WE MADE IT!!!!
We weren’t sure it could be done, but sure enough, 21 states in 25 days and we find ourselves back in good ol’ North Carolina. And in case you were wondering which 21 states they were…NC, VA, WV, OH, MI, WI, MN, ND, SD, WY, MT, ID, UT, CO, NE, IA, MO, KS, IL, KY, and TN, whew!
First and foremost though, we want to say thank you for all the well wishes, gifts, and prayers said while we embarked on this trip of a lifetime, it is certainly appreciated and made us feel as if we were on this trip with all of you!
I first thought to take this trip to see a large portion of the country that I had not seen yet. Obviously, the most important thing we both needed was the time to do it. I have recently decided to put the golf clubs away, and Brandi was not exactly enjoying her place of employment. And while we knew the expenses were going to be high, it might be decades before we could actually make this journey a reality. So we made a very rough outline of states, monuments, and points of interest that we would like to see without setting exact dates and times to get there. One of the most important things I wanted to be able to do was stay in a city or state an extra day or two if we hadn’t accomplished all we wanted to do in the given time. And given our lack of an itinerary, the best guess I could give was anywhere from 3 to 4 weeks.
I have a goal to see all 50 states at some point in my life, and have been very fortunate to have seen 38 before this trip started. So among the many goals of this trip were to wipe out 8 of the states in the middle of the country that I hadn’t visited yet, and secondly, to get my navigator Brandi to successfully be able to read maps and point us in the right direction. Both goals……success!!
Brandi has worked so hard at keeping up with our blog and making slideshows, I thought it only fair to write a final summary in case you didn’t have 12 hours to read everything and see all the pictures.
Animals…..we wanted to see all of them!!! Despite the numerous signs/warnings, and even visiting 2 Bear Lakes, not one, no grizzlies for us. We even went to Moose Falls, but no, Bullwinkle was not waiting for us at any point. How about Antelope Island…..nope, you guessed it, no antelope. But we were fortunate to see a couple dozen buffaloes, a coyote, numerous deer, one Crazy Horse, and even run with some donkeys on the road. We also crossed over Snake River and alas, we actually did see a snake!
As for adventure…..if you can believe it, we hiked, rode horseback, played kickball, inner-tubed down a river, rode a bobsled, a luge, and lassoed fake cows. And that was in a matter of 6 days!!!
But activities were not all we did……..we saw 4 NFL stadiums and 3 MLB stadiums, but these still weren’t as big as the worlds largest ball of twine, the worlds largest cow, and the world’s largest mall!! We saw Blue Lake, Green Bay, Golden, Colorado, the Red Rocks, and even the Black Pool. We saw Jenny Lake and Bridal Veil Falls, but luckily neither of these were close to Crazy Woman Creek.
Some things were just down right confusing though. I mean, the Flat River had more
rapids than the Snake River. Kansas City is in Missouri, Alberta Falls are in Colorado, and West Thumb is in the south part of Yellowstone. And for some reason Mackinac Island is pronounced mac-in-naw.
As for geographical landmarks…..we crossed the 45th parallel multiple times, meaning at some points of this trip, we were closer to Santa Claus than the equator. We drove along the Continental Divide, and we even saw the geographical center of the northern half of the western hemisphere.
We played cornhole (bean bag game) in 3 states. We hiked in 3 National Parks, we played 3 rounds of disc golf, and you guessed it, I lost 3 discs.
We camped in our tent 7 nights, stayed in a hotel 6 nights, we spent 5 days in both Wyoming and Colorado, we saw 4 of our favorite little guys (Dylan, Mason, Craig, and Quin), enough with the 3’s, we rode 2 zip lines in Utah and saw 1 Great Salt Lake. Although, both Brandi and I are re-naming it, Great Bug Lake.
When we first reached the Rocky Mountain range, the temperature went from 84 degrees to 67. And when we filled up with gas in Aspen it was $4.49 and when we got down the mountain to Denver, it was $3.99 (must have been a big mountain!!). We found out who Gutzen Borglem is, we built snowmen while wearing shorts and flip-flops, and rode two indoor roller coasters. We rode down the Oregon Trail, saw the Independence Ghost Town, and played Frisdoo and flip-cup.
All in all it was a great trip, one that neither of us will ever forget. We drove over 6,000 miles all over God’s country, but watch out, we did run into Devils Tower!
And finally we leave you with our best and worst lists:
Best Meal: Jack Stack’s BBQ in Kansas City, MO….mmmmmmm, ribs
Worst: Doc Holidays in Glenwood Springs….no refills on Diet Coke, and bad food, big thumbs down
Best Campground: Chris’s Campground (Spearfish, SD) for internet in the tent and cleanest site
Worst: Lake Cokato (Minn.) our first campsite and so dirty we almost turned the car around and headed home. Oh yea, and mosquitoes the size of lemons, yuk.
Best Hotel: Residence Inn in Salt Lake (thanks D and T!!). Awesome room with a kitchen
Worst: Extended Stay in Kansas City, don’t ever stay in an extended stay if you don’t have to
Best Lake: Bear Lake (border of Idaho and Utah), crystal clear turquoise water with mountain background
Worst: Salt Lake (Utah), bzzzzzzzzzzzz
Best Disc Course: Jackson Hole, right in the Grand Teton Mountains!
Worst: Kansas City, extremely long and extremely HOT
Best National Park: Rocky Mountain N. P., awesome views, spectacular.
Worst: Jefferson National (Gateway Arch), waaaaay too crowded
Best Surprise: Comfort Inn; Sterling, CO (Thanks Jo!!), 95 degrees at 8:00 pm, not good camping weather
Worst: No electrical hook-ups in National Parks. Makes it hard to blow up an air mattress!!
Scariest Drive: Independence Pass (Colorado), this is why they teach you to drive with hands at 10 and 2, yikes, don’t look down!
Easiest Drive: Nebraska, just beware of any cows crossing the road
Shortest Trip: Illinois to Tennessee; 2 hours
Longest Trip: Keystone, SD (Mt. Rushmore) to Jackson Hole, WY; 11 hours
