4 years ago, we took our first cross country road trip together!
Day 1823 – Reliving Our Marriage – First Road Trip
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Tag Archives: road trip
Day 1638 – Adventures On Our Drive To California
We left a little later than I originally planned, but it worked out since we missed most of the traffic in Maryland and Virginia. We also caught a great sunset as we left!
I had a silly idea of wearing my Raven’s jersey until we checked into our hotel…which was about 2 days later…it apparently didn’t work for the Patriots game. 😦
Here’s Bret enjoying the bed in the backseat. Note, this was taken at a stop and he adjusted his seat belt after. 🙂
I started reading a pretty neat book…didn’t get too far through it because I spent most of my non-driving time sleeping…or playing Candy Crush, tee hee.
This guy kept me company in the backseat.
One of the states that’s harder for me to drive through is Oklahoma. If I remember right, it is just fields and a lot of the same scenery for miles and miles. Texas is somewhat the same. This year was a totally different experience. There was an ice storm and everything was coated with ice. It was one of the most beautiful things I’ve seen in my life. It was like driving through a winter wonderland. I kept looking around saying, “WOW, WOW…..WOW!” Bret had been sleeping and I had to wake him up because it was just so amazing. I never would’ve expected to see something like that in Oklahoma! The photo only does it about 10% justice.
Then, we got to Texas and that’s when the fun started! Bret started to drive about an hour or so outside of Amarillo, Texas. I woke up when he pulled over in Amarillo to grab some gas. There was SO much ice on the road and he’d been driving about 30 miles an hour. I asked if he thought we should stop or not and he’s like, well, there are still a number of people on the road…I think we’re ok for now. Well, about 50 miles outside of Amarillo, we hit a little traffic….then the traffic was bumper to bumper…..then it stopped. Dead stop. After about an hour of being stopped, Bret said, well, shoot, I’m going to get in the back seat and go to sleep! We tried to lie down and sleep, but I kept thinking, what if the traffic starts up again? So I couldn’t sleep. I moved to the front seat, wrapped up in a blanket and watched for a while. After about an hour or so, I fell asleep. Another hour or so, sleep. We were stopped there for about 5 hours. Finally started again and I drove for about 30 minutes and we were stopped again. We stopped for about an hour at that point. Drove a little more and then were stopped another hour or so. All told, I think we were stuck for about 10 hours. It took us 10 hours to go about 30-50 miles. What’s crazy about the situation is that we were going to stop at our favorite rest stop that was only about 30 miles from where we were stopped. We were even going to stop and sleep in the car for a bit. Craziness! At least it was pretty in the morning.
I found this sign in a gas station….great advice!
We finally stopped in Flagstaff, AZ at a hotel. After we showered we headed across the street to the Galaxy Dinner. It was SOOO cool! There was a ton of 50’s memorabilia on the walls, oldie’s playing on the radio and nice greasy foods AND beers to relax with. It was a GREAT night!
Day 1623 – Leavin’ On A Jet Plane, Don’t Know When I’ll Be Back Again….Wait….Scratch That
Most of you know that Bret’s family lives in California. Well, we’re able to visit them again this year! Sadly, we just couldn’t make it last year. 😦 Since air fare is pretty steep this time of year, we’re driving again! We’ve made the drive twice and it’s SO much fun!
See ya in 2014!!! 🙂
Day 1363 – Roadtrippin’ In Maryland or Oh The Irony!
Today, the plan was to drop off Rebekah Thorsett’s wedding album at K&B Bridals and Event Planning (She’s one of their planners now!) and then drive up to Anne Marie Baumann’s to drop off her wedding album.
I was chatting with Bridget (owner of K&B and a dear friend) for a little while and mentioned I had Anne Marie’s album (all of the Baumann attire was bought/rented through K&B!) Bridget said, oh wow, she was JUST here!!! Now, normally, this would just be a funny set of events…..but it was more ironic because Anne Marie lives about an hour away from K&B! Ooops!
While it would have been easy to get mad about all of the additional driving (that I was planning on doing anyway!) but I saw it as an adventure! On the way home I stopped by the Flying J out in North East. I felt like I was driving cross country with Bret again! Ah, such good memories. I’m not going to lie, there was a part of me that almost turned around and went to the beach! I love random adventures. 🙂
Day 920 – Road Trip Adventures
Where have I been? What’s new? What adventures have I been on?
Grab a cup of coffee, tea, soda or water, pull up a chair and I’ll tell you a tale.
Bret tells me sometimes my blogs are too long, so I’ll give you two versions – a short list for the readers on the go and a longer version for the readers on the stop. (one thing we learned while away is that Bret’s dad tells corny jokes….so do I…he was a bad influence.) 🙂
- We just returned from a cross country drive to visit family.
- The Hunger Games was a great book.
- A Honda Civic is a great traveling vehicle.
- We are a spotlight vendor in the newest Perfect Wedding Guide.
- We received The Wedding Wire Bride’s Choice Award for 2012.
Morro Bay California at night.
Now, I grab my own cup of coffee to write. Bret and I love to take this trip. It’s such a wonderful time of bonding and adventure. This was the second time we drove cross country to visit family. We learned a lot last year. So, this year, we brought a lot of cup-o-noodles and travel mugs because hot water is free and refills are cheap. We also brought our own snacks, sodas, water and juice beforehand. Saves a LOT of money. We also toss a ton of blankets in the back seat for sleeping. I have to say at this point that THE BEST rest stop in the country is Russell’s Travel Center. It’s located just over the New Mexico line after you leave Texas. They have showers, a game room, clean restrooms (this is a rarity on the road…really), lots of food, coffee and drinks. My favorite part is the chapel. A little room with sermons playing and stained glass windows. Such an awesome little touch for travelers. Last year we stopped here, took our coffee mug to the counter, told them it was a refill and they let us have it for free. This year we stopped because after only 2-3 hours of driving, I was done. My normal stretch is about 5-6 hours. Bret wasn’t ready to drive either…since he only had 2-3 hours of sleep! So we parked and I hopped in the back seat and we took a nap. About 4 hours. I was shocked when I woke up, to be honest. It’s hard enough sleeping in the car, but to sleep that long at a rest stop where people are milling around, it was quite an accomplishment.
We thankfully discovered one of the best secrets of long road trips last year…audio books. Now, they have to be interesting. We took a short drive (8 hours) last year and the book we were listening to was SO technical that it was putting us to sleep. My books on the way out were the Hunger Games trilogy. I lucked out and got them from a new library branch just before we left. Because of the movie coming out in March, they have been hard to find. It was a bit gorier than I expected, but still was a great read…listen.
I’m so thankful for my little Honda Civic! The gas mileage is incredible. We use mid-grade gas and it cost us only about $500 total (there and back plus driving around in California). It also has a 6 disc CD changer, which is perfect for the books on tape. Ah, love that car. ::swoon::
On the way out, we stopped at the Aquarius Casino Resort in Laughlin, Nevada. It was a really nice casino. The bed and sheets were just amazing. (Granted, I’m sure any bed, sheet or shower would have been awesome after driving for 2 days.) I had picked them because the traveler pictures from trip adviser looked like the website, that’s a huge thing to me. I’m so happy with the choice.
While we were in California, we mostly just spent time with his family. But we did squeeze in a few fun extras. First we went with friends to SkyWalk in Fresno. It was literally a room full of trampolines. Best workout I’ve had in a while!
We also took a trip up to Shaver Lake in the mountains and made a day trip to Morro Bay on the coast.
On the way back to Maryland we stopped at a few really nice car shops. First, we stopped by Garcia Honda in Albuquerque, New Mexico to make a copy of my car key. They had one of the nicest waiting rooms I’ve seen and all of the staff were very nice. I think it was Mr. Garcia himself who walked us to the service desk.
As we were driving through New Mexico, I noticed a chip in the windshield. Our first stop was Napa Silver Moon Auto Repair in Santa Rosa, New Mexico. They couldn’t fix it, but the guy that Bret talked to was very respectable. He told us to check out Amarillo. When we arrived in Amarillo, we put auto repair in the GPS (another huge essential in a cross country trip!) and were directed to AA & A Windshield & Glass in Amarillo, Texas. The guys that helped us were beyond nice, fixed the crack in under 5 minutes and gave us a very fair price.
Right before we left for California, I was contacted by my Perfect Wedding Guide agent letting me know they had chosen me as a spotlight vendor in the new guide. I get a two page spread with nine images from my last wedding, a blurb from the bride and references to other wedding vendors.
If this wasn’t exciting enough, while we were in California, I received an email from Wedding Wire letting me know I had receive the Bride’s Choice Award! Only the top 5% of wedding vendors receive this!!
I am honestly floored at all these things. I wouldn’t be where I am today if it wasn’t for my amazing clients. Thank you, Thank you, Thank you!!! I still can’t believe I get to do this ALL the time now! I’m so thankful I could just go to California whenever I needed to (we changed the dates several times). It’s a good thing my new boss is flexible. 😉
I am so excited about the next few months. I can’t wait to share all of my new adventures! Make sure you sign up to follow the blog so you don’t miss anything! (on the bottom of the page or to the right!)
365daysofmarriage 