To think that this isnt a "road trip"?

[PyongyangKipperbang]

Colleague talking about how she is going on a road trip next month and will be gone two weeks. I ask which part of the UK she is travelling around and she is driving to South Devon, staying in a cottage for two weeks and driving back.

Thats just going on holiday isnt it?!

When did any long (or even not so long!) journey start being called a road trip?

For me a road trip is when you stop at various places on your journey - definitely not if you are only staying in one place!

Maybe she means she’s not getting on a plane, but yes, a road trip implies a tour of several places to me.

Maybe she didn't know what else to call 'getting away from judgy colleagues' 😊

YANBU. It's a bit like people saying they are having a "staycation" when they are actuallly going on holiday in the UK. A staycation is staying at home - clue in the name - and having day trips out. A road trip is definitely stopping at different places. Getting there is a journey.

I didn't get any judgement from the OP - more that they were asking if the definition of road trip had changed.

Yes exactly - I have some time off in August because people are visiting me so that will be a staycation as I will be in my own home.

It is to me too!

But I am hearing "road trip" more often in the last couple of years and most of the time it is just a long journey!

Where is the judgement?

I don't think that is what people would normally define as a road trip.

To me that would be going on a trip to Devon.
Not what I would consider a road trip but hey ho!

For me, a road trip is a trip with more than one destination and being on the road for over a day at least. But I suppose a road trip could be used to describe driving to Devon and back, especially if the journey is a long one.

To me a road trip is hitting the road and yes, you might only go one place or you might go to more.

I am in the US and our road trips can be pretty long.

Road trip! is one of my favorite phrases to hear.

I agree with the first reply.
If you live in London then I wouldn’t call a drive to Devon a road trip.
If you live in continental Europe and stopping at other places then I would call it a road trip.

In my mind the concept of road trip started in the US where you can driving coast to coast is about 3000 miles.

A road trip is where you stay in multiple places eg I stayed in 7 over 12 days last month (uk based) and in the autumn France, Spain and Portugal - 9 stops in total not including 2 overnight ferries.

Glad I clicked on this thread because it really, really matters.

I wouldn’t call that a road trip I’d call that a holiday in devon

we are going on a “road trip” next month. Netherlands and Germany, with the car, staying in 5 different places.

I agree, and yet I actually feel the need to reply.
if you travel by road then surely it’s a road trip? I mean you could have thought she was flying into Exeter. Or catching the train from Waterloo. She was just saving you the hassle of asking.

At least it's more accurate than staycation.

Especially if it's a long drive to south Devon from where she lives.

I drove 24 miles down the road to spend a weekend sailing with my primary age son. We called it a road trip. We even stopped for a Sausage and Egg McMuffin.

AFAIC thst was a roadtrip on a par with the one depicted in the film "Fandango". Nobody will ever convince me otherwise.

🚗

Uh-oh.

Now you've introduced an different but entirely plausible definition of 'road trip'. That'll give rise to all sorts of debate about usage. There'll be screenshots from the OED and claims that the original US derivation of the phrase has been attenuated by its adoption as part of British English. People will cite Kerouac and 'The Road'. Someone'll suggest that The Canterbury Tales is a sort of mediaeval meta-roadtrip saga.

This could go on and on. Can't wait.

Someone'll suggest that The Canterbury Tales is a sort of mediaeval meta-roadtrip saga.

Christ! This thread went highbrow quickly, what a brilliant insight. (Even if it's meant in jest.)

And yeah, as someone forced to study the CTs at school I'm highly skeptical it's the first framed narrative, and it certainly isn't the first novel. But now you mention it, surely it is the first Road Trip and is undeniably a Road Trip?

(I suspect Mrs Lee is in the grest classroom in the sky now, but I hope she's looking down and smiling that after several decades her subject has finally been useful to me!)

Kissing bums hanging out of windows sounds about right for a classic road trip

I wouldn't call that a road trip either, but in the grand scheme of things does it really matter?

A road trip, more like a long drive 🤣🤣.

A road trip to me is like the iconic Route 66 in the states, where you drive for the majority of the holiday and stop off periodically for rest and sustenance.

Yes. This really, really annoys me, as if a UK holiday isn't a holiday at all.