The list, start to end
Book from one page: every vacation package this Cincinnati agency reserves
The order runs one way and only one way: hours of driving divided by nights booked, smallest figure at the top of the page, largest at the bottom.
Nothing is held here until the office has written back and you have said yes to what it wrote. No part of a stay is ever paid for through these pages.
Reading a line on this page
Each line gives a name and a state, the hours of road measured out of Cincinnati, the nights the office books at the far end, and the first of those divided by the second. A hatched square stands next to the figure, and the words beside the square say what the square says.
That quotient is the whole order. Hours at the wheel divided by nights of the stay tells how much driving a single night has to carry. A small figure means the road is a thin part of the week. A large one means the road is a thick part of it.
The first line on the page carries 0.54 hours of driving for each night booked. The last carries 2.87. Nothing here is sorted by price, by state, or by how much there is to do once the engine is off.
Where the four steps are cut
A quotient of 0.75 or under falls in the first step, where the road barely weighs. Up to 1.35 is the second, where the road is a morning. Up to 2.20 is the third, where the road is most of a day. Above 2.20 is the fourth, where the road is half the trip.
The steps exist so a figure can be read at a glance, not so that one of them can be held up over the others. A short road over many nights and a long road over two nights are different purchases, and a person who wants the far end of the fourth step should have it, with the driving stated first.
How the hours and miles were arrived at
Each hour and each mile here follows the pavement rather than a straight line on a map, and all of them start from the same point in this city. Weather, road repairs and the hour of departure will move them, and a real run is worth allowing for.
The figure on the right is where a stay starts, per person. It covers what is booked at the far end and nothing on the way, and the written offer that comes back splits it into its parts.
A short list, and it stays short
A stay that is not on this page is not something the office books. There is no back room of other places and no search to run on request, and an enquiry about somewhere else gets a plain answer saying so.
No company is named in the list. A room, a permit and an hour with a guide each belong to somebody, and that somebody is named in the written offer instead of on a public page.
Nothing on these lines is transport of any kind. The car is yours and so is the road; the office books the bed at the far end and measures the distance to it first.
- the road barely weighs
- the road is a morning
- the road is most of a day
- the road is half the trip
- Lexington, Kentucky1.62 hours of road over 3 nights, 0.54 an hour a nightfrom $585
- Serpent Mound, Ohio1.72 hours of road over 3 nights, 0.57 an hour a nightfrom $495
- Hocking Hills, Ohio3.15 hours of road over 5 nights, 0.63 an hour a nightfrom $950
- Louisville, Kentucky1.92 hours of road over 3 nights, 0.64 an hour a nightfrom $615
- Red River Gorge, Kentucky2.71 hours of road over 4 nights, 0.68 an hour a nightfrom $720
- Hoosier National Forest, Indiana3.42 hours of road over 5 nights, 0.68 an hour a nightfrom $825
- Cave Run Lake, Kentucky2.96 hours of road over 4 nights, 0.74 an hour a nightfrom $680
- Columbus, Ohio2.24 hours of road over 3 nights, 0.75 an hour a nightfrom $555
- Indianapolis, Indiana2.10 hours of road over 2 nights, 1.05 an hour a nightfrom $420
- Big South Fork, Tennessee4.29 hours of road over 4 nights, 1.07 an hour a nightfrom $740
- Wayne National Forest, Ohio3.27 hours of road over 3 nights, 1.09 an hour a nightfrom $510
- Great Smoky Mountains, Tennessee5.72 hours of road over 5 nights, 1.14 an hour a nightfrom $1,075
- Blue Ridge Parkway, North Carolina7.32 hours of road over 6 nights, 1.22 an hour a nightfrom $1,290
- Mammoth Cave, Kentucky3.71 hours of road over 3 nights, 1.24 an hour a nightfrom $600
- Natchez Trace, Tennessee6.37 hours of road over 5 nights, 1.27 an hour a nightfrom $975
- Nashville, Tennessee5.08 hours of road over 4 nights, 1.27 an hour a nightfrom $960
- Cumberland Gap, Tennessee4.03 hours of road over 3 nights, 1.34 an hour a nightfrom $540
- Asheville, North Carolina6.86 hours of road over 5 nights, 1.37 an hour a nightfrom $1,150
- New River Gorge, West Virginia5.53 hours of road over 4 nights, 1.38 an hour a nightfrom $820
- Sleeping Bear Dunes, Michigan9.85 hours of road over 7 nights, 1.41 an hour a nightfrom $1,645
- Chicago lakefront, Illinois5.66 hours of road over 4 nights, 1.42 an hour a nightfrom $1,120
- Land Between the Lakes, Kentucky5.69 hours of road over 4 nights, 1.42 an hour a nightfrom $720
- Shawnee National Forest, Illinois5.99 hours of road over 4 nights, 1.50 an hour a nightfrom $680
- Shenandoah, Virginia9.40 hours of road over 6 nights, 1.57 an hour a nightfrom $1,350
- Allegheny National Forest, Pennsylvania7.89 hours of road over 5 nights, 1.58 an hour a nightfrom $950
- Dolly Sods, West Virginia8.17 hours of road over 5 nights, 1.63 an hour a nightfrom $925
- Indiana Dunes, Indiana5.14 hours of road over 3 nights, 1.71 an hour a nightfrom $585
- Charleston, West Virginia4.09 hours of road over 2 nights, 2.04 an hour a nightfrom $380
- St Louis, Missouri6.54 hours of road over 3 nights, 2.18 an hour a nightfrom $705
- Cuyahoga Valley, Ohio4.61 hours of road over 2 nights, 2.31 an hour a nightfrom $430
- Cleveland, Ohio4.87 hours of road over 2 nights, 2.44 an hour a nightfrom $460
- Detroit riverfront, Michigan5.00 hours of road over 2 nights, 2.50 an hour a nightfrom $450
- Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania5.74 hours of road over 2 nights, 2.87 an hour a nightfrom $480
Start with the number of nights
Tell the office how many nights you have. Everything else follows from that number, including whether the drive is worth making at all.