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The curious fermenter's guide to travel
I'm going on a road trip this week. In particular, I'm going on a road trip to my beloved old stomping grounds in the Florida panhandle, to officiate a wedding.
I'll be returning to Grayton Beach, where I wrote roughly half my dissertation in the state park cabins a decade ago, waking up for sunrise dips in the Gulf before a frenzy of writing, a lunchtime dip, writing frenzy, then beer on the little screened in porch. It was idyllic, and one of the most productive moments in my life. And that process, of rooting my productive creative energy in play, also served as an anchor memory for me in how I create now: remembering that being in that state of fun, and flow, is more productive than anything else I can do for my work as a writer, cook, and human being.
Road trips, even just day trips, are a favorite way to do this, and one I plan to plug into more this year as days get warmer and longer. In Grayton Beach, I'll get to reconnect with the Gulf of Mexico, which remains my favorite body of water on Earth, in part due to my personal and familial connections to it, and in part due to the fact that it's just such a pleasant body of water to spend time with. I've always really resonated with the energy of the Gulf, especially in northern Florida, so in preparation for my road trip I've been thinking of ways I can bring some of that energy back with me: Like a thread between two places, hundreds of miles away.
Connecting to and exploring place through food is a practice I've taught for years and have consistently practiced myself for even longer.
Oftentimes, I think of this in terms of an individual place: My home, a favorite beach, etc. But how does this look when we think about the movement between places?
This is my road trip guide, for building in connection to place not only at your destination or your origin point, but everywhere in between.
If you want to dive deeper, adventure is a big theme in my next book, The Fermentation Oracle. When you preorder you get lots of really, really cool thank you gifts that I'll be announcing soon!