Philadelphia in the Life of America, Part 1

For this week's column, I'm reflecting on the first major travel experience that my wife and I planned for students back in 2000. Next week I will have more to say about the destination, Philadelphia, which we will be revisiting, this time in a trip for adults, in April 2026.

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In the year 2000, I was a young professor with a passion for literature, history, and travel.  North Carolina, where I was teaching at the time, had a program for college students training to be teachers, and I had learned about the opportunity to plan something called a Summer Enrichment Experience for some of these students.  Working with my wife, who also loves to travel, I designed a trip with as much enrichment as I could pack into a few days.

I called it "Philadelphia in the Life of America."

I'll never forget the night before we left.  I was lying in bed in our home in Laurinburg, North Carolina, and a thought occurred to me.  It went something like this:

"What on earth have I gotten myself into?"

We didn't know any of these 23 college students, who came from all over the state.  We were going to be driving Enterprise vans from Raleigh to Philly.  I had never stepped foot in Philadelphia — oh, and we were bringing along our two-year-old daughter.

I guess I should have written "a passion for literature, history, travel, and hare-brained schemes."

We went through with it, and the whole trip went off without a — well, without any hitches we couldn't overcome.  For starters, when we met the students at the Enterprise location, we also met their luggage.  Let's just say some of these students traveled a little less lightly than we did.  When we had calculated the number of vans we would need, we hadn't planned for suitcases that would take up about as much room as the travelers themselves.  There clearly wasn't going to be enough room, so we wound up bringing along our brand new van, as well — not such a big deal, except that Lisa and I, as the only travelers over age 25, had to drive the Enterprise vans, so that meant handing over our keys to a pack of strangers.

We also ran out of gas (my fault) on the way.  Then there was the day that some of the students disappeared.  It turns out they were hiding out in one of the hotel rooms.  There are worse ways to go missing, to be sure.

My favorite snafu was one with a happy ending.  Near the end of the trip, we called together all the students and let them know we had miscalculated the cost of the trip.  Before any of them could pull out their checkbooks, we explained that we had overestimated the cost, and then we handed them some cash they could use on their final day in the city — a surprise, but a very nice one.

In the end, we returned everyone, including our little daughter, safely to North Carolina, and we had a new passion — curating and leading travel experiences for other people.  Over the next four years, we led four more trips, even while our little family was growing.  Our son, Will, joined us in utero in Boston and then in person in Williamsburg, New Orleans, and St. Louis, and Esprit — already an intrepid traveler — never missed a trip or a beat.

Fast forward 25 years.  Today, Lisa and I are planning trips for adults in our new business, Mind Inclined, and we are getting help from — you guessed it — our still intrepid daughter (who has, by the way, traveled widely on three continents and visited more countries than her father has).

We have never again run out of gas or had to hand over our car keys, and not a single traveler has gone into hiding.

I think we're getting the hang of this travel thing.

If you share our passion for seeing the world, I hope you will consider joining us on one of our trips.  Next year, in fact, we will be returning to Philadelphia, this time to mark the 250th anniversary of the Declaration of Independence.  "Founders in Philadelphia: Franklin, Jefferson, and a New Nation" (April 15-19, 2026) will feature visits to all the major historic sites, such as Independence Hall, as well as some special treats.  Later, we will go even further afield in another American Revolution-themed trip, "American Patriots in Paris," part of an IU Travels experience. Contact office@mindinclined.org to express interest in the trip to Paris. Please click on the button below to learn more about the trip to Philadelphia.

Philadelphia

The year after we took students to Philadelphia, we traveled again with a different group, this time to Boston.  This picture of our daughter, then 3 years old, at the train station is one of my favorites.