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Tuesday, September 4, 2012

America the Beautiful



America the Beautiful

At the beginning of August, Pat and I set out on a whirlwind cross country trip. His parents have a retirement home in Tucson, AZ, and needed a car brought out for the future. We happily volunteered. It was such a fabulous trip, but I haven't sat down to write about it until now. This immediacy could be spurred on by the fact that I start school tomorrow. Alas, it had to happen sometime. No whining here. 


Anyhow, here was our route: Boston to Niagara Falls to Cleveland to Chicago to St. Louis to OKC to Amarillo to Santa Fe/Albuquerque to Tucson. Just under 3500 miles!

We loved seeing the USA from the car! Each morning we would set out for our next destination and read up in the car about what to do there. We stayed with friends some places, like Chicago, St. Louis, Boston, Albuquerque, and of course Amarillo with my family. Other places, we would just drive and find a hotel. Some of our sightseeing highlights included: Niagara Falls (STUNNING), the Sears Tower, the St. Louis Arch, Lincoln's Tomb, the Mississippi River, the play "Texas" in Palo Duro Canyon, and the Miraculous Staircase. In addition to the sights was the food. Our journey began at a delicious BBQ with Pat's friends from college. Then we ate at Wegmans, a Chicago dog at the Sox Game, BBQ at Piggy Pats, custard in St. Louis, Lola in Cleveland, Mama Thamer's cooking, lunch at the Shed in Santa Fe, Mrs. Pierce's brownies, and lots of Mexican food in Arizona. Such great eating adventures! We also got to stop and buy green chiles in Hatch, New Mexico which I have always wanted to do. They are sitting in my freezer as we speak.

The trip was great for Pat and I too. We didn't have any, "Am I going to have to pull this car over?" moments. Pat killed a giant grasshopper that jumped onto my leg while I was driving. Heroic in my book! We listened to books, music, radio, bad radio, and the wind in our hair from the Jeep. We thanked God for our GPS and iPhones that helped us immensely. Those may be the two things that kept our trip so smooth. All in all, a fabulous experience. If you have the chance to drive cross country, do it! It makes you appreciate the open road, the diversity of our country, and the people on the journey with you.











2 comments:

  1. Thats awesome Katie! Looks like you had a great time and hit up a lot of great cities. I also think road tripping does wonders for a relationship. It not only teaches you how you each travel but when you are stuck in a car together for hours on end with no escape it makes you talk about the nitty gritty with each other and really learn about one another!

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  2. Looks and sounds like an awesome trip!

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