Disaster vacation(first half)

A bit of just a rant and maybe a trigger warning. It’s quite a long one, so I might split into a couple of parts. I have a small group of friends and we all went on a vacation out of state, but staying in the US to a rather large popular area. It was supposed to be just the 5 of us. Involving me and 4 others who I’ll call S, T, V and C. More people do come into play, but I’ll mention them later. S and T are married. V and C were dating at the time. And me all by my lonesome. I’ll let it be known as well that I mentioned to this friend about my financial situation from the beginning. I was worried about having the money for a vacation like this because at the time I was having a hard time affording some basic necessities in my life. And S was aware of this. S told the group that we should have a small part of us drive to the location and the others all fly. S wanted to bring her vehicle since it was able to hold a bunch of people and the luggage so that those who fly wouldn’t have to worry about luggage claim at the airport when they arrived to and from the location. I offered to fly if no one else wanted to, but others in the group wanted to fly. I offered them to drive with S so that she wouldn’t be by herself. More planning started and we came up with spending almost a whole week at the destination and we started planning each individual day. We tried to plan for rest days where we wouldn’t do too much. We were planning on having a day to rest after we arrive where we’d all go kayaking. Day 2 would be going to a popular park and enjoying some time hanging out there. Day 3 was planned to have dinner reservations at a particularly fancy place. We planned also that day to just hang out. Day 4 we planned to have a beach day and enjoying some time the sun since some of us hadn’t seen the ocean before. Day 5 was lunch reservations at a popular buffet in the area and later going to a party in a popular park. S offered to pay for everyone when we would be at the lunch buffet. S also offered to pay for everyone tickets to the party and just have us pay her back when we can. Day 6 was everyone either flying or driving back to our home town. I’m the midst of our planning, S’s mother wanted to join us since she had obligations around that area and told us that she wasn’t going to going to our destinations while we were all there. We all approved of that. After that though, S’s sister chimed in asking to go stating that she hasn’t had a vacation in a long time. Most of us weren’t too happy to let her in on our vacation, but S convinced the rest of the group to let her join stating that she’d be doing her own thing and promising she wouldn’t be in the way. After this it was decided that we’d all need large rooms. So S, T, V and C would be in a room together. And I would be roomed with S’s mother and sister. We were told that each of the rooms have 2 separate bedrooms and large beds with their own kitchens attached. I was assured that I’d be okay being roomed with S’s mother and sister. I was okay with this since I’d known them both for a long time and trusted S’s mother. So, we continued planning and S told the group that we were going to using hotels from her parents time share in the area. And we were told that this helps a lot and saves us in having to book a couple of rooms for a hotel in the area we were going to be in. We started planning more of the trip day by day. As we got closer to the date, I was panicking because I hadn’t gotten a chance to buy my tickets for the party and was worried that I wouldn’t be able to purchase them before the trip. S told me not to worry and that she’d purchase it for me and I can just pay her back at a later date. I was relieved. S and I also started planning our drive to the destination. Per our directions that we input the trip should take about 24+ hr to reach the destination. I was fine with this and mentioned to S that I had made the trip before a couple years prior with my brother. I discussed with her about the route that my brother and I took and told her a specific way we should take to avoid tolls and rely pretty heavily on cruise control. S wanted to talk with her father about my route as she told me that he’s made the trip more to that area more than I have. I was a bit taken a back from bit, but went along with it and listened to him to see what he had to say about it. The route that was suggested would add a lot of time to the drive. I prompted my route to him and he wasn’t really liking what I was suggesting. S sided with her father and we were going to go with that route instead of mine. I was a bit pissed, but my words were getting through to anyone. The group that was going to fly had all their tickets purchased and ready to go. As the day to start the vacation got closer I got really excited. That is until the actual day came for S and I to start our drive to the destination. Both S and I had talked the week prior about how we’d handle the gas and driving shifts so that we wouldn’t become too tired or anything. Originally we’d agreed on me giving her $80 for gas to contribute since it was her vehicle. But I reconsidered and thought it’d be rude of me to do that, so I suggested I pay for gas on the way down and S pay for gas on the way back. S agreed to that plan. S was supposed to pick me up from my place the morning/afternoon before we were supposed to start driving. I texted both S and T to see when they’d both be by since we had to go and pick up luggage from V and Cs place to start packing up the car. Both of them said that they’d be by in the early afternoon around 2pm or so. I relaxed a bit after hearing that and proceeded to extra check all my luggage to make sure that I had all of my stuff with me for the trip. It was about 2:30pm when I still hadn’t been picked up and I messaged them both asking if they were on the way. They usually message me when they are on the way over, so it was a bit odd that they hadn’t yet. I got a response from T that they were running late and said they be by around 4 instead. I was a but Ker-fuffled over this and asked if they could let me know when they’d be by. The finally showed up at almost 5pm to pick me up. I was a bit pissed, but rolled with it. We got to V and Cs place around 5:30pm and got the luggage in the car. We then had to stop for gas which I paid for, $90 later. I started to recognize at this point what I’d gotten myself into. We stopped at a grocery store before heading back to S’s place to relax and sleep for the night. Finally getting to her place around 10pm. Our plan was to start driving around 1am the next morning and arrive to our destination by Atleast 10am or so the following day. I got about 3hr of sleep before having to get up again and start the journey with S. S was going to start the driving herself since she was a bit of a night owl and I wasn’t. I was okay with that since I’m a bit of an early morning person. In the car, I did sleep for about another 3hr before I could feel/hear the safety bumps on the shoulder of the highway buzzing the car. I was wide awake at that point and asked if S wanted to switch with me and I’d drive for a bit. S said yes and at this point it was around 5am. We stopped at a rest area and I asked which route we were taking to so that I could I put the directions in my phone. S told me that she was inputting specific capital cities in the states we were traveling in and going from there. I had to think for a moment after hearing that and thought it was a bit odd and I asked her if I could input the address of where we’re are going to keep us on track. S declined giving me the address and said that we’d be okay inputting the cities and going from there. She wasn’t really letting me use my phone for directions during the whole trip. It got to around 1pm or so and I wasn’t getting hungry. We were at about a third of the way there at this point so I thought it’d be nice to get some lunch. We stopped a a restaurant that was on the billboard and we enjoyed a nicely themed lunch for the area we were in at the time. I offered to continue driving because I wasn’t feeling tired and thought that I’d be able to handle it. I lasted about another 4 hours. I asked to swap and S said we could. I started to lull off in the passenger seat and was awoken about 3hr later to S asking to swap again. I said sure and drove more. It was around 8:30pm when we swapped back to me driving and I was stopping at almost all gas stations along the way to wither grab gas or coffee or both. In this point in the trip alone, I’d spent $240 on just gas for her car. I drove for probably another I would say 5 hours and I was tired as I could have been. We got to a point in the trip where I was struggling to stay awake a bit and with the winding roads in some parts with higher speeds, it was hard. Other traffic around me melding together. I snapped a bit at S because I was tired at the time and she asked if I was mad at her. At this point in the driving, yeah, I was a bit mad at her since I had done the majority of the driving. We stopped at a rest area as soon as I found one. I got out of the car and booked it for the bathrooms not wanting to come out. After about 20min I walked out of the bathrooms, I sat on a bench outside the bathrooms and broke down crying badly. I was stressed, angry and anxious about the rest of the drive. S came up behind me while I was crying on the bench and just leaned on me, not saying a work. I had so much anger in me at that moment due to lack of sleep that I just could t speak to her. After about an hour of being at the rest area, we both slept in the car for about an hour. After we both woke up, we got back on the road. S started driving for that time and this time she lasted about 4hr before we swapped again. We began to feel really crunched for time and flew a bit down the highway to get to our destination. I got us to a part of our destination around right on time approx at 12pm. Once we got to our destination, S and I learned that the rest of the group is a bit held up at the airport trying to get a rental car for the trip. There was apparently an issue with the cards they were using. S and I were told that they’d be over in a little bit. We got to chatting in our friend group chat and agreed on having us all meet at a local eatery and get some food together. S and I waited for them in the parking lot until they told us that they were on the way. We asked for seating to be prepared for our large group and the employees were very nice about it! They all arrived at the eatery and we got seated. V and C could tell that I was visibly exhausted and asked what happened. I wasn’t really into talking about it in front of S at that time so I said that I just don’t want to drive at all during this whole trip. They didn’t pry and further but gave me the biggest hugs that almost made me cry. After we finished eating, we headed to the hotel where we’d all be staying. The car ride wasn’t too far away from the eatery we were at so it was nice. T offered to drive us to the hotel to let S and I rest a bit. I agreed, but I wanted to be in the other vehicle and not in S’s car. The rest of the group was fine with that. I vented a bit in the car with them about what happened. S’s mother told me that it’d be okay and that she’d want to talk to me once we all get settled into the hotel. Once we got checked in to the hotel and had our keys, everyone helped unload the car. S’s mother and sister lead me to our room and we started to get unpacked a bit. S’s mother offered to all of us to have her go grocery shopping and get us all food for the week for when we aren’t at our destinations. We all appreciated this and I offered to go so that I’d be able to get some things that I’d want. S’s mother thought that I should rest, but I didn’t want to yet. We went shopping near the hotel and got what we needed. Once back, we all unloaded the car and separated our stuff for everyone. Once back at the hotel, I crashed the fuck out. Like sleep til you can’t sleep no more. I crashed at about 7pm when we got back from shopping til damn near 8-9am the following morning. I was tired as hell… The others started to wake up around 11am and we started to get ready for that days part of the trip, kayaking. I learned while we were driving to go kayaking, that most of the group went to a popular park in the area while I was asleep. I thought that I’d really missed out, but I was tired and didn’t think that I would be up for something like that. V and C said that they were out til almost 1am and said that they really didn’t want to be out that late with kayaking planned for the following day. Overall, kayaking went really well and we had a good time hanging out. We didn’t really finish kayaking until about 6pm when the day was almost done. We didn’t really get to do much else at the kayaking park. It was advertised that there was a swimming area and condensation. We were excited to be able to eat some food when there until we found that the swimming area and concessions were closed for the season. We were a bit taken aback from learning this since S told us that it would be open and we’d be able to eat. We all wound up leaving the park with empty stomachs and stopping for some fast food on the way back to the hotel. Once we got back to the hotel, we all were a bit tired so we went to bed. The next day was going to be going to a large popular park having me, S, T, V, C and S’s sister. I had never been to this park and was excited to go S and her sister were planning on going early in the morning around when they were set to open and I asked to join to see if I could walk around before it go too busy to do so. They both said yes. We were going to let V, C and T sleep in a bit and meet them at the park. As we were walking through the park, I was finding that pretty much everything they have there is super expensive. Food and drink especially. I hadn’t really budgeted for that and paying for gas on the way up really dug into my funds for the trip itself. After a bit of the 3 of us being at this park, the rest of the group arrived and we all go to hanging out. S’s sister departed our group to let us hang out a bit. V and C were talking a bit with me about the cost of stuff and I agreed. The prices were crazy for the amount of food/drink you get. Like $16 for 8oz of wine at this park and $15 for a very small portion of food. S overheard us talking and goes about damn near freaking out on us saying that we should have expected this. We were expecting the trip to be expensive, but the cost of some things didn’t seem worth being there to hang out and enjoy our time. T butted In trying to be a bit of a peacekeeper and trying to keep everyone happy at the park. We all spent the rest of the day just lulling about the park and keeping our feelings compressed to not bug S more. At the end of the day, we all went back to the hotel and rested for the night.

I’m going to stop here and post a part 2.