Home, sweet home.

Chronicle of a Cross-Country Road Trip

Sunday, September 05, 2004

11,094 miles on odometer

Left Mystic at 10 a.m. after a big breakfast at Gramma’s. Last night Daddy met us in Mystic to get the cat, and came along with us out to Jamm’s for dinner. We were treating Gramma for her 70^th birthday. I had baked stuffed shrimp and by the time I finished one I was full! The steamed fresh vegetables were beautiful. We had a really fun time.

James fell asleep before we got to the end of the street!

Jim just noticed that he forgot his glasses! Fortunately he doesn’t need them that badly to drive—his driver’s license is not restricted.

I’m thrilled that so far everything in the camper is working. Everything is frozen in the freezer. I worry about losing all that meat.

Going to keep track of “idiot tow combinations.” Best one so far was an older Class C E350 motor home towing an older, heavy-looking 20-foot travel trailer.

I still haven’t towed the trailer!

Route: CT Rte. 27 to Rt 184 to Rt 95 in Groton. I-95 S to CT 9 N to 91 S to 691 N to 84 W into New York, then into PA.

Monday, September 06, 2004

11,738 miles on odometer

Yesterday took I-84 to Rt 380 to I-81 to I-80 near Scranton. Enjoyed looking at the Pennsylvania mountains. We stopped for lunch at a rest area. It was quite chilly; I made lunch and we ate in the camper. It was very convenient, with the refrigerator and all. Sure beats assembling sandwiches from a cooler in the back of the van. Afterwards, the kids ran around a little bit and I got to brush my teeth in the bathroom sink!

James was pretty content for the whole ride. Didn’t play any Teletubbies movies for him. Lauren and Charles were a big help keeping him content.

Boys had their first fight—Jack was sitting behind Charles and touching his head, Charles hit his hand away, Jack hit the back of his head, then Charles lunged over his seat to give Jack a belt! Well—Jack had to move to the back and they lost privileges. Their snack coolers contain saltines, water, and carrots today. I told them we’d see how their behavior was for the first four hours before we stopped and if they can keep their act together they’ll get some goodies for the afternoon after lunch.

At 4:30 I called a campground in Woodland, PA and they had a site for us for the night with water and electric. The site was a pull-through. They were pretty close together but there was no one on one side of us, and an empty travel trailer on the other side. We set up, pulled down the awning, got out the turf and RVQ grill. While I was getting some food ready, a man came over and engaged Jim in a conversation about our apparently brand-new camper and van. I took some hamburger patties that I had flash-frozen out, and washed some lettuce and sliced up onion, cucumber, and tomato. The grill worked great and we both think it’s really handy. While we were cooking James sat in his seat attached to the table and had some pretzels and onion dip!

We ate inside, and after dinner Lauren got some of the slice-and-bake chocolate chip cookie dough she had made out of the freezer and baked about a dozen chocolate chip cookies in the oven! That was exciting, having never had an oven while “camping” before other than our Dutch oven that we sometimes baked in over the coals.

Then I gave James a bath in the little tub. I am very glad to have a tub in the camper—not to mention a hot water heater! He was having a ball splashing and wouldn’t get out—but the other kids wanted to wash their feet before bed, so I offered him milk and he got right up. (At home I have to let the water out of the tub before he’ll get out willingly, but in the camper we don’t want to fill up the grey water tank too quickly so I was trying to recycle it.)

At the same time Jim, Jack, Charles and Elise played Headache while Lauren read in her bunk. They sounded like they were having a really good time. Jim won.

As I got James dressed, the kitchen cleaned up and the coffee maker set up, Jim sat outside looking at road maps. I think he’s hoping to find a way to avoid driving through Gary, IN.

We sent Jack, Charles, and Elise to bed while Lauren played solitaire and Jim read the AAA Tour Book for South Dakota. I tried to no avail to get James to sleep. I was so tired. I had wanted to read, but couldn’t. Jim turned on the AC fan to get some cooler air into the camper and then we shut out the lights and we all went to bed and James finally fell asleep.

We set the alarm on the stereo for 6 a.m. but lay in bed for another half an hour. It was chilly. I had gotten up in the middle of the night and turned off the fan. We had mini-bagels with cream cheese and Lauren’s homemade banana bread for breakfast, with orange juice and coffee.

After getting dressed we cleaned up the dishes and washed up while Jim went outside and put the grill away and rolled up the awning. We were on the road by nine, and enjoying going over all these high bridges on I-80 in PA. We saw what we think was a mountain lion cub trying to cross the Interstate. Fortunately, it changed its mind.

We hope to make it to western Indiana before stopping for the night.

Tuesday, September 07, 2004

On Monday we took I-80 through Ohio and Indiana, into Illinois, to I-294 around Chicago to I-290 and back onto I-90 in Schaumburg, IL.

Well, we made it to western Indiana all right—but did not stop there. Know what’s in western Indiana? Gary, Indiana. Having been through there on I-90 we knew we didn’t want to stop anywhere near there and so decided we’d have to keep going, and if we had to sleep at a truck stop, we would.

Not wanting to stop in or near Chicago, either, we opted to drive past Chicago. In Marengo, IL, we got off I-90 and stopped at a TA truck stop. But it was very full, only of trucks, and we didn’t want to take up a space a trucker could use so we decided to go to a nearby campground. We pulled into Lehman’s campground and it was very nice. We had a gravel pull-through site with water and electric. The site was so level that we didn’t have to unhitch. Boy, were we tired.

Earlier in the day we stopped for lunch at an Ohio rest area. It was very RV-friendly; even had a place with hookups. We spread out a blanket and I sprayed around the perimeter with food-safe bug spray. James enjoyed sitting there watching Jim and the children play ball. I made up turkey and ham sandwiches and everyone used the bathroom and then we were on our way.

Wednesday, September 08, 2004

12,440 miles on odometer

Yesterday we took I-90 into Wisconsin. We drove about 150 miles and decided to stop at a state park in Wisconsin called Devil’s Lake. This is a very pretty, well-kept place to camp. Quartzite mountains surround the lake. Where the rock is exposed it looks pink to purple. We hiked part of one trail that was up the side of one mountain to some exposed bluffs. This was very beautiful and very scary! After a lot of climbing, we came to a cave. Then we climbed to where the rest of the trail was about 18” wide on the exposed mountainside. That was enough for us. We turned around and then hiked another trail along the other side of the lake called Tumbled Rocks Trail, which went through piles of purple quartzite rocks that had split off and piled up along the mountainside.

That night we had hot dogs and grilled zucchini and a campfire. We got up at 6 a.m. this morning and weren’t on the road around 8 a.m. thanks to chatty neighbors. We aren’t used to people being so interactive!

Maybe we’ll cross the border into South Dakota today. I-90 all the way today—80 miles to the Minnesota border and then 280 miles across Minnesota to the South Dakota border.

Thursday, September 09, 2004

12,893 miles on odometer

On Wednesday (yesterday) we drove the rest of the way through Wisconsin on I-90, stopping at a cheese factory and buying some goodies. We drove on, crossing the Mississippi River into Minnesota. Instantly the topography changed from flat farmlands to big hills—then they disappeared after a half-hour, for good. Just when we thought we’d seen the flattest land possible, it got even flatter. Across Minnesota we went, watching corn and soybean fields pass us by, endlessly. We saw a few windmills, too.

In late afternoon we took a detour into Iowa. We got gas and drove around for a while, having seen a sign for a historic marker that designated the spot where Minnesota, Iowa, and South Dakota meet. Alas, we never saw another sign and so never found that spot. We entered South Dakota on I-90 and got off after a few miles to set up camp at a Yogi Bear’s Jellystone campground that was right on the highway. It was very clean and child-friendly and our site was a very level pull-through site with full hookups. This is something we wanted because if we camp in Badlands NP tonight we won’t have any hookups; we wanted to make sure we were able to drain our waste tanks.

After setting up camp, the children went swimming in the heated pool and Lauren enjoyed the hot tub. I left the pool to get dinner ready. I defrosted some pre-cooked ground beef/onion/celery/green pepper mixture, made some egg noodles, and we had a “real” homemade meal at the picnic table: ground beef stroganoff with mixed vegetables. After dinner the children begged to climb up the big bare hill at the back of the campground. They did, and Lauren took her camera and ran through the tall grass to get a feel for what it must have been like for Laura Ingalls.

After dinner I set up the computer so the kids could watch Lassie. I did dishes and we all went to bed.

The next day we emptied the tanks and while backflushing the black water tank one of the straps supporting the tank tore off. (We realize now it needs venting during backflushing.) Jim was able to repair that and the resultant loosened bracket, but we lost time.

We decided to take a detour to De Smet, SD to visit the home of the Ingalls of Little House on the Prairie. We are on our way there now.

Wednesday, September 15, 2004

Miles on odometer: 14, 399

“Nothing is better than this!” exclaimed Elise, age six, in response to my question this morning: “So, kids, are you enjoying our vacation or do you wish you were home now?”

It’s been busy. There is so much to look at while riding that I don’t want to pull out the computer. The combination of activity while sightseeing and the lack of stamina from high altitude have made me too lazy to sit and type.

So, we did ride up to De Smet, SD and visited the Ingalls homestead.

You have to admire the perseverance of Charles Ingalls to arrive in what appeared to be the middle of nowhere and carve out a homestead and a livelihood. We stayed for two hours and continued on long, straight US 14 into Pierre, the capital of SD, where we decided to stay for the night. After viewing the Oahe Dam just northwest of Pierre and a bit of driving around Pierre to avoid a low railroad bridge (the camper will make it under, but will the air conditioner get sheared off the roof?) we found a campground on the Missouri River called Farm Island Recreation Area on SD Rt 34. It didn’t look like much at first but then we found all the sites right along the sandy riverbank.

It was in the 80s the three days we were in SD. We set up the camper and turned on the air conditioning and went in the river, even James, who at first was content to stand in three inches of water along the edge while I held his hands, but then plopped himself down to sit in the water and splash, splash, splash. The outside shower came in handy here after we walked across the sand back to our site. We had hamburgers for dinner and went to bed.

In the morning we began our trip to the western half of the state and Badlands National Park, hoping to make it to Mount Rushmore that night.

Again the roads were interminably long with nothing but fields and fields of corn, sunflowers, and soy. You could see for miles, and there was a good 30 miles in between towns. We knew we were coming into a town when we’d see some trees up ahead. There would be a sign with the town’s name and population, usually around 200 or so. The towns here along Route 14 consisted of a small church, run-down looking shops and homes, and always, a lot of abandoned cars and parts thereof. As we drove through the next stretch of fields I realized that for all these thousands of acres of farmland we’ve passed over the last couple of days, it was odd that I’d only seen the land being worked once. I also wondered who owned this land—the people farming it, or General Foods, Kraft, or Archer Daniels Midland? I wondered if it was “real” or genetically modified? Some of the crops were marked as experimental. At this point I called my Dad and had enough reception (albeit only briefly) to let him know that we now know where the Middle of Nowhere is.

Finally we hit Interstate 90 again and after another hour or so we arrived at Badlands National Park. So far this trip, this has been the most striking memory for me. It was just so unusual and otherworldly. We rode the loop road towing the camper and took a lot of pictures. Imagine what it was like for these pioneers crossing the continent via wagon 150 years ago to come across such unusual and nearly impassable rock formations.

As we left the Badlands we entered the town of Wall, SD—Home of Wall Drug! Now, I had already heard of this place thanks to a show on the Travel Channel, I think. The story is that the couple that owned this tiny shop in this tiny town 50 years ago started putting up billboards on the highways in SD advertising Wall Drug and their offer of free ice water to travelers. They had such success with the billboards that they began to expand the area in which they advertised, eventually putting up billboards even overseas. Their business boomed despite the Highway Beautification Act of 1969 that forced them to remove many of their billboards in the country. They still offer the free ice water in their huge store, along with five-cent cups of coffee. Anyway, Jack bought a newspaper, the kids bought some post cards, and I bought a fly swatter and a Wall Drug yardstick to take home. They also gave us a bumper sticker that says, “Where the Heck is Wall Drug?”

Our next leg of the trip was through Rapid City, SD to Custer, SD, where we stayed at Big Pine campground on Route 16. We had a site next to some playground equipment and backed up to the National Forest. I was thrilled to see deer grazing right behind our camper—until I discovered the reason. A woman camping in a fifth wheel a few sites down from ours was feeding them dried corn every day. Ignorance is bliss, I guess. She obviously didn’t realize the harm she was doing.

The campground was well-kept and we were able to get some laundry done and relax a bit because we were staying for two nights. The weather was nice and warm and we had a nice dinner outside under the pine trees. Then it rained so we put the picnic table under the awning, and left to see Mount Rushmore lit up at night.

Mount Rushmore was an awesome sight.

Lit up by mega-powered spotlights, it looked a little more rough than I had seen in photos, but it was a marvel nonetheless. One of the most amazing things I learned about the construction of Mount Rushmore was that no one died during its sculpting—and over 400 people worked on the sculpture, hanging from bosun’s chairs after climbing 700 steps with their tools, or, in later years, riding the tramway to the top. It took fourteen years (1927-1941) to complete the project as it is today, though the sculptor, Gutzon Borglum had designed it a little differently (to include three Presidents, Washington, Jefferson, and Lincoln, from the waist up). Gutzon Borglum was an already-famous sculptor and statesman when he was asked to design this memorial. He made 1/12 scale sculptures in a studio on-site and those dimensions were used when transferring the image to the mountain. Unfortunately, poor Gutzon died about a year before the completion but his son, Lincoln Borglum carried on his work, adding finishing touches.

The name Rushmore belonged to a New York attorney who was visiting the area years before the sculpture’s existence and asked his local guide, “What’s the name of that peak?” and the guide replied, “Well it doesn’t have a name, but from now on we’ll call it Rushmore!” Little did he know that this obscure mountainside would become a famous landmark.

The next morning we toured some of the scenic roads in the area including Custer State Park & the Black Hills. One of them was the Needles Highway where we drove among tall spires of stone rising into the air, and at one point drove through an eight-foot, seven-inch wide tunnel between them! Custer State Park was loaded with bison.

Traffic was often stopped for bison in the road. We also saw prairie dogs and pronghorn antelope.

Along the way we decided to catch the view from the top of 6,000-foot plus Mount Coolidge. As we wound our way up a gravel road perched on the edge of the steeply-rising and guardrail-less mountainside, I lost my cool, being mere inches from disaster in our huge van. By the time we got to the top I was in tears! Jim took Lauren, Jack, Charles, and Elise to explore the mountain top buildings that were built by the Civilian Conservation Corps (as was the road up the mountain) during the Great Depression. From their viewpoint they could see the Badlands and Mount Rushmore. I stayed in the car with the baby and read the AAA guide describing the road and warning that RVs and large vehicles should avoid it. I showed it to Jim who assured me that our 15-passenger, 21-foot van was not what they meant by large vehicles. On the way down closed my eyes and talked to the kids. It was only a mile down to the road, after all.

The rest of the park had beautiful views of grassy meadows, rolling grassy hills with occasional patches of lodgepole pine trees. We stopped frequently to view wildlife.

Later, we arrived at Mount Rushmore after approaching the memorial along a winding road with “pigtail” bridges and three tunnels each positioned so that you are met with a marvelous view of the monument as you emerge.

We stopped first at the welcome center and (finally) purchased a National Parks “passport” for each of the children. Why didn’t we do this years ago? They’ve already been to several National Parks. Better late than never, I guess. These passports give visitors a place to record their visits with a stamp or two unique to each site they visit in the National Parks system. Lauren, Jack, Charles, and Elise also began their work here to earn their first patches. We all learned a lot in the process, and in the end, Charles and Elise did earn Junior Ranger patches, and Lauren and Jack earned Rushmore Ranger patches. All four were given certificates of completion, too. They were proud of their accomplishment.

In the morning, Sunday, September 12, we began our ride into and across Wyoming to Yellowstone National Park. As far as scenery goes, this was the low point for me, so far. I don’t know which was uglier, the huge hills of bare dirt and rocks, or the occasional depressed towns that appeared to have large proportions of abandoned vehicles and junkyards. It’s as though no one ever trades in an old vehicle—they just park it in the yard and watch it rust to a slow death. The landscape was such a stark contrast to the northeast that I couldn’t help but think it’s no wonder people can have such different perspectives, having grown up in such vastly different environs. There were occasional horse pastures and many oil wells pumping along the way. One highlight was a 126-car train that we passed. Jim beeped his horn and the engineer blew the train’s whistle, giving the kids a thrill. Another was, in the distance, Devil’s monument, about 30 or 40 miles away. But we had a full day’s drive ahead of us and already wouldn’t be arriving in Yellowstone until after dinnertime because the east entrance was closed to traffic until six p.m. due to construction, so we didn’t veer off our route to go see it.

As we got further west in Wyoming we were treated to some impressive mountains—the Buckhorn range and then the Rockies! At one point, we were at 9,666 feet. Many of the climbs were 6% grades, sometimes more. We were glad we upgraded to the bigger van. It took a long time to get through these ranges along these winding, steep roads. We drove through canyons with huge straight walls of red rock. There were some very memorable views and I took lots of pictures. We finally got to Cody, Wyoming, apparent home to Buffalo Bill Cody—there is a big museum devoted to him. Knowing the east entrance wouldn’t be open for another hour or so, we took the time to fill the gas tank, get some cash, and drive in circles looking for a place to fill our one empty propane tank—a place that was open on a Sunday, that is. When we did finally find a place that would fill (not just trade in) our tank, the lug nut that held ours on would not budge—and Jim has incredible upper body strength. The man finally offered to just fill the tank right there on the rack. We didn’t think we had any other choice, with so many stores closed on a Sunday and being en route to an area where the nighttime temperatures were in the mid-20s. Phew. At least we had propane, but Jim will deal with that problem later.

We stopped in Buckhorn, WY for gas, and parked in an empty parking lot and made lunch. I turned on the oven and reheated the pizza we had the night before, and that really hit the spot.

So on we drove, fifty mountainous miles or so to the East entrance. The ranger at the gate, a young man, complimented us on our bumper plate that says, “Affordable Healthcare Begins with Breastfeeding.” We proceeded down the narrow, bumpy, under-reconstruction roads into an area of Yellowstone NP called Fishing Bridge. It was a little frightening to be towing the trailer so close to the edge of a dirt road—for me it was, anyway. I was so relieved by the time we arrived at Fishing Bridge RV Park(ing lot) that I didn’t mind paying $70 to spend two nights in a parking lot so packed that we couldn’t open our awning all the way. It gets expensive at some of these campgrounds that charge four or five dollars extra per child. We set up just as it began to rain, went inside, ate dinner, and fell asleep quickly.

The next day we spent driving all over Yellowstone, visiting geysers, walking around Old Faithful, attending a ranger program, and viewing hot springs, waterfalls, and mudpots.

Along the way, Lauren, Jack, Charles, and Elise worked on their Junior Ranger pages. We couldn’t view every feature in the Park—it’s the size of CT and MA combined—but we did get a taste of everything. We ended our day in Canyon Village at the Lodge restaurant. I was prepared for mediocre food and service, at best, but the food was quite good. Jim had a steak that he said was “like butter” and I had a free-range cattle burger made with no antibiotics. Jack and Charles got chicken fried steak for the first time, Lauren got fish and chips, Elise got chicken fingers, and James had a little bit of everything. The Yellowstone Ale was particularly good.

We drove south to Fishing Bridge, completing our loop.

The next morning we left Fishing Bridge, stopping on our way at the Ranger station to turn in the Junior Ranger papers the children had completed. The Ranger went through each child’s papers carefully, making conversation and sharing information. He signed their certificates, gave them their patches, and we left for Grand Teton NP, south of Yellowstone.

It snowed most of the way down to Grand Teton. At one point, the John D. Rockefeller, Jr. Highway was under construction—which in this case, meant the road was dirt—clay actually—for miles. Despite Jim’s efforts today to rinse off the dirt, we are still sporting a good coat of dirt on our camper and van.

The sun shone just as we got near the Grand Tetons, but clouds hung low so that we couldn’t see the highest peaks. We drove to the south end of the park and got a spot at Sagebrush Acres (a.k.a. Gros Ventre) Campground. The landscape there wasn’t very pleasant—just lots and lots of sagebrush and cottonwood trees. It was still very cold out, too. During lunch Charles discovered a puddle of water at his feet—there was a water leak somewhere near the hot water heater under the dinette bench he was on. Jim took a look, found the leak, and tightened it, and that was that. We breathed another sigh of relief.

After having lunch, we set out to view the mountain loop road. The Grand Teton’s peak is almost 14,000 feet above sea level—certainly not the tallest mountains in the West but what makes this range look so impressive is that they rise out of flat prairie with no foothills to hide their height. We were already at about 7,000 feet above sea level so those peaks were over a mile over our heads (we did, at one point, catch a glimpse of the highest peak through the clouds). Sun shone for a few hours though the clouds were low, but halfway through our ride, it got very cloudy and began to snow again, so our views of the lakes and mountains were pretty foggy. We stopped in at Sacred Heart chapel along the way, a pleasant little log building with a rose window overlooking one of the lakes.

We stopped for some groceries on the way back. When we got to our campsite, our LP alarm was going off saying we had a fault. Turns out that our battery got down to 1/3 power. We think that while we were at Yellowstone the night before, we either weren’t getting full power or we lost power because when we got up the microwave clock was re-set. Our short ride from Yellowstone to this campground hadn’t been long enough to trickle-charge the camper’s battery. It was about 7 pm and Jackson, WY was only about ten miles south, so we left Gros Ventre and drove to a KOA campground south of Jackson so that we would have an electrical hookup—it was to be in the mid-20s during the night, so having the electricity to power the furnace was imperative. We paid the most we’ve ever paid for a campsite ($45) that was like a parking lot with strips of grass in between, and a postage stamp-sized playground. There weren’t any cheaper options in the area; Jackson seems to be a popular tourism destination even when it’s not ski season. But Jim did get a golf-cart escort and direction backing into our site from an employee. I was glad to not have to get out in the rain and direct him! Knowing we had to leave early today, we didn’t unhitch or even lower the stabilizers. I heated up frozen pizzas in the oven, I set the alarm for 5:15 (yeah, right) and went to bed.

We did get on the road at 7:30, which is a record so far, I think. Driving south on Rt 89, we again encountered road construction (but we were lucky, the road was open at this hour—they close it at night). We sat for about 20 minutes next to a road sign that said “Caution: Falling Rock. Do not stop or park.” (Get it?) Once traffic started up again, we were again treated to miles of riding on gooey dirt roads. The Snake River Valley was pretty this morning with occasional low-lying clouds hovering in front of the hills.

On our way out of Wyoming we went through Afton, WY, the hometown of Rulon Gardner, the Olympic wrestling medallist I had watched on television a few days before we left home. His house was also right on Route 89. We passed into Idaho for about an hour. We went through Montpelier, ID, a town through which the Oregon Trail passes. Then we drove along Bear Lake, which was a beautiful turquoise color. We are now entering the Cache National Forest, having entered into Utah a few minutes ago and climbed our winding way up, up and up Beaver mountain with incredible views of the cerulean lake. The color is so beautiful it looks like it can’t be real.

I do get nervous riding perched on the edge of these treeless mountains traveling on shoulderless roads with no guardrail. I think I can, I think I can . . . we just passed a Class A (i.e., bus-type unibody) RV pulled to the side of the road—didn’t make it up this long and winding hill. Salt Lake City, here we come—if only for a drive-through. We are hoping to make it to Elko, NV tonight so as to only have one more day’s drive to San Francisco tomorrow.

Thursday, September 16, 2004

14, 897 miles on odometer

Or maybe we won’t quite make it to San Francisco. We were about to leave Valley View RV Park(ing Lot—is that what “RV Park” means—a parking lot?) when I discovered our water pump wasn’t pumping water. I unscrewed the cover to the compartment and everything looked as though it was connected properly and there were no leaks. After another half hour or so, Jim fixed it by blowing water into it. Apparently when we ran our fresh tank dry on the way to Elko it collected a lot of water that prevented it from priming.

It’s about 70° in the daytime and was in the high 40s last night. We opened up the bunk end for the first time since we got to Yellowstone, and we didn’t have to unhitch last night, saving us time in the morning.

I find this portion of Nevada along I-80 to be very unappealing. I’d describe this trip out west as long stretches of barrenness punctuated by occasional breathtaking scenes. We drove past Great Salt Lake, which didn’t look anything like I’d imagined from my less-than-ideal I-80 vantage point. The color of it was beautiful but the area still looked barren and desert-like, which it was. We stopped along the way and went through a truck wash, then drove through the salt flats for hundreds of miles, from one ridge of mountains to another. At one point we went straight along level salt flats and sand for 38 miles, no turns, no hills, before reaching West Wendover, UT, just before the UT/NV state line. I prefer the desolate-looking high desert in NV here to those salt flats.

While in Elko, (which, by the way, is along the Donner trail) I pondered why anyone would chose to live out here. I suppose to someone, perhaps this desert with its endless sagebrush and lonely brown mountains is attractive. I’ve heard of people who feel a sense of being claustrophobic unless they are in the wide open like this. Still, from my perspective, this area has absolutely no redeeming qualities. If I had to live here I’d make the most of it but I’d certainly have a period of mourning!

I’m going to check my various sources and look for a campground to stay at in the San Francisco vicinity. If we get there today, it won’t be until after dinner time. We might choose to stay one night somewhere along the way rather than arrive in the dark. We’ll spend several nights in the area.

Thursday, September 23, 2004

16,481 miles on odometer

We are 39 miles east of Barstow, CA, in the Mojave Desert and on our way to Lake Mead National Recreation Area and Hoover Dam. We spent the last two nights in the San Joaquin Valley visiting Kings Canyon and Sequoia National Parks.

We arrived at the Petaluma, CA KOA around 9 pm Thursday night and paid through the nose for the campsite--$58. They charge $4 extra for each of the four older children. It was the smelliest environment in which I’ve ever camped—they had a farm and petting zoo. Yippee. Not the normal cow or horse manure smells, but much worse. Pigs? Peacocks? Donkeys? Whatever, it took some getting used to. And, since my only other choices were, as far as I know, fifty-dollars-a-night RV parking lots with sites twelve or 15 feet wide, I decided to just let it go and stop thinking about how annoying it was.

San Francisco was a big hit! The next morning we drove down US 101 through Sonoma and Marin counties and onto the Golden Gate Bridge. We had a great time just driving around the city, going up to Telegraph Hill and Coit Tower, and driving down Lombard Street, the “Crookedest Street in the World” with eight hairpin turns in one block. We couldn’t believe the steep grades on Jones Street, where cars parked head-in at 90-degree angles rather than parallel parking. It looked like you could reach under one of them and start a domino effect by toppling the first car over. We went to Fisherman’s Wharf and had a really nice, long, relaxing late lunch at Alioto’s, where my parents ate once and where the kids were fussed over and we were given our own dining room overlooking the marina.

Speaking of the marina, I saw some of the most beautiful homes in the Marina district. There was such exterior detail to these homes, with beautiful plate glass windows overlooking the Pacific.

Jim also drove the kids around to the ballparks. We decided to try to see a Giants game that weekend if possible.

Our second day in San Francisco was a Saturday and the Embarcadero was mobbed. But we rode the trolley up and down California Street, then went back to Fisherman’s Wharf for lunch and some shopping. We did a little more driving around, taking pictures and enjoying the views, and went back to the campground in time to cook dinner there.

The next day we went to a beautiful church in Petaluma for Mass. It had three four rose windows and lots of marble. One notable difference was that people were late—some quite late—and it seemed like for the first half of the Mass people were straggling in. I guess it’s not a big deal to be late here—like it would be in New England.

After Mass (we bypassed the coffee, OJ, and donuts they had at the plaza outside the church), we headed for San Francisco to watch the Giants play the Padres. It was a pretty good game. This was two days after Barry Bonds hit his 700^th home run, and it was exciting when he finally came up to bat in the eighth inning—but they walked him! That was disappointing (we were sitting in the left-field bleachers for a reason, you know!). But the game itself was close and we enjoyed it as we kept an eye on the score for the Yankees game. They had a lot of good food available at the stadium but we just had some good hot dogs and lemonade. After the game all the children were invited onto the SBC Park field to run the bases!

That night we did a bunch of laundry at the campground—six loads at once, wish I could do that at home--and got ready to leave the next morning for Yosemite National Park.

We left later in the morning on Monday than usual and the ride was a pretty long one. We saw El Capitan and Half Dome and the huge trees were so beautiful. To my chagrin, after driving all the way into Yosemite Valley, all of the campgrounds there were full. We had to drive 18 miles—45 minutes—back out to Crane Flat campground, where the rangers had said there were still sites available. I guess I was thinking that the Valley campgrounds wouldn’t fill up because it was midweek during the school year. I wasn’t thinking of the close proximity of Yosemite to a population of millions of Californians! At any rate, by the time we drove back out to Crane Flat, it was dark and quite cold, and we hadn’t eaten dinner, or even a decent lunch, I’ll admit—though we did snack quite a bit. The poster on the window of the campground office listed sites by tent/RV/vehicle length. Our camper is 26’ including the tongue. There was one site left that was for up to 30’ RVs. We drove to it, and it was taken already by a large Class A motorhome. So, our next choice was to check out the sites for up to 24-foot RVs. We eventually found one of those and Jim maneuvered the camper into place. I couldn’t wait to get inside, crank up the furnace, tuck the baby in, and heat up some food for dinner. Jim put all the food in the van into the bear box at the site, got the kids in, came back out to help shivering me out with the bundled baby, and told me that the battery was at 2/3 charge and when he turned the furnace on, it went down to 1/3 charge! It was so cold out—could this night get any worse?

Well, there were tent-campers all around. We knew the forecast was for a low of 26° that night, but it was too late to move—and where would we go? None of the campgrounds in Yosemite have electrical or water hookups, and it was a long way out of the park. The other concern was that when the battery got low, the propane detector would go off—it’s a shrill beep and a rude awakening while sleeping. Jim cut a piece of duct tape to muffle the sound in case it went off, and planned to go outside and unplug the battery from the trailer if it did. He also backed the car up to the trailer in case it got very cold so he could start the engine to power the trailer if need be.

I also decided not to attract bears by heating up dinner in the oven (I later found out from a Ranger that this was unnecessary), so we had turkey sandwiches. We were unclear as to whether we had to empty the food out of the camper into the bear box. The literature we had on the park only said to make sure all food and trash was removed from cars. But we had far too much food in the camper to consider removing it all. (The next day I asked a park ranger and she told us that no, the bears have only figured out how to bend down the upper frame of car doors to get into cars.)

It wasn’t too cold at night. Baby James slept with me on the fold-out couch (we, of course, did not consider opening the bunk-end) in a wool sweater with a hood, under a comforter, down comforter, and sleeping bag. It was cozy, and he stayed nice and tucked in. Sure enough, at 2 a.m. the LP detector went off. Jim covered it with the duct tape, got his shirt and shoes on and went outside to unplug the battery, and the alarm faded. Since we had no detector, he also shut off the propane, so the fridge just had to sit. We were all glad when 7 a.m. arrived, and Jim started the car and turned on the heat. Ahhhhh. We ate breakfast and got out quickly.

Back in Yosemite Valley, we parked the van and trailer in the RV parking lot, loaded up our backpacks (one with the baby, one with food and drinks) and walked about the valley enjoying the scenery. We visited the Visitor’s center and decided we wouldn’t have enough time that day for the Junior Ranger program, but at one shop we bought the kids Yosemite patches since they wouldn’t be able to earn Junior Ranger patches. They had displays in the Visitor Center on the different kinds of rock that make up some of the features at Yosemite such as Half Dome

and el Capitan and on how glaciers contributed to the formation of domes and Half-Dome. We had a nice day of walking around the Valley and then headed for Kings Canyon and Sequoia National Parks.

Kings Canyon and Sequoia National Parks were two parks with two administrations until the war years when the administration was combined to save money. They are now operated as one National Park.

We have been sitting for the last hour on CA State Route 58 west of Boron—in the Mohave Desert—unmoving, in a huge backup from Boron to Bakersfield, supposedly because of a shooting. Apparently a police officer was engaged in pursuit and ultimately shot the alleged criminal. We’re in the Wild West. Unfortunately for us we are sitting in the heat in some proximity to a cattle truck. Peeeeuuuw. Well, at least we sort of know what’s going on, (or so we thought) thanks to the CB and the truckers.]

Due to the uncertainty of our battery’s usefulness and availability of sites, we got a campsite with full hookups on Rt. 180, 16 miles east of Fresno on the road to Kings Canyon NP. The campground was home to a lot of migrant workers—we were in the middle of the nation’s “breadbasket”—and we had a nice grassy site with rose bushes. It was only about 4 p.m. so the kids went out to play ball and I made hamburgers, beans and carrots and cucumbers with dip for dinner. I now know where all our domestic produce comes from, by the way! The San Joaquin Valley grows what seems to be endless supplies of citrus, peaches, tomatoes, cotton—on, and on, as far as the eye can see.

The next day we drove to Kings Canyon. Our plan was to see the biggest living things in the world—the largest, and third-largest giant sequoia trees. The General Grant grove is in Kings Canyon National Park, and the largest tree, General Sherman, is in Sequoia National Park.

Lauren, Jack, Charles, and Elise each began their Junior Ranger program at the Visitor Center near Grant Grove. We walked the General Grant Tree Trail together. We walked through a downed sequoia called the Fallen Monarch. The tree fell centuries ago and has been used as a cabin, hotel, and stable for the US Cavalry. It is believed the tree fell because it was hollowed by fire and didn’t shatter on impact with the ground as sequoias usually do probably because it landed on a cushion of deep snow.

The General Grant tree is the world’s third-largest living thing and has the largest base diameter at 40.3 feet. It is 270 feet high and if the wood of the Sequoia were strong enough, it could supply enough lumber to build more than 40 five-room houses. It is about 2000 years old and so is large for its age.

Then we had lunch in a picnic grove, and headed to Sequoia National Park. Just driving through the parks is worth the trip. We were at an altitude of 7600 feet at one point, and the views were astounding. Some of the curves were scary, though, with no guard rail and a straight drop down with no trees to catch you if you drive off the road! We drove down to Moro Rock, a dome with 400+ stairs to climb the quarter-mile to the top. Jim went up with the kids and I gladly stayed with the baby—whether that was because of the height or because of the climb at high altitude, I don’t know—either one would be enough to deter me in my fifth month of pregnancy (which, I found out when I got home, was twins!). They could see the whole western side of the Sierra Nevada range, including Mount Whitney, the tallest peak in the contiguous 48 states at 14,000+ feet.

Then we went to the Lodgepole Visitor Center and met the nicest park ranger ever, Paul. He went through the kids’ work on in their Junior Ranger books (this has been the best Junior Ranger program yet because they have a wide age-range, including 13 and up.) and shared more information on the trees and wildlife in the parks. He swore in Lauren, Jack, Charles, and Elise as Junior Rangers, and awarded them each the specific patches they had earned for their appropriate age group. Then we did a little shopping at the store and went to see the Giant Forest, including General Sherman, the tree.

What a grand site that was! I could have sat and looked at it all day long. When I would look up at the height of the tree, it was dizzying! The tree was so huge that I felt as though there was something wrong with my eyes, looking at it. What’s neat about the sequoias is that the trunks are SO FAT even way up high. It reminded me of the kind of trees little kids draw, with a big, fat cylindrical trunk all the way up.

[It’s been a couple of hours and I’m still sitting on Rt. 58 in the desert, barely moving! We are probably not going to make it to our destination today. Get to spend a night in Barstow, perhaps—yuck! I’m tempted to go back into the camper and heat up a pizza. Backup is 58 miles now.]

Friday, October 01, 2004

17,677 miles on odometer

We just drove through Sedona, Arizona.

As I had told the kids, we wouldn’t know if the story we’d been hearing on the CB is true or not until we read it in the paper the next day. We had been routed on a 70-mile detour and having lost all that time, decided to spend a night at a KOA in Victorville, CA. We got there around 4 pm and used the pool and had a relaxing evening. All the paper said was that there was a stolen limousine, a pursuit, and a shot fired. Seems a big deal was made out of that—maybe the paper didn’t have all the information. Apparently a huge traffic back up is not newsworthy and forcing people onto a 70-mile detour is not either!

I’ve been disappointed twice in the AAA route: once they routed us out of Sequoia Nat’l Park on a route not recommended for RVs, and for the same reason on the route from the South Rim of the Grand Canyon to Prescott, Arizona. I had stressed that we’d be towing a 26’ travel trailer and carrying propane when I requested the AAA TripTiks. We found other routes using my maps and Rand McNally Trip Maker Deluxe here on my laptop.

While we were in Victorville, California, Jim saw a brochure for a KOA campground right on the strip in Las Vegas at Circus Circus, which has an indoor amusement park. We decided to camp there in the parking lot-style RV park (there were people camping in tents there despite the heat) to be close to the action. When we got there we went for a swim, walked around the casino and checked out the “Adventure-dome”. The kids were really excited to be going on the rides the next day.

We went and had a long leisurely meal at the buffet in the casino, then walked around the midway until about 10 pm. Jack won a bear for Elise. Then we got into the car to drive up and down the strip, looking at all the lights and amazing casinos. Among other things, we saw a replica of the Eiffel Tower, the Statue of Liberty, and the Brooklyn Bridge.

In the morning we went to Lake Mead and browsed the visitor center, and then went to Hoover Dam. That was impressive. It was in the upper 90s though and hot, and I walked a couple of miles like that, often carrying James.

By the time we were done there I was really wiped out, being 23 weeks pregnant and all!. (Didn’t know then it was twins!) I enjoyed learning how the dam was constructed in early 1930s. The dam supplies most of its water to southern California. Las Vegas was such a tiny town at the time that they only contracted for four percent of the water, a contract that doesn’t expire until later this century. It is also the dam that has made Las Vegas what it is today. Because the dam workers (24 hours a day in three shifts, 363 days a year they worked building the dam!) were government employees who were all living in Boulder City, a government settlement at the time, they had rules they had to follow, like no drinking, no gambling, no prostitution—and Las Vegas, having nothing else going for it, decided to capitalize on that by allowing all of those things.

The one place to which I care never to return again is to Nevada. When we drove across I-80, it was so awfully ugly and depressing, I felt that surely the southern part of the state must have some redeeming qualities. I spent most of the time driving across Nevada trying to imagine scenarios in which one would want to live there—such as really loving being surrounded by nothing but brown! Driving through the southern part of Nevada didn’t change my impression either but I do realize I haven’t seen all of the state. Perhaps its midsection is gorgeous. Who knows?

After visiting the dam we went back to Circus Circus and then on to the amusement park. Around 9 pm we had dinner in a nice Italian restaurant in the Casino. I took Elise back to the Adventuredome for two more rides, and then Jim walked us back to the camper. Elise and James and I went to bed and Jim took Lauren, Jack, and Charles back to ride some more of the big rides. Jim also did the sledgehammer contest and won a nice big red bear for Lauren. I’ve never seen Jim do the sledgehammer thing and not hit the bell—it’s a sure win for him. I always win the weight-guessing challenge, but I didn’t bother with it this time!

February 18, 2005

Guess I got a little tired of writing—and just plain eager to get home. Following our stay in Las Vegas, we drove through southern Utah and Zion National Park, with its fascinating rock formations, on our way to visit the North Rim of the Grand Canyon. After our Yosemite disaster, I resolved to make reservations for the rest of the trip. Our reservations were at Kaibab Camper Village, in Jacob Lake in the Kaibab National Forest in northern Arizona. Just beautiful. I would be glad to stay there again if we return some day. We visited the North Rim of the Grand Canyon the next day, and the children earned Junior Ranger patches. The North Rim was very lush and beautiful, with a lot of trees.

We stopped for lunch in a picnic area, and the children took part in a class and a hike about the geology of the area while I sat with James in the beautiful lodge.

The ride from the North Rim to the South Rim of the Grand Canyon took five hours though the two are just ten miles apart as the crow flies. Log ride—but we are fortunate to be able to visit both. At the South Rim we were unable to get a site in the park, and camped at the worst campground ever, the Bedrock City campground a half hour south. Yuck. Parked on gravel, mostly permanent residents, and totally seedy. It was more like parking in a shopping center parking lot right near the road. They had a “theme park” there and when I asked for a AAA discount the owner gave me a “free ticket” to the Flintstones “theme park” hidden away behind the buildings. It was so pathetic I can’t write about it.

But the Grand Canyon was great! We took the propane busses along the rim stopping at each stop. It was threatening to rain and there was lightning so we didn’t do any hiking, but we were at the door of the Arizona Room when it opened for dinner, and had a lovely meal there, then walked around the village. Earlier in the day we had also attended an interpretive Ranger-led program at the Visitor Center about how the Grand Canyon was formed. The Colorado River didn’t cut into the rock, creating the Canyon. The earth rose up around the river to create it.

Our next stop was Prescott, Arizona, to visit my aunt and cousins. We stayed two nights in a very pretty secluded campground called Point of Rocks.

I’d like to go back there. Prescott was very unique and pretty and it was great to see my aunt who is in her 90s and my cousins who I hadn’t seen in about fifteen years. On our way out, we drove though Sedona, Arizona—home of lots of red rocks and vortices.

We drove through Painted Desert and Petrified Rock National Forest which was amazing—huge logs of petrified rock everywhere.

We spent a night in Gallup, New Mexico, then drove across New Mexico to Amarillo, Texas. By request of my six-year-old daughter, we stopped at Cadillac Ranch,

then stayed at an RV park, where, after a swim, a free limousine complete with horns on the front drove us to the Big Texan Steak House Home of the Free 72 oz Steak. Jim resisted attempting eating a 4 lb + steak dinner in one hour, but the steaks we did have were good.

The limousine drove us home to the RV park and the next day we drove across Oklahoma, then into Arkansas and stayed at a campground run by a homeschooling family.

We drove all the next day to Nashville, and found a very nice campground—Jellystone. They had all sorts of Class A RVs for sale on the empty sites and it was a lot of fun looking at the ones that were open. One had an upstairs! We decided to take a break from driving and stay another night there in Nashville. After a game of mini-golf and playing at the playground we drove into the city and walked around but didn’t see anything that appealed to us, so we opted to go back to the camper for a leisurely dinner and a movie on the laptop.

We were almost home! We drove to a state park in West Virginia, and then into Pennsylvania the next day. We ate in the camper, then got up early for a big breakfast at Cracker Barrell. We drove into CT by mid-afternoon, thinking we had only two more hours to get back to Mystic. But no. Connecticut had the worst traffic and the craziest drivers we’d seen in our 10,000-mile trip! Just horrible.

It was good to be welcomed by Jim’s parents and my father, who was our cat-sitter. We told Jim’s parents we were expecting, and then took everyone out to Jamm’s again to celebrate a safe trip.

The next morning upon returning to Maine, I came home and cried tears of relief, thanksgiving, and exhaustion. I had no desire for several weeks to set foot in the camper again—but I’ve been craving another trip again in the last few weeks. Something about sitting on a couch all day nursing three babies might give one wanderlust though.