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What is "to take the road"

The Collaborative International Dictionary
To take the road

Road \Road\ (r[=o]), n. [AS. r[=a]d a riding, that on which one rides or travels, a road, fr. r[=i]dan to ride. See Ride, and cf. Raid.]

  1. A journey, or stage of a journey. [Obs.]

    With easy roads he came to Leicester.
    --Shak.

  2. An inroad; an invasion; a raid. [Obs.]
    --Spenser.

  3. A place where one may ride; an open way or public passage for vehicles, persons, and animals; a track for travel, forming a means of communication between one city, town, or place, and another.

    The most villainous house in all the London road.
    --Shak.

    Note: The word is generally applied to highways, and as a generic term it includes highway, street, and lane.

  4. [Possibly akin to Icel. rei[eth]i the rigging of a ship, E. ready.] A place where ships may ride at anchor at some distance from the shore; a roadstead; -- often in the plural; as, Hampton Roads.
    --Shak.

    Now strike your saile, ye jolly mariners, For we be come unto a quiet rode [road].
    --Spenser.

    On the road, or Uponthe road, traveling or passing over a road; coming or going; traveling; on the way.

    My hat and wig will soon be here, They are upon the road.
    --Cowper.

    Road agent, a highwayman, especially on the stage routes of the unsettled western parts of the United States; -- a humorous euphemism. [Western U.S.]

    The highway robber -- road agent he is quaintly called.
    --The century.

    Road book, a guidebook in respect to roads and distances.

    road kill See roadkill in the vocabulary.

    Road metal, the broken, stone used in macadamizing roads.

    Road roller, a heavy roller, or combinations of rollers, for making earth, macadam, or concrete roads smooth and compact. -- often driven by steam.

    Road runner (Zo["o]l.), the chaparral cock.

    Road steamer, a locomotive engine adapted to running on common roads.

    To go on the road, to engage in the business of a commercial traveler. [Colloq.]

    To take the road, to begin or engage in traveling.

    To take to the road, to engage in robbery upon the highways.

    Syn: Way; highway; street; lane; pathway; route; passage; course. See Way.

Usage examples of "to take the road".

And the tellers of the tales agreed in warning Sir John to avoid this region and to take the road which ran deviously to the north of Antchar.

They did not dare to take the road, but they kept it on their left, following its line as well as they could at a little distance.

And to take the road that branched off for Cheslow would have endangered the car, too.

But by and by she saw fit to take the road, and being come, unrecognised by any, to Montpellier, rested there a few days.

It was Egbert who advised me which way to go home at the end of each day: whether to pass the toy shop, its windows filled with the cars and soldiers I dreamed of owning, or to take the road where in autumn the verge was strewn with walnuts.

He would have liked to take the road too, but he felt that he was to stay with the river.