Well, we made it the whole way there and back. It was a truely amazing experience. I wish we could have stayed longer in Gatlinburg and experienced the Smokey Mountains more. The weather had just cleared up as we got there and the next day looked like it was gonna be beautiful. But we had to keep on movin.
The ride back was actually pretty nice, up until the end of Virginia. Then the rain started to come. It was absolutely pouring by the time we got to NY. I was actually kind of getting nervous. But when it seemed at its worst and almost undriveable... it let up almost immediately. It was still raining by the time we got back but not like it had been.
I wanted to post more pictures than I did. It just became to hard to load them and resize them, save them and then post them. We sually got in pretty late and we didn't want to do much more than sleep when we did. And in places like San Francisco and Las Vegas where we had more time... we were generally out and about and didn't have much time to do the photo stuff then either. So what I plan to do is find a way I can just load all my pictures onto a site and put the link here so people can click on it and see all the pictures. I'll try to write something about each picture to tell you what it is all about, depending on the site. Maybe FlickR would be best. I'll do that later though.
Trip was great... kind of mad-cap and not really as expensive as I thought it would be. Can't wait till out next adventure.
Tuesday, April 21, 2009
Monday, April 20, 2009
Home Again
We've arrived back home. It was pouring rain for the vast majority of today and we're mostly just glad to be out of the rain.
I kind of wanted to just keep going - maybe up to Canada and then down to Vermont and then back to Gatlinburg and then who knows... but sadly our funds are not bottomless and I have to return to work tomorrow. :(
That was the best adventure I've had and I would do it all again in a heartbeat. The things I saw and experienced made me speechless and I'm so so so glad that we went on this trip.
I'm not sure what will happen to this blog now that we're home, we might post more photos once we sort them, or just leave it until our next adventure and then blog that. We'll just have to see. Matt may want to add something later, but for now - g'nite all.
I kind of wanted to just keep going - maybe up to Canada and then down to Vermont and then back to Gatlinburg and then who knows... but sadly our funds are not bottomless and I have to return to work tomorrow. :(
That was the best adventure I've had and I would do it all again in a heartbeat. The things I saw and experienced made me speechless and I'm so so so glad that we went on this trip.
I'm not sure what will happen to this blog now that we're home, we might post more photos once we sort them, or just leave it until our next adventure and then blog that. We'll just have to see. Matt may want to add something later, but for now - g'nite all.
Sunday, April 19, 2009
Brinkley, AR to Gatlinburg, TN
Touched down in the pouring rain...
We're heading out from Brinkley, Arkansas towards Graceland and of course it's pouring rain. We already listened to "Walking In Memphis" and noted the comment about pouring rain. Now we're listening to Paul Simon's "Graceland", although I'm thinking more and more I may not even be getting out of the car because damn it's raining hard. We don't really have time to go in anyway, I just wanted to see the gates - but I hope I can get some kind of decent photo. At least maybe the rain is washing the dead bugs off my car.
-- So apparently Graceland does not open until 9. It's 8:15. We were going to just park and take a photo of the gates except the gates are open and there are a bunch of cops around - there was a tent out and it looked like there was something going on. The biggest problem for me is the rain. It's absolutely pouring and in combination with everything else it just seemed ridiculous. So we saw the gates, snagged a couple postcards at a gas station and took a photo of the more official looking sign across the street. And now we're driving through the rain to Gatlinburg. I really hope it stops raining by the time we get there because I'd really like to see the town. Memphis I could give or take - it seemed silly to not try since we were passing through - but we're staying in Gatlinburg and I've heard so much about it from Matt I've been kind of excited for this all week.
We missed the Tennesse State Line because it was in the middle of the Mississippi River and I wasn't paying attention. We've missed other state lines so I guess it's okay, but I was on a role this half of the trip so it's a little sad. Ah well. Maybe we can get it on the way out or something.
-- drove through a crazy rainstorm in Tennessee... but it cleared up almost as soon as we entered town... and boy what a town.
I describe Gatlinburg and Pigeon Forge as Las Vegas, the New York State fair and a Renaissance Faire all rolled into one. Bright flashy signs and lights, tiny little shopping villages and mini golf/arcades/haunted houses etc etc etc galore. Tons of Old Tyme Photo stands, fried dough and corn dogs for sale and a Ripley's museum or two. Thankfully the rain ended as we checked in so we had a wonderfully perfect evening walking around town and looking in shops and playing mini-golf with a wonderful view of the mountains. The weather was perfect, I wore jeans but didn't need a coat. Here's hoping we get good weather for tomorrow too... maybe the storm is done.
There are also - we counted - 9 Pancake houses within a 3 minute driving distance on a main road through Pigeon Forge. There are more we missed, we're pretty sure. But try to go to these pancake houses and you discover that they are only open until 2pm. Had to go to this fantabulous 50's diner for some pancakes as it was after 9pm. They were aaaamazing though.
signing out for the night - back home soon, :(
We're heading out from Brinkley, Arkansas towards Graceland and of course it's pouring rain. We already listened to "Walking In Memphis" and noted the comment about pouring rain. Now we're listening to Paul Simon's "Graceland", although I'm thinking more and more I may not even be getting out of the car because damn it's raining hard. We don't really have time to go in anyway, I just wanted to see the gates - but I hope I can get some kind of decent photo. At least maybe the rain is washing the dead bugs off my car.
-- So apparently Graceland does not open until 9. It's 8:15. We were going to just park and take a photo of the gates except the gates are open and there are a bunch of cops around - there was a tent out and it looked like there was something going on. The biggest problem for me is the rain. It's absolutely pouring and in combination with everything else it just seemed ridiculous. So we saw the gates, snagged a couple postcards at a gas station and took a photo of the more official looking sign across the street. And now we're driving through the rain to Gatlinburg. I really hope it stops raining by the time we get there because I'd really like to see the town. Memphis I could give or take - it seemed silly to not try since we were passing through - but we're staying in Gatlinburg and I've heard so much about it from Matt I've been kind of excited for this all week.
We missed the Tennesse State Line because it was in the middle of the Mississippi River and I wasn't paying attention. We've missed other state lines so I guess it's okay, but I was on a role this half of the trip so it's a little sad. Ah well. Maybe we can get it on the way out or something.
-- drove through a crazy rainstorm in Tennessee... but it cleared up almost as soon as we entered town... and boy what a town.
I describe Gatlinburg and Pigeon Forge as Las Vegas, the New York State fair and a Renaissance Faire all rolled into one. Bright flashy signs and lights, tiny little shopping villages and mini golf/arcades/haunted houses etc etc etc galore. Tons of Old Tyme Photo stands, fried dough and corn dogs for sale and a Ripley's museum or two. Thankfully the rain ended as we checked in so we had a wonderfully perfect evening walking around town and looking in shops and playing mini-golf with a wonderful view of the mountains. The weather was perfect, I wore jeans but didn't need a coat. Here's hoping we get good weather for tomorrow too... maybe the storm is done.
There are also - we counted - 9 Pancake houses within a 3 minute driving distance on a main road through Pigeon Forge. There are more we missed, we're pretty sure. But try to go to these pancake houses and you discover that they are only open until 2pm. Had to go to this fantabulous 50's diner for some pancakes as it was after 9pm. They were aaaamazing though.
signing out for the night - back home soon, :(
Tucumcari to Brinkley from Lindsey
Day 10 - Technology Rebels
Yesterday we had continuing problems with Jareth (the laptop) who refused to turn on because the battery was dying and we kept turning off his power source. Today I ran out of battery for both my cameras and ran out of room on my camera cards. I need a CVS and we're in the middle of nowhere - having just entered northern Texas from New Mexico. I also noticed this morning that the "F" key on my keyboard is missing. I'm not sure if it ran away in the hotel or in the car, so we'll have to do a quick search for it later, or when we get home.
We stayed in Tucumcari New Mexico which was supposed to have like 5 Route 66 roadside attractions to photograph, but we only saw two. Route 66 is running parallel with the interstate 40 that we're traveling on, so occasionally we see signs for things like Meteor Craters and Native American Travel Plazas and Dinosaur Museums. We haven't seen anything that sparks our interest enough yet, but we're also kind of on a tight schedule. It's sad. Someday I think I'd like to just drive Route 66 and see everything I want to on it. Take the time to stop etc. We're seeing a few things, but not as much as I think I'd like to.
It's really bright out and we're driving East again - so right into the sun. Thankfully we're past the snow and hopefully past rain for a little while. Our next stop is supposed to be 70 and beautiful, but we're not getting there till after dark so we'll see how the day goes.
-- Didn't really type much today as we were constantly on the move - only stopped for gas and postcards today and it worked in our favor because we got in early for us. It'll be good to get a little more sleep.
Yesterday we had continuing problems with Jareth (the laptop) who refused to turn on because the battery was dying and we kept turning off his power source. Today I ran out of battery for both my cameras and ran out of room on my camera cards. I need a CVS and we're in the middle of nowhere - having just entered northern Texas from New Mexico. I also noticed this morning that the "F" key on my keyboard is missing. I'm not sure if it ran away in the hotel or in the car, so we'll have to do a quick search for it later, or when we get home.
We stayed in Tucumcari New Mexico which was supposed to have like 5 Route 66 roadside attractions to photograph, but we only saw two. Route 66 is running parallel with the interstate 40 that we're traveling on, so occasionally we see signs for things like Meteor Craters and Native American Travel Plazas and Dinosaur Museums. We haven't seen anything that sparks our interest enough yet, but we're also kind of on a tight schedule. It's sad. Someday I think I'd like to just drive Route 66 and see everything I want to on it. Take the time to stop etc. We're seeing a few things, but not as much as I think I'd like to.
It's really bright out and we're driving East again - so right into the sun. Thankfully we're past the snow and hopefully past rain for a little while. Our next stop is supposed to be 70 and beautiful, but we're not getting there till after dark so we'll see how the day goes.
-- Didn't really type much today as we were constantly on the move - only stopped for gas and postcards today and it worked in our favor because we got in early for us. It'll be good to get a little more sleep.
Saturday, April 18, 2009
April 18th
Drove from Tucumcari New Mexico to Brinkley Arkansas, took about 11 hours with stops and things to refuel and get post cards and all that. The change from Oklahoma to Arkansas seemed pretty dramatic, like from basically flat flat farmland to a hilly forested landscape, kinda like New England. the spring is in full force down here though. I don't know what its like at home. It was about 70 most of the drive.
From Vegas to Tucumcari was ok, not too much too look at. We did stop by a place that had petrified wood and we got a free sample of it. Also saw alot of fake tee-pees outside "trading posts" along the highway. Oh yeah, we've been riding along side rt. 66 for a long ways also... yesterday and most of today. We went to a small rt. 66 museum yesterday also.
So now here we are toward the end of Arkansas. On to Gatlinburg TN tomorrow and the Smokey Mountains. Too bad we can't stay longer there. Missing everyone back home... sorry I didn't call today, was driving most of the day... Only like 2 hours off today. Tomorrow is a short driving day though so I'm looking forward to that. Tell you about Vegas when I have more time. Mattavina, out!
From Vegas to Tucumcari was ok, not too much too look at. We did stop by a place that had petrified wood and we got a free sample of it. Also saw alot of fake tee-pees outside "trading posts" along the highway. Oh yeah, we've been riding along side rt. 66 for a long ways also... yesterday and most of today. We went to a small rt. 66 museum yesterday also.
So now here we are toward the end of Arkansas. On to Gatlinburg TN tomorrow and the Smokey Mountains. Too bad we can't stay longer there. Missing everyone back home... sorry I didn't call today, was driving most of the day... Only like 2 hours off today. Tomorrow is a short driving day though so I'm looking forward to that. Tell you about Vegas when I have more time. Mattavina, out!
a couple of days behind
Didn't have internets in Vegas and forgot to post last night. Here is what I wrote on the way to Vegas:
April 15th.
I'll just say that yesterday was really, really amazing! Lindsey wrote more on the subject so I'll just do a little synopsis here. First off, we left San Francisco. It was nice and I was sad to see it go. But we had the Pacific Coast highway, which is Rt. 1. but before that we wanted to see if we could see what kind of redwoods we might be able to see below San Francisco. We saw some Parks while we were looking online that said there were some Redwoods around there. Since it wasn't in Redwoods National Forest, I figured we wern't gonna see much. But we started driving up the Mountain and the Trees were getting bigger and bigger looking. Finall we got to the park and the headquarters we were astounded by the trees. There was no doubt that these were certified redwoods, and it blew us away.
Next we went down the Coast Line almost instantly after and were then, once more blown away, this time by the pacific ocean and its deep blue aquamarine color and the size of the waves crashing against the rocks and cliff walls. I can't imagine seeing so many majestic and beautiful things in such a short period ever again.
Now, after a quick stay at Bakersfield, CA, we are on our way to Las Vegas. We will be getting in around 2. So I imagine when we get there, it will be absolute insanity in the middle of the desert, which we are currently driving through. The desert isn't just flat and boring though. There are pleanty of mountains and clouds and distant rains showers to look at. Its actually quite beautiful in it's own right. Ok I'll post later and let you know what I think of Vegas.
April 15th.
I'll just say that yesterday was really, really amazing! Lindsey wrote more on the subject so I'll just do a little synopsis here. First off, we left San Francisco. It was nice and I was sad to see it go. But we had the Pacific Coast highway, which is Rt. 1. but before that we wanted to see if we could see what kind of redwoods we might be able to see below San Francisco. We saw some Parks while we were looking online that said there were some Redwoods around there. Since it wasn't in Redwoods National Forest, I figured we wern't gonna see much. But we started driving up the Mountain and the Trees were getting bigger and bigger looking. Finall we got to the park and the headquarters we were astounded by the trees. There was no doubt that these were certified redwoods, and it blew us away.
Next we went down the Coast Line almost instantly after and were then, once more blown away, this time by the pacific ocean and its deep blue aquamarine color and the size of the waves crashing against the rocks and cliff walls. I can't imagine seeing so many majestic and beautiful things in such a short period ever again.
Now, after a quick stay at Bakersfield, CA, we are on our way to Las Vegas. We will be getting in around 2. So I imagine when we get there, it will be absolute insanity in the middle of the desert, which we are currently driving through. The desert isn't just flat and boring though. There are pleanty of mountains and clouds and distant rains showers to look at. Its actually quite beautiful in it's own right. Ok I'll post later and let you know what I think of Vegas.
Las Vegas TO Tucamcari, New Mexico
Day 9 ? Friday April 17th, 2009
Amusingly enough the most high class place we've stayed yet and we didn't have internet - except it was because it cost $14 a day and it really didn't seem worth the money. Hopefully we'll be good tonight in some cheap hotel in New Mexico.
Tuesday night we drove into a pre-chosen but also slightly random town in California and found a place to sleep for the night. We had breakfast for dinner at a place that was across the parking lot, but service was terrible. It took at least 40 minutes to get our food and we were starving by that point because we hadn't eaten for a while that day. Checked the car oil and stuff in the morning and headed off to Vegas for our shortest drive yet, only about 5 hours. There was a crazy amount of construction to drive through going in to the city and we couldn't seem to find the Welcome to Vegas sign, but once we got ourselves situated we checked in with my parents and crashed for a little bit. A couple showers, a short walk around a few hotels and dinner later we took a taxi down to Freemont Street.
Las Vegas essentially has two sections - the Strip and Freemont Street. They're about 6 miles apart and sort of very different worlds with similar elements. The Vegas Strip is all the casino/hotel's you've heard about - Bellagio, Monte Carlo, Luxor (the pyramid), etc. it's a bit classy in parts and trashy in others, but that's Vegas. Freemont Street is Old Vegas - the Golden Nugget is one of the main casino hotels there and everything is neon and bright. What makes it seem brighter than the strip is that they put a half tunnel across the top of Freemont Street covered to the brim with LED Lights. Every hour or half hour they have shows on this giant screen above the street. That night they played Don Mclean's American Pie and illustrated it with photographs and illustrations and dancing girls. Later they had a tribute to Queen which wasn't quite as impressive, but was still cool. The last time I was in Vegas they had this weird animated Alien thing. The aliens were like looking down on you with their experiemental tools and stuff. It's really a cool experience no matter what they're showing.
Back at the strip we crashed for the night. We were up at a decent hour and went walking down the strip and in and out of more hotels. Hit up shopping centers in Planet Hollywood and Caesars and had an amazing lunch at a restaurant called Serendipity 3 in the courtyard at Caesars. We must have walked a few miles in just the morning, so we took a break and hit the pool at our hotel which felt really really good until you got OUT of the water and then the wind hit you. At the Venetian I bought a mask from Venice that I had wanted to buy the last time I was here and it's beautiful. It's one of the smaller ones that I could afford, but it'll look great hanging. Next we saw Sigfried and Roy's Secret Garden and Dolphin Habitat at the Mirage. The animals were beautiful but I couldn't help notice that they were in very small spaces and the cats were pacing a lot. It made me a bit sad. There's so much space behind all these hotels, I feel like they could have given these animals a lot more space.
Finally, what I've been waiting for for probably a year now - we went to see the Cirque du Soliel Beatle's show LOVE. The theater was in the round and incredibly small - all the seats were great no matter where you were. Everything was amazing. The sets and costumes were so incredible and detailed. The acrobatics were amazing - a lot of aeriel work as well as roller blading and awesome awesome use of trampolines. The songs were beautifully interpreted and I was singing and dancing the whole show on the edge of my seat. Favorite bits include these little kids wearing blank face heads with mop tops and the 1964 suits, also pulling a huge sheet of white fabric over almost the entire audience and shaking it so that the bed at on top looked like it was floating on the clouds. Simple dancing and aerial work with the help of a ladder attached to a giant wheel during Lucy in the SKy - when they could have done a lot of visuals they stayed simple it was good. They also had characters for Eleanor Rigby, Father Mckenzie and Lady Madonna that were featured and also on stage at other points. During Lady Madonna there was a cool video of rain boots dancing in the rain. And the people on stage had TAP DANCE YELLOW RAIN BOOTS. .. they were awesome. Everything was amazing and made me so so happy. It was too short.
We saw the Bellagio fountain show twice - once during the day to "Lady Luck" and then again at night to "Viva Las Vegas". I love watching that - it's always fun. We tried to find fuzzy dice to add to the mirror after Vegas, but the only ones we could find were too big. We got a small keychain with dice in it instead and it's hanging with my crystal currently.
Today we started out from Las Vegas and saw the Welcome to sign... well, the thanks for coming part anyway, and i got a photo of the welcome part through the back window as we passed. We noticed somewhere in Arizona that our camera had stopped working, so we pulled off the highway - and as fortune would have it landed at the Route 66 Museum! I bought postcards and Matt bought a travel mug and we both chatted with the older gentleman manning the museum in the middle of nowhere. It was awesome.
Back on route, we're still driving through Arizona towards New Mexico.
-- Hit a bitty snowstorm in the upper elevations of New Mexico, of course just when I needed to get out adn get gas. But we got here okay and the room is really nice so we're going to figure out tomorrow and crash for the night.
Signing off till next internet time :)
Amusingly enough the most high class place we've stayed yet and we didn't have internet - except it was because it cost $14 a day and it really didn't seem worth the money. Hopefully we'll be good tonight in some cheap hotel in New Mexico.
Tuesday night we drove into a pre-chosen but also slightly random town in California and found a place to sleep for the night. We had breakfast for dinner at a place that was across the parking lot, but service was terrible. It took at least 40 minutes to get our food and we were starving by that point because we hadn't eaten for a while that day. Checked the car oil and stuff in the morning and headed off to Vegas for our shortest drive yet, only about 5 hours. There was a crazy amount of construction to drive through going in to the city and we couldn't seem to find the Welcome to Vegas sign, but once we got ourselves situated we checked in with my parents and crashed for a little bit. A couple showers, a short walk around a few hotels and dinner later we took a taxi down to Freemont Street.
Las Vegas essentially has two sections - the Strip and Freemont Street. They're about 6 miles apart and sort of very different worlds with similar elements. The Vegas Strip is all the casino/hotel's you've heard about - Bellagio, Monte Carlo, Luxor (the pyramid), etc. it's a bit classy in parts and trashy in others, but that's Vegas. Freemont Street is Old Vegas - the Golden Nugget is one of the main casino hotels there and everything is neon and bright. What makes it seem brighter than the strip is that they put a half tunnel across the top of Freemont Street covered to the brim with LED Lights. Every hour or half hour they have shows on this giant screen above the street. That night they played Don Mclean's American Pie and illustrated it with photographs and illustrations and dancing girls. Later they had a tribute to Queen which wasn't quite as impressive, but was still cool. The last time I was in Vegas they had this weird animated Alien thing. The aliens were like looking down on you with their experiemental tools and stuff. It's really a cool experience no matter what they're showing.
Back at the strip we crashed for the night. We were up at a decent hour and went walking down the strip and in and out of more hotels. Hit up shopping centers in Planet Hollywood and Caesars and had an amazing lunch at a restaurant called Serendipity 3 in the courtyard at Caesars. We must have walked a few miles in just the morning, so we took a break and hit the pool at our hotel which felt really really good until you got OUT of the water and then the wind hit you. At the Venetian I bought a mask from Venice that I had wanted to buy the last time I was here and it's beautiful. It's one of the smaller ones that I could afford, but it'll look great hanging. Next we saw Sigfried and Roy's Secret Garden and Dolphin Habitat at the Mirage. The animals were beautiful but I couldn't help notice that they were in very small spaces and the cats were pacing a lot. It made me a bit sad. There's so much space behind all these hotels, I feel like they could have given these animals a lot more space.
Finally, what I've been waiting for for probably a year now - we went to see the Cirque du Soliel Beatle's show LOVE. The theater was in the round and incredibly small - all the seats were great no matter where you were. Everything was amazing. The sets and costumes were so incredible and detailed. The acrobatics were amazing - a lot of aeriel work as well as roller blading and awesome awesome use of trampolines. The songs were beautifully interpreted and I was singing and dancing the whole show on the edge of my seat. Favorite bits include these little kids wearing blank face heads with mop tops and the 1964 suits, also pulling a huge sheet of white fabric over almost the entire audience and shaking it so that the bed at on top looked like it was floating on the clouds. Simple dancing and aerial work with the help of a ladder attached to a giant wheel during Lucy in the SKy - when they could have done a lot of visuals they stayed simple it was good. They also had characters for Eleanor Rigby, Father Mckenzie and Lady Madonna that were featured and also on stage at other points. During Lady Madonna there was a cool video of rain boots dancing in the rain. And the people on stage had TAP DANCE YELLOW RAIN BOOTS. .. they were awesome. Everything was amazing and made me so so happy. It was too short.
We saw the Bellagio fountain show twice - once during the day to "Lady Luck" and then again at night to "Viva Las Vegas". I love watching that - it's always fun. We tried to find fuzzy dice to add to the mirror after Vegas, but the only ones we could find were too big. We got a small keychain with dice in it instead and it's hanging with my crystal currently.
Today we started out from Las Vegas and saw the Welcome to sign... well, the thanks for coming part anyway, and i got a photo of the welcome part through the back window as we passed. We noticed somewhere in Arizona that our camera had stopped working, so we pulled off the highway - and as fortune would have it landed at the Route 66 Museum! I bought postcards and Matt bought a travel mug and we both chatted with the older gentleman manning the museum in the middle of nowhere. It was awesome.
Back on route, we're still driving through Arizona towards New Mexico.
-- Hit a bitty snowstorm in the upper elevations of New Mexico, of course just when I needed to get out adn get gas. But we got here okay and the room is really nice so we're going to figure out tomorrow and crash for the night.
Signing off till next internet time :)
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