Last summer, my best friend and I took a road trip from Connecticut to Colorado with four people and one dog. I’ve known my best friend my entire life, we’re even convinced that our parents had to have planned their pregnancies for us to be best friends. Her family had decided to move out to Colorado and needed an easy way to get the car out there. Instead of paying someone to drive it out, we all jumped in the car and drove for miles and miles. With many states and miles ahead of us, we learned so much, whether it be the fact that dogs do not do well in cars for days on end, or that being in the same car for days can force people to bond more than ever. Here are 5 things we learned on our road trip.

1. It is almost impossible to drive past cows and not yell “cows!”

If you don’t point to cows every time you pass them, then you’re 100% insane. I’m sure everyone sees the cows each time since we were, in fact, driving through the midwest, but regardless, there was not a single day someone did not yell “cows!” at least once.

2. Dogs have no sense of personal space

The dog we had was a medium sized dog, so we didn’t expect her to take up too much space, but boy were we wrong. No matter what sized dog it is, they somehow know how to take up double their body mass. She would often take up two seats and whoever was in the back would be squished for space for hours on end.

3. When your car says it’s running out of gas, that means you should get more gas

I will admit, that sometimes cars can run on empty for a little, but when you are on the highway for miles and miles, you have to plan where the next gas station is. We were in a bunch of traffic one day in the carpool lane and all of a sudden, I look down and see that we have 12 miles left until empty. Just to our luck, the next gas station was 13 miles away.

4. The speed limit is not a suggestion

You may think that going a little over is okay, and usually, it is, but when you’re one of the only drivers on the road, cops tend to notice how fast you’re going, and more often than not, they don’t like it.

5. Somehow there’s never a rest stop when you need one

Similar to gas, you have to plan your rest stops like no other. You may not have to go to the bathroom at a certain moment, but once you pass the last rest stop for another 50 miles, somehow your bladder seems to fill up so quickly.