with the month of april wrapping up tomorrow, i’m able to review how my first 1 tank / 300 miles per month challenge went. i’m happy to report i came in at 240 miles this month, and while i thought it would be lower, i did take some luxuries, and had some emergencies that reminded me every month is going to have ups & downs and not to worry about them. i’m already driving a lot less, and even doing errands far less frequently.

the two main things i’ve learned are these:

+ i subconsciously allow myself to run a bit late, and only when it’s too late for other options do i confront driving. when i didn’t have a car, i didn’t really do this, so this is the fine line i have to watch.

+ i don’t mind the act of driving, but negotiating with bad drivers is infuriating, and happens a lot more often than i realized before i scaled back. the main times i was irritated this month revolved around driving.

the main thing now is to keep it going, and find new and exciting excursions to take. i still used my guidelines for making errands walkable and my on-the-go lessons of carless travel to get by. i’ve learned to run for busses [you catch them more often than not] and check ahead on my metro app for which options are arriving when. currently, i’m working on utilizing the amtrak surfliner, which allows bike walk-ons, for trips to bike-friendly beach cities. we’ll see how it goes!