On the Road

So firstly my apologies to everyone who I am disappointing terribly by stooping so low as to go beyond sending a mass email and starting a *gasp* blog! I've been able to check email nearly every night since we left and because we're already getting in late, this is making us get to sleep even later. Zzzzzzz...
So I've decided that this is it. Wednesday, 20 September, 2006: The Day I Started My Blog.
so here's the update:

Yesterday morning we left from Des Moines, IA. It was actually really nice around there, rolling hills, lots of trees. And that part of Iowa had less 'busyness' than I expected. [I should also point out that in Sioux Falls, SD, we saw the spitting image of your favourite rocker and ours - Disco Stu!!!] We drove a really long time - all the way through Indiana. I would love to say that we met Reggie Miller and he invited us over for lunch, but being that we only stopped at two rest stops and a Cracker Barrel for lunch, the story wouldn't be very plausible.

We ended up at a hotel at around 10pm and finally got the cats all settled (getting all their gear in has become quite the production and Luke firmly believes this is preparing us for traveling with kids.)

This morning we set out from some podunk town in Ohio - or maybe it was Indiana, now I can't remember. Let's say Indiana. Hotel breakfast was less than ideal, but they had a cool fish tank and the front desk guy was super friendly. Again, another day of driving forever. We had decided on a route that would get us to PA, but would avoid any toll highways. For future reference to anyone insane (!) enough to make this trip - TAKE THE TOLL ROAD!!! We spent about two and a half hours meandering (if we were snails, it would be crawling, but alas) through the back country of West Virginia. Seriously, when you cross the border from Ohio to W. VA., it's like going from the nice part of town to the wrong side of the tracks (or in this case, the river). Dilapidated row houses, abandoned factories - it was all there. Poorsville. We took a turn south - again to avoid the tolls - and ended up on this road that was neverending. There wasn't a space big enough turn around in even if we'd wanted to! It was awful! It reminded me of driving in Ireland! Such tiny narrow roads with almost no shoulder at all! The views were really incredible, but the driving - and the remoteness of it all was quite overwhelming! We felt a little helpless. I must say though, the rolling hils and houses tucked in little private forests or along a little stream was quite idyllic, but you could sure never play bacce ball in those yards! 'Sorry, Bobby, it rolled down the ravine again.'

We drove through several unnamed towns (sorry, "Unincorporated"). We saw a mama cat and three kittens almost right out in the road. When we came by the mama cat ran away! We drove by several bridges that looked like something from a ghost town movie set. And several were only wide enough for one car at a time - or had signs posted saying only one vehicle on the bridge at a time. There were again, lots of run-down houses with a ton of junk sitting outside them. It was a little depressing.

On the plus side, I got to see my first real live possum ever! Well, I'll be a noodle in soup! Okay, well, it was dead. Flattened road-kill actually, but it was still a possum!!

We FINALLY made it out of there but subsequently made several wrong turns trying to get out of the town at the end. We finally made it to Maryland. The drive to Harrisburg where we turned north again seemed unusually long. But hark! There lies in the distance Pennsylvania (which I could never live in because the name takes too long to spell). It was dark the entire time we were driving so I'm not sure what we missed, but at least it was flatter, not so many winding roads, and no dead possums!!

Now, we're in Gettysburg. We've decided to take a much slower day tomorrow and tour around G-burg a little bit and see the sights. As most of you know, I'm an avid lover of American history (Christine - quit laughing!), so this will be especially interesting.*
*Actually, the clincher is that we're going to this one museum place and we get a free bear. I'm not sure what that means. Do you think it will handle the car ride okay with the cats? Or will it just end up being a tiny lapel button with Smoky the Bear on it (convenient castoffs from the Forest Service)?

After G-burg, we're heading to Lancaster County to see the life I narrowly avoided. Just kidding! But I DO have some super-strict Mennonite relatives somewhere in this land of PA. We're also going to hit Lititz for the pretzel factory (100+ years old) and Wilbur chocolates to see where they make Wilbur Buds. <- these I found out about through my church secretary discussion board at work. These women from PA were all about Wilbur Buds - enough to start a topic about office candy, so we have to check it out now! I'll let you all know how it turns out.