After taking a couple of months off, the blog has finally returned! In the ensuing weeks since our hiatus began, Linda and I took a little vacation and made a road trip back East to visit family and friends. We had made the across-country drive twice before, but it was one-way each time because we drove out West and then flew back East on a plane. The first time we made the trip, it was our Truck Trip, when we drove my truck across country and left it at Linda's sister's house in preparation for our moving to Washington. We then flew back home, and a month later we drove Linda's car out West to move to Yakima. So we knew we were in for a long haul. The reason we did not fly back East for this trip is because I absolutely HATE to fly.
We were accompanied on this trip by our friend, Mr. Cardinal. His ancestors were from North Carolina, so we decided to take him with us so he could visit his homeland. He will be your tour guide for parts of this trip.
Our trip spanned the timeline from May 29th through June 28th, a total of 31 days, and we racked up 7252 miles on our car. Our original route was to go along the middle of the country on I-40, but due to increased tornado activity in that area the week before we were set to go, we decided to change and go on a more southerly route, driving down to I-10 and going across from there.
Our days usually consisted of 8-9 hours driving. Some days were shorter, some days were longer. We had to plan our trip so that we could land in a city with a decent motel to stay in overnight. And so we began our journey...
DAY 1 & DAY 2 - MAY 29 & MAY 30
Our first day we drove from Yakima, WA, to Jackpot, NV, driving in the states of Washington, Oregon, Idaho, and Nevada. As soon as we left Yakima and got on the Interstate, I remarked to Linda that the steering wheel on her car was not on straight. Since she had gotten all new tires about a month earlier, I didn't think anything of it. Hmmm...
Our first night we stayed in the Cactus Pete Casino in Jackpot, NV. To say that we were two tired puppies would be the understatement of the year.
We arose the next morning to a beautiful Nevada sunrise.
On our second day, we drove through the entire state of Nevada and into Arizona. Let me tell you, there are some gorgeous mountains in Nevada. And that's just about all there was in the part of the state that we passed through. We drove for hours on a mostly two-lane road, passing through only a couple of small communities, without seeing much traffic.
However, the scenery was absolutely beautiful and our trip through was uneventful...until we came upon something that was taking up both lanes of the road ahead of us. It was only when we got to a passing zone that we could see what it was.
Finally we reached civilization...Las Vegas. Not really sure how civilized it is, but we did manage to find the freeway and I took this video of part of Vegas as we drove through. There is no sound on this video because the road noise was very loud.
While going through this area, we saw a Stealth Plane coming in for a landing at Nellis Air Force Base. I managed to get a hazy shot of the Las Vegas Strip, and also a view of Lake Mead (the lake formed behind the Hoover Dam).
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| Lake Mead at top, Stealth Plane lower right, Las Vegas lower left |
After we left Las Vegas we traveled through some rocky areas. The formations of rocks, all across the western part of the country, never ceases to amaze me. We stopped for lunch at a truck stop along the way and ate in the shade of a beautiful, old gnarly tree.
Our stop for the second night was in Kingman, AZ. Our motel was situated right on the old Route 66, and Mr. Cardinal posed for us. He was too short to reach the sign, so Linda gave him a boost up.
We walked across the street and had dinner at a funky restaurant decorated in old 50's style.
We had two days under our belt, only four more to go before we reached our first destination, Jacksonville, FL. It had been a long two days, but we had enjoyed seeing parts of the country that were new to us. And the best part of each day was when we relaxed with a couple of beers as a reward for all that driving!
Join us again next week, as we continue on our journey across the southern part of the United States.
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