So we did get to go on our HUGE road trip. Here's the story:
Hour 1-24 (Salt Lake City, UT-Chicago, IL): We left at 7:30 pm on Friday July 30th on our way to New Jersey. The plan was that we would take turns driving and drive until we couldn't drive anymore. We drove for 24 hours! Longest day of my life! I got the lovely midnight shift in lovely Wyoming. Talk about middle of no-where-ville...or so I thought at the time. I also got the middle of the afternoon shift in...again middle of no-where-ville Iowa. Our very smart GPS lady had no idea what she was talking about I'll tell you what! You do what she tells you to do, which isn't very clear by the way, and then she's recalculating your route because OBVIOUSLY you didn't do what she told you too. We almost ended up in Minneapolis instead of Chicago. My dad decided that we needed to sleep horizontally instead of vertically on about hour 16. Boy were we glad for that! We stopped in Wisconsin before going to Chicago to get new state #1 for me and ShyAnne and #2 for Austynn. (She'd never been to Iowa). Reached our destination!! (#3 for Austynn).
Hour 36-55 (Chicago, IL-Ocean City, NJ): We left bright and early at 7:00 am on Sunday morning headed through Indiana, Michigan, Ohio, Pennsylvania, and New Jersey. #2, 3, and 4 for me and ShyAnne and #4, 5, 6, 7, and 8 for Austynn. Definitely is not an exciting drive until you get to about Cleveland, OH. Its all corn fields and flat lands! Cleveland was really cool! You could see Detroit, MI across Lake Erie! Talk about a huge lake just out of no where. We got lost yet again in Philadelphia, PA while mom was driving...again the fault of the stupid GPS lady not knowing what she's talking about. Its a good thing it was 1:00 am and there was no one around! I'm pretty sure my mom would have had more of a heart attack then she was already having. (She stopped in the middle of the road and said she didn't want to drive anymore! That was pretty funny.) We FINALLY got to Aunt Sharon's house at 2:00 am. Little did we know we wouldn't be getting much sleep once we got there....
Hour 59: Up at the crack of dawn! Are you kidding me!?! I didn't get much sleep having Austy in bed with me anyways, she is a body magnet and sleeps right on your face! My uncle's mother has Alzheimer's and has no concept of time and that others are around TRYING to sleep past 6:00 am. (4:00 am Utah time) I did lay in bed until like nine trying to tune out her desperate cries of "Where are you? Help me! I don't know where you are!" over and over and over again. Didn't work so well. I finally get up and Uncle Richard made breakfast...French Toast! Gag me with a spoon! I choke it down knowing that I probably won't be eating again for a while, and we're going to go be vegetables on the beach. Austynn was so stoked about going to the beach for her first time she could hardly stand it. We finally get to the beach to the "fortress" as my uncle calls it. (He pretty much digs a trench around "his spot" so that the waves don't distroy and take off with our personal belongings.) We went boogie boarding, dad surfed for the first time and stood up!, built a sand castle, buried Austynn and made her a mermaid tail, and got beat up by the waves. All in all it was a good day at the beach (I was fried of course)....until we had to leave. Talk about a melt down on Austynn's part! We went home and showered outside first and then inside, ate dinner, walked on the boardwalk, got ice cream and went home to bed.
Hour 86: We were all surprised when the desperate cries waited to start until 9:00! Still not an ideal time to get up while you're on vacation seeing as it was seven at home. We ate breakfast and were off to Pottstown, PA! We drove 3 hours to get there, take a family picture, eat lunch at Wendy's and drive 3 hours back to Aunt Sharon's house. Once we got back dad and Sharon took Austynn to the beach again until dinner. (She's a fish I tell ya!) She once again did not want to leave the beach!
Hour 107: No sleeping in today! We were awake by six, and headed to NYC by eight. Destination....the Statue of Liberty! #9 for Austynn. We got to the dock about 11:00, bought our tickets for the ferry and were headed to Liberty Island. We didn't get to walk up into the crown, tickets are sold out until October!
We walked around the island and took some family pictures with the NY skyline and Statue of Liberty. We had to drive into NYC so that Austynn could actually get New York as a new state. (There's some debate on whether the Statue is in NY or NJ). My dad did almost have a heart attack driving downtown NYC! They have these awesome signs that say "No honking! $350 fine!" Does anyone listen? Of course not! Its New York. We drove through the Holland Tunnel which is built under the Hudson River. We stopped at a sandwich shop on our way home to get dinner. ShyAnne wanted to get a "real Philly Cheese steak". When we got back we played some games with Madison and Harrison, my cousin Trevor's kids. It was a late night of Monopoly to say the least.
Hour 135: We got to sleep in until 10 today! That was a mind blowing experience. We had some breakfast and were off to the beach! The water was FREEZING! Did that stop us? NO WAY! We stood barely in the water for about 15 minutes waiting for our legs to go numb before getting any further wet. That lasted a whole 30 seconds and then the tide started coming in and ruined the master plan of slowly going numb. Boogie boarding was a lot harder today. Trying to keep Austynn centered on the board while trying to get past the tide, then getting on the board with Austynn once we found the perfect wave...not an easy thing! We didn't stay at the beach as long today. We were all freezing and ready for a hot shower once 3:00 rolled around. We had dinner and got packed up for the long drive back home Friday morning.
Hour 156: We were up at six, SURPRISE!, and leaving for Heath's house in Platte City, MO at 7:00. We drove through Delaware, Maryland, Virginia, West Virginia, Kentucky, Illinois, and Missouri. #5 and 6 for Shy and I, and #10, 11, 12, 13, 14, and 15 for Austynn. So we're stuck in traffic at hour 165, traffic is going from two lanes to one, this random guy in a minivan decides that he is going to be the traffic police and stops in the middle of the lanes and starts waving people behind him! Obviously determined to not let anyone in front of him. Now that's something you don't see everyday! We finally make it to Heath's house at 4:00 am.
