Turning any of these into a working plan is the subject of how the backroad itinerary process works. The equipment each pattern asks for differs, and what holds up on back roads covers which categories survive.
