Getting Paid to Drive Cross Country

And now that I was on the topic of traveling with this person who asks me why I live in Central New York, I would ask them, “Have you ever driven a van and trailer 13,000 miles across the United States?”

After I graduated from college, I decided I was not ready to enter the working world and instead took advantage of an internship that was with the American Junior Golf Association. I went through a few rounds of intense interviews and I was very lucky to get accepted because more than 600 people applied. I flew down to Atlanta a week after graduation, not knowing what to expect, met five other people that I would be traveling with, learned how to back up the van and trailer we would be driving and of course change a tire, and they sent us on our way.

For this internship and with the five other people who I still keep in touch with today, we were in charge of running golf tournaments for junior golfers throughout the country. Ralph Lauren was the sponsor so they gave us an entire new wardrobe, we got paid $200 a week and we ate out at restaurants three meals a day. Our longest trip was 40 hours, and we drove from Wisconsin to Arizona and made enough memories to last a lifetime. The only bad thing was I gained 10 pounds from eating out all the time and had to cut slits in the new wardrobe that Ralph Lauren gave me, but it was still worth it. :)

We worked 100 hour weeks, and as soon as we were done with a tournament, we would hop into the van and drive to the next tournament. Riding in the van was my favorite part of the internship because we all got along so well and experienced so many funny things together. Our journey took us from Atlanta to Colorado, Kansas, Illinois, Kentucky, Iowa, Wisconsin, Arizona and California. If you asked anyone in the group what their favorite memory was of the entire experience, they would probably tell you it was when I drove away from the gas station in New Mexico with the gas nozzle still in the tank! Lucky nothing bad happened, but it still something we laugh about to this day!

My favorite golf tournament was in Colorado and we got to stay with this couple who belonged to the golf course where we were holding the tournament. They lived in a mansion on top of a mountain and it was one of the nicest houses I have ever been in! When we arrived, they brought us to their garage and let us pick out whatever one of their ten cars that we wanted to drive for the week. We thought carefully and decided on the white Lincoln Navigator. They had a friendly Golden Retriever that would sleep with me in my bed at night and they had a maid who would do our laundry for us. They set the bar very high since it was the first tournament we had been to, but no matter where we were or where we slept, we had an amazing time.

I wonder if the person asking me why I live in Sauquoit ever got paid to drive across the country…