One of the joys of the seasoned traveler is helping the newbies learn the tricks of the trade. As such a seasoned traveler I saw the need for young obi wan lopez to learn about the forces. You can tell him there is a darkside but youthful exuberance can not feel the farces (not a mispelling) that the seasoned traveler can expect.

To create a true learning experince I created a perfect lab environment. Painless air travel with Airport Luxury Lounge, Hotel room upgrade with two floors, microwave and refrigerator, and about 15 minutes from the training site. The conditiona at a training site are always beyond experimental control but almost everything else was in place. The one area I used to train him was the rental car.

Dollar had promised a “cheap” rental charge and an upgrade to a “hot” charger. Yes, I hear the experienced travelers laughing now but how else to train a newbie? I even warned him that this was never a good idea but he needed the taste of combat.

Sure enough, the sobering experience of reneged promises and the shock of seeing a PT Cruiser rather than a cool LA style car brought him to earth. I saw his excitement turn into seasoned whining and was secretly proud.

To make the experience complete, the breakdown he reports did occur. What was not reported was I also pushed the car with the savior who came by to help us. Now there was a reason to my madness. Let’s see, he is in his twenties, I am a few … years older. He is in great shape, I have a great oval shape. Why would I, the senior traveler and mentor in this experience push the car? I was not going to face his wife if someone smashed into the car from behind while we pushed. My wife has long understood my samurai like dedication, his wife just had a child and would not be amused.

Once there what else could I do to help him understand travel? I explained the customer comes first and left him with the car, to truly plump the depths of the experience with dark rental companies. Now understand that this required trust on my part, the car was under my name. But I had to believe he had learned something and I reluctantly left him there alone, flagged a cab, and got to my class on time.

Many of the points he complained about were part of the process. Teach him to trust no one, have him learn to find and correct mistakes, and show him that pure logic has no place with travel arrangements and expectations.

The seasoned traveler and husband also knows: have everyone believe you can do nothing. This guarantees much less gets put on your platter out of fear. My wife has not let me rent a chainsaw for years.

I have already planned the next experience, we need to line up a deeper, darker training experience. I think we’ll go with Motel 8 and JetBlue. I think he is ready, we’ll sign up and then I’ll have to find an excuse to let him solo. It will be a proud joy to listen to his experiences.