Road Trip... #1

Ok... this will be the first of several LONG posts. I am home, once again, for a short visit... Josh had a doctor's appointment yesterday, and Kayti has an appointment today for her senior pictures for the yearbook (yes, I said "SENIOR PICTURES"... but let's NOT go there right now. I am trying to still be in denial!)

The first thing that I should tell you about this trip is that most of the pictures that I will post are all taken from the van as we are booking it down the road. We left out of here on a Friday afternoon, and our plan was to be in Utah by Saturday night, then Idaho by Sunday afternoon. Barry had a plane to catch on Monday morning, and I had a wedding to get ready for as soon as he left. So, with all that said, there wasn't a whole lot of time to stop and take pictures. Some of these are a bit blurry, so please forgive the quality of the picture, and endure with me as I relive the memories!

The very first time that I made this particular roadtrip, I was 4 years old, and our family had been invited to visit the family of the missionary who baptized my dad. I don't remember much about this trip, but we moved to Idaho a month or so later. In the 35 years since that first trip, I have traveled these roads between Tennessee and Idaho many times. The last time that we drove out west was 10 years ago, so I was anxious for the kids to see things this time that they were just too small to remember from the last time.

I usually try to take the by-pass around big cities, but Barry was driving, and the GPS took us right through the middle of St. Louis. It was about 11:00 at night, and the archway was all lit up. The kids were in awe, and it was fun to hear them be so excited.


We had a "master plan" going into this trip. Barry had the day off the Friday that we left, so he was going to sleep that day, and then drive all night. I was then going to drive on Saturday while he slept. Life had other plans for us, and Barry was not able to get the sleep that he needed, so he started getting pretty sleepy around 3:00 AM. I had been trying to sleep, but just couldn't seem to relax and fall asleep. Actually, I was feeling pretty wired, so I told him to let me drive for a while, and he could rest. I learned 2 new things on this trip... the best time to drive through Kansas City is 3:30 AM... there is NO one on the road at that time, and Missouri gets REALLY dark at night, especially around 4:30 in the morning! :) That is when I started to get really sleepy, and made Barry (who couldn't sleep because he was worried about me driving with no sleep) start talking to me to keep me awake. We should have been smart and pulled over at a rest stop, but we didn't... I just wanted to hurry up and get to Lincoln, NE, which we did at 6:30 that morning. Megan had been asking me what "rolling hills" are, and I was only to happy to be able to show them to her once we were in Nebraska. I wish that I had some pictures to share of them, but I was driving, and so the camera didn't get pulled out. Barry was finally able to get some sleep, and with the sun up and the kids awake, I got a second wind. Barry took over driving by the time that we hit the western side of the state. That allowed me to catch about an hour-long nap, then I was ready to pull the camera out again.

I love to see how the terrain changes in Nebraska from rolling hills of green, to flat farm land, then to far off mountains in the distance. Once we got into Wyoming, we were able to see the Rocky Mountains off in the distance... and they were covered in snow!


There was still snow on the ground in places in Wyoming, which the kids just could not believe. It did make this southern girl shudder to think about all the snow that had been there during the winter!

The next thing that caught everyone's attention was the windmills! They dotted the hillsides, and were huge.


Wyoming always captures my attention. Just driving through that state makes me wonder how anyone can say the world is over-populated! You can drive for miles and miles and only see this:


One of the things that stands out in my memory about making this trip as a child was staying in Rock Springs, Wyoming. This was always our first stopping point, and this is the hotel where we stayed:


I was tickled to find that it is still there, and just had to take a picture of the sign as we stopped for gas! The best part of this hotel... the indoor pool, where my older sister tried to teach me how to swim!

I think, though, that my favorite part of the trip as a child was this:


There was nothing cooler that driving into the mountain! I still got a small thrill as an adult driving through that tunnel.

This next picture is for my sister, Kristi:


As a kid, nothing said "Heaven" like the signs for Little America. Promises of "Kids stay free" and "Ice Cream Cones" on their billboard signs just called to me and my sister. They even had pinguins on their signs, and we were convinced that there were actually pinguins running around there somewhere! We used to beg to stop and stay there, but no... we would always drive on by. On one trip, though, late at night, my dad actually pulled in, and Kris and I were so excited we couldn't stand it. Imagine our disappointment, though, when dad returned to the car 5 minutes later and declared that they were too expensive, and pulled us back on the road. I think we actually cried! Looking at the place now, I don't see actually see anything spectacular about the buildings, but there is still part of me that wants to one day stay there, just so I can say I did it!

As I said earlier, we wanted to be in Utah by Saturday evening. I had made reservations for us in Ogden, and we wanted to get there early enough to get out of the car and do a few things. Our hotel had an indoor pool, and we wanted to take advantage of that as well. We made it into Ogden by 5:30, and were very proud of ourselves for making it across the country in just over 24 hours. Every time that we visit Utah and see the spectacular mountains, we want to move there. Barry has often made the statement that we could just have his mom sell all of our stuff, send us the money, and make a new home there. I took lots of pictures of the mountains, but I won't bore you with all of them. Here is one of my favorites:


The next morning as we left Ogden, it was raining, and the tops of the mountains were hidden by the clouds:


As we drove drove north, we saw several old homestead sites:


Please forgive the extreme blurriness of this picture... once again it was taken as we were driving down the road at 80 mph! We saw several of these, though, and they made me very thoughtful of the people who had once lived there. One of the places even had a picket fince around the house, and several barns behind it. Some of the homes were little like this, but a few of them were larger, 2-story homes. I had just read the book, "These is My Words", and with that on my mind, it made me really appreciate all of the hard work that went into building and maintaining these places.

I think that up until that day, Ogden was the furthest north that Barry had ever been in Utah. He had never been to Idaho before... the last time we made this trip, he flew home from Salt Lake, while I drove on up to Idaho. I couldn't wait to show him the state where I lived for 8 years as a child, and it was fun to see the expression on his face as he saw new things. As we got near Twin Falls, Idaho, I got to see something new as well, and I am almost ashamed to say that I had never seen it before. I was always facinated by the "ravine" that I could see between the interstate and Twin Falls. I pointed it out to Barry, and he asked me several questions about it, but I had to confess to him that I had never actually been any closer to it than we were at that moment. We were getting low on gas, so Barry decided that it was as good a place as any to stop, so off we headed into Twin Falls, Idaho. What we saw next took our breath away. There was a place to pull off the road and park, so we did, and I was able to take some wonderful pictures:


I got a few of the kids... even though a few were a bit reluctant!


We could have stayed much longer, but my nieces were calling me, and asking us to hurry up and get there! We still were about 2 hours from their house, but you would have thought we were 2 days away!

That Sunday was Kayti's birthday, and she was very content to have this amazing road trip be part of her present. She LOVES to take road trips, and was almost as excited for the trip as she was to visit her aunt, uncle and cousins! We surprised her with a present, though, while we were on the road. What more could a girl want than this:


The picture is a little dark, but that is the complete works of William Shakespeare, which she adores! She loves, and "gets" Shakespeare, and was thrilled with this present, and her dad for thinking of it!

We finally made it to my sister's house, about an hour later than we planned, thanks to stopping and sight-seeing, and me taking Barry around to show him a few places that I knew we wouldn't have a chance to see once we got to Kat's house. We had a fun, although fast, trip out. We really want to make this trip again soon, and take more time to sight-see across the way.

I think that I will finish this post off with a few random shots...


This was a rain storm that we went driving into on Sunday morning. It had been pretty rainy on Saturday, too, and it was just kind of wild to see the rain ahead of us like that.


I love this picture because you can see the rain clouds above us, a streak of blue sky, and snow-capped mountains.


It was kind of funny to see our name up on an exit sign!


I couldn't resist taking a picture of this for Shari K! I think she has been holding out on us, girls!