On the Road Again

What a crazy start to our summer.  The movers were at our house for 4 days.  The kids finished school.  We had family visit.  Taylor graduated from high school.  We spent a couple nights in a hotel.  Then we hit the road.  All seven of us.  The dog.  Two cars and a U-Haul trailer.  We were ready for an adventure. 

We were almost out of town when we realized we hadn't checked out of the hotel.  Oops!  We took care of that, THEN we hit the road.


First stop, Cadillac Ranch outside of Amarillo, Texas.  We stopped there in 2010 on our way to New Mexico.  This time we brought spray paint.

We had to leave our mark too...

Our first night was spent at the Amarillo KOA.  Quite possibly the windiest place on this earth!  I was ok with the noise of the trains, planes and automobiles, but the wind!  It was a NICE campground, but I could have done without that wind! 

Night two was spent at the KOA in Sallisaw, OK.  This one was nice.  It was SO GREEN!  The weather was perfect.

Night three was spent in Hurricane Mills, TN.  Because of construction traffic we figured we would be arriving late, so we called ahead and reserved a couple cabins.  We didn't want to have to set up camp in the dark.  We tried to eat dinner at Loretta Lynn's Kitchen, but it was closed - At 9:30 on a Friday night!  We ended up having to eat at Arby's in the truck stop across the street.

Night four was spent in Wytheville, VA.  The scenery was getting more and more beautiful, but we were pretty sick of the construction/traffic by this point.  We got in VERY late this night.  We wondered where in the world the GPS was taking us after we left the freeway and started up into the mountains!  We'd decided we didn't want to pay extra for cabins, so we had to set up camp in the dark and be QUIET so we wouldn't wake the neighbors. You try that with 7 people and a dog! Actually, we did quite well, though the kids heard the neighbors complain about us in the morning.   

Night five was spent with GREAT friends in Virginia.  Our time together was too short, but so fun!  What was not fun was driving through Washington D.C. in traffic the next day! 

**Break for a day at Six Flags America**

Night six took us just outside of Washington D.C.  This one was nice and had a great play area for the kids...but we got our first taste of camping in the rain.  The poor kids woke up a little wet.

Night seven was spent somewhere in New York.  We were SO tired.  We had reserved just one night, but we decided to get a big cabin and stay two nights.  It was so fun to just hang out and relax. 

We drove over rivers, under rivers, on busy turnpikes, through the mountains and the valleys.  We ate Red Vines, Beef Jerkey, Crackers, Cookies, Red Vines, Dried Fruit, more Red Vines and had a great time!  Not saying I want to do it again anytime soon, but we had fun...and we survived NINE days in the car!

{I'm pretty sure I labeled some of these pics wrong, but you get the idea}