On Our Way!!

We will be driving to Orlando first to visit Walt Disney World and Universal Studios. We’re leaving the 25th of October early in the morning, and we are arriving in Orlando on the 29th of October. We have purchased four nights of accommodations through our Air Miles, another four nights through our Save-On-More points, and another week we purchased through a time-share deal that we bought two years ago when we were sucked into a time-share presentation last time we were in Walt Disney World. It’s a really nice place though, and well worth it, and we just purchased the single week.

We plan on spending Halloween night in Universal Studios, they have a bunch of scary activities going on, with haunted houses and things, but I think the kids may get too scared and we may have to end up leaving! We’ll see how it goes.

The only stops we’ll be making on the way to Orlando is to sleep at night, and at Mount Rushmore. I’ll try to post pictures each day when we stop.

October 23th

We’re off!! Well, we had some great goodbye parties, and spent our last night with family and good friends saying goodbye. We didn’t get to leave as early in the morning as we had planned because there were a few loose ends we had forgotten to tie up that had to be done in the morning, so we ended up leaving town around 9:30am. Not too bad, and we live right by the border, so within a few minutes we were at the US border and waiting our turn to cross.

We got hauled into Customs as soon as they heard about our detailed itinerary, but it was quick and rather painless as they went through our passports and entered us into their system. They took the sniffer dog around the van, but didn’t make us haul anything out thank goodness, as everything was packed pretty tightly in there.

We actually agonized about how tightly everything was packed into the van, and we were really packed pretty light for a family of four gone away for six months, we thought. But at the last minute we decided to do some camping along the way, so our light camping gear took up some room, as well as all the kids sporting equipment like football, soccer ball, basketball, tennis rackets, you get the picture. Anyway, we made it all fit and still managed to keep the seats fairly open so the kids could be separated if need be. And no roof racks!

As I said, the night before we left, the kids decided they really wanted to camp along the way since we didn’t do any camping in the summer, so we decided to change our driving route to go straight down the I-5 and try to get into California sooner so that we could get to hotter lands where camping would be more of an option. This way we can also see the Grand Canyon, which was something we had originally really wanted to see as well. Since we are leaving a couple of days earlier than planned and this route only adds on an extra day, we know we’ll still arrive for our reservations on time. Nothing like changing plans at the last minute, but that’s okay, we’re flying by the seat of our pants now!!!

We didn’t make much headway today, we had a few stops to make, getting some groceries for the road to make lunches and breakfasts, then at Home Depot for flashlights and some other odds and ends. We passed Seattle around 2pm.

The kids settled in pretty well, but I’m not gonna’ lie, Jorden had a harder time than Kelsey!! He sure thought I was mean when I told him he had to work on his home schooling work and he figured out it was Saturday!!! The days of the week don’t count anymore, we told him. Soon enough he and Kelsey were settled in and both working on schoolwork.

We ate lunch AND dinner at rest stops today, we bought a roast chicken and some salads and buns for dinner, and sandwich stuff for lunch. We decided to stop at 6pm for the day in the lap of luxury at the Motel 6 in Springfield, Oregon. We wanted to stop and let the kids get some more school work done, and pick up some more supplies as well. The kids got a kick out of being in Springfield and made jokes about us being the Simpsons in Springfield and John being Homer…heh heh.

Tomorrow we hope to make it further south into California or even into Nevada, we’ll have to see how far the day takes us.

October 24th

I had a horrible night’s sleep, the people in the room above us were really noisy and it being the first night away from home all contributed. I probably only ended up getting a few hours sleep in total, and I woke up at 4am and couldn’t get back to sleep. John’s an early riser anyway, so he was up too, and we started to get things ready to go while the kids still slept. By 5am we were pretty set to hit the rode, and the kids were up now also, so off we went. We had some cereal before we left, and decided we’d stop later for some more to eat.

Down the road when we hit a gas station for coffee, breakfast snacks, and gas. Kelsey got a kick out of this place being called “Love’s”.

The kids watched a Garfield DVD for awhile,

and then after awhile them and I all fell asleep for a little while. We woke up when the sun was coming up and we were up in the mountains and entering into California. It looked beautiful to see the sun coming up over the horizon.

As we ascended higher into the mountains, the kids thought it was really neat to see the clouds below us, and then when we started to come back down they thought it was neat again to be driving through the clouds.

We stopped at a rest stop later on for some lunch (sandwiches) and later in the day we hit the Walmart just outside of Sacramento for some supplies. I found some incredible deals on summer clothes for kids that were discounted to unbelievable prices, perfect since we needed this kind of stuff for Mexico, so we picked some up.

We stopped at a rest stop and made a cheap dinner tonight of soup and grill cheese sandwiches. At the rest stop I saw something on the ground and upon taking a closer look I saw that it was a dead tarantula!!! I called the kids over and they thought it was pretty darn cool.

We decided just to get to Bakersfield today, and try to make it Las Vegas tomorrow. We decided to stop in Vegas on the way to the Grand Canyon as we’ve never been there and it only adds a little over an hour to the trip by going there. We’re not going to stay long, just an hour or two, just long enough to take a look and say we’ve seen it!

We stopped at another classic hotel, the Vegabond Inn (what can I say, we’re on a budget =) and arrived around 8pm, very tired and ready for bed.

October 25th

We woke up early again, 4am (well, John woke up and woke us all up). We wanted to try to get to the Grand Canyon before dark so had to leave early. We packed everything up and set off, the kids and again fell asleep right away in the van.

We headed towards Barstow, CA, and in Barstow we stopped for coffee, muffins, gas and ice for the cooler. The sun was coming up so we could see the desert around us, which was pretty cool.

We decided that we weren’t going to go to Vegas as it actually added 3 or more hours to our trip, and it would put us in the Grand Canyon at nightfall. That would mean we’d have to wait until late the next morning for the sun to come up to see it, instead of being able to get on the road. We’ll see Vegas another time.

As we drove, the sun started to come up over the hills and it was so neat to see. The sun gradually came up over the hills and it was huge and red in the sky. Pretty cool. We stopped at a rest area so I could take a quick photo.

We drove to Needles, CA and stopped to pick up some food supplies and get some gas. We picked up a roast chicken and some salads again and decided to have a big lunch, then maybe just have some soup and sandwiches for dinner. So far we have done well and haven’t eaten one meal out. We’ll be doing that enough in Disney and Mexico! The kids read books in the van today, and were amazed at how boring the scenery of the desert got. It was beautiful, that’s for sure, but it just goes on and on through CA and Arizona.

Arizona had some wonderful hills of what Kelsey told me were metamorphic rock (she’s studying them in school). They looked really cool.

We made our turn towards the Grand Canyon and we arrived there around 1pm. It was a beautiful sunny day, but cold. Colder than it was back home, even! We had to pay $20 US to enter the park, then we drove for awhile until we reached Mather’s lookout point. We parked and got out and weren’t even prepared for the site we saw. The kids were amazed, and so were we. The canyon was absolutely breathtaking and amazing, a wonder of nature that’s for sure. We took a lot of pictures and looked around, but all in all we didn’t stay too, too long. We wanted to stick to our schedule because each we seem to get a little more behind and we want to make sure we arrive on time.

We were back on the road headed towards Flagstaff, Arizona by about 3:30pm. We decided to drive to Winslow, Arizona (like in the Eagles song!) and then stop at a hotel for the day, have some dinner and have the kids work on some school work and be able to just relax for awhile. We stopped in Flagstaff for some gas, and it was soooo cold! We decided that maybe we would just head south to Phoenix, and then head east from there to Orlando in order to travel in some warmer climates! It only added an hour and a half to the journey, so we decided to go for it.

Well, about 15 minutes down the highway to Phoenix our first big “hiccup” came…a weird noise came from the side of the van, and suddenly we realized that the front passenger tired blew out (at 75 miles per hour!!) John quickly maneuvered the van over to the shoulder of the road, and we instructed the kids to get out of the van and head up the hill a ways off the road, just in case to be safe. It was really quite freaky with all those big rigs and cars screaming by, the van shaking from the wind of them, and John trying to change the tire all the while. He got it changed pretty quickly, and we decided to head back to Flagstaff and find a tire store, the tire was a brand new Uniroyal with a warrantee and it had a side blowout, so John wanted to get the tire replaced under his warrantee. Both tire shops in Flagstaff said they’d have to order one in and it would take two or three days to come from Phoenix. Well, since we’re going there anyway, we’ll just replace it when we get to Phoenix. So we went to McDonald’s (what a gross way to top off a gross day!) and then, as usual, the luxurious Motel 6.

Hopefully it won’t take too long in Phoenix tomorrow to find a replacement tire!

So far the kids have been able to stay sitting beside each other! They’ve done pretty well considering the amount of time they are spending in the car, with just a few moments of insanity (both them and us..heh heh) We’ve stopped a few times at the rest areas and let them jump out with their scooters and scooter around the parking lot just to work off some steam (too bad kids won’t play fetch….)

John and I haven’t had to be separated yet either, although it came close when we took a wrong turn up the wrong highway in Arizona and had to come back down again (a 20 minute mistake). Guess who was navigating that one….well, let’s not point any fingers.

Well, off to bed for an early morning. I have to put in the ear plugs to block out the highway traffic!

October 26th

We got up around 6am today. We wanted to arrive in Phoenix around 8:30 or 9 to be at a tire place first thing. It was a nice drive to Phoenix when the sun started to come up and we could see the desert. We stopped at about 7:30 at a small gas station at the roadside to have some cereal and milk and grab a couple of coffees. It was still pretty darn cold!

Back on the road, the sun was coming up even more, and the hillside looked really neat.

We were descending constantly all the way into Phoenix. As we got nearer to Phoenix we started seeing cacti. We all thought this was just way cool, since none of us have ever seen a real cactus before. We were all oo-ing and aw-ing over all the cacti out the window (simple things please simple people, I know!). The kids liked all the overpasses in Phoenix.

We found a Big-O tire and soon found that our warrantee on the tire wouldn’t cover for the damage for some reason or another, so we just bought a new tire and within an hour we were all set and back on the road headed for Tucson. Jorden started in right away with his choice of “bug the parents” sentences, and Kelsey settled into her homeschool work. Jorden has taken to repeatedly singing one line from two different Kiss songs over and over and over again until one of the other three people in the car are ready to cuff him. There’s that, and then saying “Ewwwww!” over and over again for no apparent reason other than to get my goat. =) Kids, gotta love ‘em!

We stopped outside of Tucson for some lunch at Pizza Hut, and then headed towards New Mexico. This time I was driving, and I tell you I’ve never driving a more boring drive than down the I-10 through New Mexico. You could close your eyes for 6 hours and open them again and everything would still look the same.

One thing we’ve been amazed about this trip is the amount of big rigs and trucks we see travelling these highways. We never see this many trucks in Canada. I don’t know why that is, if we transport more goods by train or other means or what, but we were just amazed at the amount of trucks on the highway. Go teamsters!

We made it to Los Cruces, New Mexico around 4pm, and just outside of town we came upon an accident on the highway. Traffic was backed up for miles, and we had to sit in a traffic jam on the highway for about two hours. A bit of a nightmare, mostly just the timing of it since it was right when we were watching for a rest stop at which to stop to cook up some hotdogs and stuff for some dinner, and now by the time we got through this jam it was dark. Turns out it was a big rig that was burned almost to a crisp. I sure hope the driver was okay.

After the accident it was dark, so we did the drive-thru thing in El Paso. We then got back on the I-10 and drove through El Paso, heading out of town. We wanted to drive a few more hours and try to make it to Van Horn to make up lost time that we lost in the traffic jam. El Paso was beautiful at night, with all the lights we could see from the hillside as we drove along the highway. I sure would have liked to have seen in the day also, though. Maybe on the way back.

On the way through the mountains of the Rio Grande, we were stopped at a checkpoint where they checked our passports and shined lights in our windows. John says they were looking for illegal aliens from Mexico that may try to come across the border. The kids asked why, and we explained the whole complicated, sad situation to them about how it’s not anyone’s fault really, it’s just unfortunate for the Mexican people, and also for the Americans as they just can’t open their doors freely either. Another life lesson for the kids on the road!

We reached Van Horn at about 9pm our time, but we soon realized that it was 11pm Van Horn time! Uh-oh, we’re losing more hours. Time to get to bed!

October 27th

As usual, we woke up early to get on the road again. Only this time we woke up at 5:20 local time, which was actually only 3:20 our time. yikes. Oh well, we had to get used to the time change anyway, as we’d be living 3 hours ahead when we got to Playa.

We drove a long time in the dark and we could see some sheet lightning way off in the distance. After an hour or so, we could see we were getting closer and closer to the lightning. We tried to get some weather reports on the radio but were unsuccessful. We were tired last night and had forgot to check out the weather report before going to sleep. As we drove further down the road, the rain starting coming down harder, and the sheet lighting was lighting up the entire sky overhead on a more regular basis. We even started to eventually see some forked lightning mixed in for good measure. I turned to see if the kids were noticing, and they were both asleep. I’m glad they were, because if they had been awake during what came next they would have been very upset and freaked out, and probably crying.

Just as John and I were mentioning that we had never seen lightning like this before, coming at such a rate and lighting up the whole sky like this, and that maybe we should hit the next town (Fort Stockton, Texas) and hide out for a bit, suddenly we drove into what I would guess was the very middle of the storm. I can say that I’ve never experienced anything so freaky as this before in my life! Suddenly the rain was pelting down in drops the size of golf balls, and we had to slow to about 20 miles an hour and visibility was about 3 feet in front of us. Lightning was flashing directly in front of our windshield and completely shaking our car, and the thunder was roaring. At that point we both were just kind of stunned, and we just had to keep moving through it to get out of it. It was short, maybe 3 or 4 minutes, but seemed longer at the time! Once we were through, the rain slowed down right away, as did the lightening somewhat, and we just kind of looked at each other dumbfounded. “What the..?” The kids woke up, and we pulled off the highway right then where there was an exit as we needed some gas right away and a bathroom break!

As we got out of the van with the kids, lightning was still flashing and thunder pealing loudly, and the kids were jumping. The rain was pouring down, and we told the kids about what happened down the road. They were a little freaked, but not too bad. I’m just glad they slept through it, although I don’t know how they did!

As we continued on down the highway, we saw some windmills that Kelsey thought were neat as she was studying alternate energies in school before we left.

We stopped just before San Antonio at a rest area to have some lunch. We cooked up some dogs and had some other snacks with it. Here’s the family at the rest stop:

As you can see, we all just piled out of the van as quickly as possible without even shutting a door…

A funny sign we saw that I took a picture of, what a name for a town:

We were soon in San Antonio, which was a little crazy with all the freeways and byways.

We managed to find our way through, though it was hectic for a moment or two. Just outside of San Antonio we stopped for gas and when I asked for the washroom, the attendant says, “no, we don’t have public showers.” I’m like, “uh, no..I want a toilet?” OH, the RESTroom. Must remember to call it RESTroom.

After a very tiring day of driving for us, we finally made it to Houston. Let me say, I didn’t like trying to make it through Houston. It was so complicated and stressful trying to navigate ourselves along the correct route through the freeways, and in rush hour, and to make sure we stayed on the I-10 all they way, but we managed. All of the stacks of roads looked quite amazing, but we were glad to be through it. And those texas semi truck drivers are crazy!!

We saw this Dodge Ram beside us towing a huge load that Jorden thought was pretty cool. He thought it was cool to see a regular truck towing such a big load. “Wow, now THAT’S Ram tough!” he said. Ha, ha.

We stopped early today just outside Houston at the, you guessed it, Motel 6. It had a pool, so we all went for a much-needed swim. Tomorrow we should reach New Orleans by mid-morning, we want to visit New Orleans on the way to Florida to get it out of the way, instead of on the way to Mexico.