Well, there seems to be a major storm in the Midwest and we are in the middle of it. We can't go north into the snow, and we can't go south into the snow and wind.
So we got up on Friday morning and checked the weather forecast and the highway conditions and hit the road. It rained all the way to Springfield MO where we stopped for the night. The weather was so bad that we waved to the Gateway Arch in St Louis and kept driving, worried about getting through the storm. In Springfield, the campground was equipped with storm shelter, and so we told that if the storm sirens went off in the middle of the night, we would have shelter. We were glad the ditch was no longer our only option. We slept through the hail and rain and got up the next morning and checked the forecasts and conditions again and hit the road.
It stormed all the way into Oklahoma and Texas, where we saw fresh snow on the ground. But by the time we stopped for the night in Amarillo, we seemed to have left the storm behind as it moved into the northeast and we moved west. In Oklahoma, things inside the car got a little dicey, mostly because the weather had been so bad that the girls couldn't run around outside when we stopped. So we brought out the laptop and a harness we had brought along and got out the movies. Ok, only 1 movie, Madagascar, which the girls watched 4 times in a row and we can all recite now. Once we got to Texas, we promptly went to Walmart and bought out their $7 family DVD section.
Also in Texas, we ate near where we were staying at The Big Texan, a place that advertises a free 72 oz steak if you can eat it all in an hour. The waitress told us that usually at least 1 person a day tries to eat one, but only 1 a month or so actually eats it all and gets it free. The record is 12 minutes or so, by a 115 lb Cheerleader. We didn't even try and were happy with our regular sized steaks. They were really good too. It was a fun place to eat, the walls were covered with game trophies and they had a shooting arcade that Mikaela and Madeline enjoyed.
We left Amarillo and headed west through New Mexico. Around lunch time, we decided to take a detour and go north to Four Corners Monument, the only place in the US where four states meet: Utah, Colorado, New Mexico and Arizona. It was a lot of fun, and we were so happy to be back in the sunshine and warm weather. We didn't arrive at Four Corners, until about 6pm at night, and we were still 2-3 hours from a campground, in the middle of the Navajo Indian Reservation. So, we ended up deciding to stay in a hotel in Kayenta. The Holiday Inn there has family suites and kids eat free... sooooo. We considered asking if we could just park overnight in their parking lot, but Dad started mumbling about showers and room service, so we took the room.
We had intended to sleep in, but the girls were up at 6... their body clocks all messed up from all the different times zones we had driven through. So we had breakfast and got on the road. It was a long day driving through Arizona, and we all cheered once we crossed the Colorado river into California. We forgot about some apples we had bought back in Boston, and the inspectors confiscated them from us outside of Needles... oh well.
We thought we were home free coming over the Cajon Summit, only to see traffic at a standstill in the Cajon Pass. While we waited for the traffic to clear, we all talked about our favorite things on the trip. Mikaela liked Colonial Williamsburg best, while Maddie said she liked Mississippi the best. Aislinn and Abby still were saying they liked the ship exhibit at Jamestown the best. Kristian said he liked the Grand Canyon and Washington DC the best. I said I liked Washington DC and Manhattan the best. We then talked about the funniest thing on the trip... which by a majority votes was when Daddy retrieving his glasses from the river in PA. The one dissenting vote was Daddy of course, who still wasn't sure that river swim was funny at all. He said the funniest thing was the day before, when Abby was fussy and sleepy and tired of being in the car. She thought that passing the time by kicking the seat in front of her was a good idea, while Daddy (who was sitting in front of her) disagreed. She was reprimanded several times, until she (and we) was very angry. She clenched her fists and set her jaws and said quite sternly that she was "very very very very very very mad." With each "very" she pause at looked at one of us, and then looked at the other parent on the next "very." It took every ounce of strength to keep our composure and tell her that we understood that she was mad, and were glad she was telling us, even though she still was not going to be allowed to kick the seat. We were laughing so hard at those "verys" that I started to cry and Dad was choking. We did not want to openly laugh, as we really did appreciate that she used her words instead of screeching and we didn't want to mock her since she really was mad. I don't know if that description captures it, but I wholly agree with Dad that it was the second funniest thing on the whole trip.
Well, things cleared up fairly quickly in the pass and we were on our way. We got home about 8:30 and after ordering pizza we all fell into bed.
Thanks for keeping up with us and sharing our adventurous journey! We'd especially like to thank all the people at home who took care of things while we were away, especially Auntie Karen who took care of the house, and Mr and Mrs Leslie who took care of our bird. Thanks!
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