By popular demand: drive across America travel tips **Updated**

Drive across America - Day 9
Can you believe we drove a straight 3500 miles last month? All the way across America. 3500 miles with no incidents other than a dead battery and a defective cargo carrier.
And then in the last week I’ve been in two car accidents!
Well, one car accident and one car incident.
Yes, just this evening while pulling out of a parking spot at Wal-Mart (oh, how I hate that store!) I failed to notice the woman pulling out behind me. And she failed to notice me. We tapped bumpers. (I’m fine.)
Yes, I was driving the rental car given to me while my car is being repaired. So there’s that added layer of embarrassment and paperwork. Ugh.
As a result, I have decided to retreat back into the relative safety of that 3500 miles and post a bit more about it.
Why? Because you, oh surfers of the internet, have asked for it. Read more

April 11, 2008 | Filed Under Smarty Pants, Someplace Else | 2 Comments 

Drive across America – Day 9

Contemplating a long drive? My family and I have driven all the way across America. Twice. For travel tips, click here.



Mileage: 353
Total mileage: 3048
Today’s time in car: 6 hours 40 minutes
Starting from: Salt Lake City, Utah
Ending in: Boise, Idaho
States visited: Utah, Idaho
Today’s boredom buster: room service
Mood: reminiscent

Today we ended our tour of Mormon history with visits to the Museum of Mormon History and Art and Temple Square.
On our walk to the museum we saw people setting up for an Easter egg hunt in front of the Salt Lake Art Museum. I felt a bit sad that we would be traveling on Easter. I had arranged for the Easter Bunny to pay a visit to our house before we moved. And tomorrow we will attend church. We will also spend some time talking about the crucifixion and resurrection of Jesus Christ. Maybe even listen to Handel’s Messiah in the car, but I felt like we would be mostly ignoring the holiday this year.
So I was delighted when a woman with a box full of plastic eggs noticed us and insisted we come join in the hunt. She even went so far as to find a bag for Abby to put her eggs in.
Abby was thrilled.
When we resumed our walk to the Mormon history Museum, Abby was clutching a plastic bag full of Easter cheer.
Thank you, kind lady!
After our brief morning in Salt Lake, we drove north to visit my brother and his family. We enjoyed a couple of hours of good conversation with Bart, his wife Gwen, and their teenage son, Derek who Abby may or may not have developed a crush on.
We left, supplied with Uncrustables, Girl Scout Cookies, Twinkies, Orange soda and plans for a reunion this summer. I’m already looking forward to it.
Before leaving Utah, we stopped by the little house my Grandmother had lived in for all of her adult life (pictured above). I felt as though I could run up to the door and announce “Grandma, we’re here!” like so many times before, but I know the house is empty. Instead I took a few pictures and remembered her.
Then we turned west again and drove on.
Tomorrow: Oregon

March 22, 2008 | Filed Under Someplace Else | 1 Comment 

Drive Across America: Days One and Two

Contemplating a long drive? My family and I have driven all the way across America. Twice. For travel tips, click here.

We are on day two of our 3000 mile trek back to Oregon.
As we do not intend to drive all the way across the US again, ever, we decided to plan many of our stops around places of historic interest, even if they take us a bit out of the way.
The first part of our journey will be focused on early Mormon history.
I’ll post whenever I can get a good connection. Please don’t expect much out of Wyoming.
Read more

March 15, 2008 | Filed Under Someplace Else | 1 Comment 

flat stanley adventure

Minnesota Mom is hosting Flat Stanley Fridays on her blog. Since I love company, I offered to show the little guy some sights around here. The day he arrived in my inbox, Abby and I headed to the library so she could make his acquaintance.
Then on Saturday, the whole family took Stanley out for some fun.



We started our day with a visit to Aji Ichiban in Rockville, Maryland. I had read about it on Candy Blog some time ago and was excited to find one close to me. Although I should have re-read her post before going because for some reason, I was picturing a Japanese candy utopia. What I got was a tiny strip-mall store with a few scant bins of Japanese candy (but no cool, crazy Kit-Kat flavors :( ) and a bunch of bins of food oddities. And it smelled. Really bad. Like old fish.



Here Stanley is posing in front of a bin of “Mini Roasted Crabs”. I chose not to sample them.
I did, however, sample the preserved ginger. I love crystallized ginger. Just not ginger crystallized with salt.
How do you say “gross” in Japanese?
(Cybele from Candy Blog made a similar mistake. Yet another reason I should have re-read that post!)

From there we headed into DC.
Here is Stanley at the National Cathedral… (I have to say, I am quite proud of this photo!)



…and at the White House.



After which we treated him to dinner.

On the walk back to the car, Flat Stanley went crazy and jumped the White House fence.
He was arrested and is even now in detention. We’ll miss him…


As a matter of national security, his photo has been censored by the US Government.

February 11, 2008 | Filed Under Someplace Else | 8 Comments