Cross Country Travels

Whew. This post is coming to you from Seattle, Washington! We have finally reached our final “lower 48” destination and are scheduled to fly to our new home on Thursday! The journey has been amazing! The sights were beautiful and the scenery was beyond words! I know that I’m several days behind on letting you in on the sights and doings of our little trip, but I can’t seem to get caught up. Instead, I’m going to attempt to shorten it into just one post and lots of photos. That okay with you guys?

I left off with our stop in St. Louis and Kansas City, Missouri. We headed into Nebraska. While I admit that I have never really had a desire to go through the state of Nebraska, there was something humbling and surreal about driving through a state that society doesn’t seem to have touched. We came into the state and were surrounded by nothing but fields. For miles and miles and miles there were no gas stations, no Walmart’s, no malls. Just the land. Everything in that area is just as it was years and years ago. The fields, the tiny towns, the trains:

It really made me stop and think about things. I know that may seem crazy and may not even make sense. But in a culture where we don’t survive without our smart phones, our internet, our technology and our shopping centers, it was somewhat of a wakeup to drive past these places where all of that just didn’t seem to matter as much. Slow paced…relaxed…to be quite honest, I envied it a bit. Now, don’t get me wrong. The frigid temperatures and the 45 mile per hour winds that we experienced while in Nebraska don’t suit my fancy, but the peace that would come from some time away from society…seems like a little piece of heaven.

We spent the third night of our trip in North Platte, Nebraska. I had my very first Jimmy John sub sandwich [the club, for those interested] and we all went to sleep early. Day Four was the big day. There were double snow storms heading our direction and we were scheduled to spend the night in Wyoming. Didn’t happen. The weather threatened to trap us for several, several days. So we drove. And drove. And drove. Passing some of the most beautiful scenery I’ve ever seen.  Cheyenne, Wyoming is such a fun little town. The snow covered the city like a blanket and we stopped off to stretch our legs. One of the locals showed us to Walmart so we could buy snow-chains for the car. Then we trekked into the mountains:

We had intentions of stopping once we crossed Wyoming, but that didn’t happen. We drove all the way across the state and into Utah. I thought that the mountains of Wyoming were beautiful, but they were just the beginning. We were able to watch the sunset in Utah. It seemed like God himself was painting a picture for us. The sunset, mixed with the snow, mixed with the mountains…it was unreal.

We thought we were going to be able to stop in Utah…and that didn’t happen. We drove right on through the state of Utah and into Idaho; passing through the potato fields [okay, I really don’t know if we did pass the potato fields, but that’s what they grow in Idaho, right?] and eventually into Boise. It was late and we passed out soon after arriving to Boise, but we were able to slow down the next day [which was Monday] and slow up our path. The mountains in Idaho were just as beautiful as the ones in Utah, but the best was yet to come. Driving through the Blues Mountains in Oregon was an experience beyond words. It started snowing on us and we had to pull over to fill the car up with gas just in case the interstates were shut down. The snow was the size of quarters…large enough to actually see the shape of the snowflakes; which may not be a big deal to some of you who see snow a lot, but for this southern girl, it was a HUGE deal.

Once we made it through the snow storm [driving 40 miles per hour for almost 60 miles] we stopped outside of Seattle. And now, on Monday, here we are! Resting in the hotel room right outside of Seattle, watching some TV and enjoying the time outside of our vehicle. On the agenda for tomorrow? Getting the car ready to be shipped, working on packing all of our stuff up, and getting ready to do some sight seeing! We’re hitting up the Space Needle, Fisher Plaza [where they shoot Grey’s Anatomy] and Forks. Lots and lots of sight-seeing today in a day and a half before we fly out on Thursday! I can not wait to get to Kodiak and be in my own

home again. I miss having a house. And if you want me to be perfectly honest, I almost miss having to clean…almost.

Make sure to check out my Facebook [if we aren’t friends yet, add me!] for more photos from the trip. I haven’t been able to upload all of them yet, but I’m working on it!

Hope you guys have a great Tuesday!!