Road Trip 2009
Aaron finishes kindergarten in just 6 school days. I have scheduled my vacation around his last week of school and Mike and I have decided that this is the perfect time to start taking summer vacations with the kids. The inaugural trip will be to Washington DC which seems more than appropriate since this year in school both the kids followed the election and learned about government and such. I went with my family (when I say "family" I mean mom, Brooke, Tatman grandparents, Heather, Mandi, Kenny, Charlotte and Mackayla. Yeah, LOTS of family) when I was 12 and had a great time. Mike went when he was a kid too but appearently never went to any of the museums or visited any of the monuments, so I really don't know what he and his parents did....
Anyways we've decided to camp in Shanendoah National Park which is a little out of the way but seems worth it. I'm really not a fan of the over commercialized campgrounds and the kids are too little to go backcountry, at least in my opinion. (Ok lets rephrase that, I don't have the patience to take Mike, my biggest whiner, and the kids, who have yet to develop strong hiking legs, backcountry camping.) Anyways we are really excited.
My mom used to make the 18 hour drive from Seminole to Akron every year with us and from there we went camping all over the place. The last year we went at all I was 16 and we went to Niagara Falls. I haven't been on an extensive road trip since then, and the last time I went camping was in 2002 down in the keys with Mike. I'm practically jumping-up-and-down giddy that the kids are finally old enough to do this stuff with and that Mike is eager as well since he never did it growing up.
We will be leaving on June 4th. Mike and the kids will pick me up from the TIA around 7:30pm after a quick business trip and we will leave straight from the airport as soon as I can peel off my suit. We decided to make the first long trip a night trip to ease the kids into it. (Thank goodness my mom bought me a dual screen dvd players for the car a few years ago.) Doing most of the driving at night makes for fewer Mommy-I-HAVE-to-go-potty's and less highway traffic. Its a 15 to 16 hour trip so the kids will wake up while we are well into the mountains, something they have never seen. We should get to the park around 11, just in time for check in. We can set up camp and just chill for a while. We will probably do some hiking and exploring, but mostly just relaxing and enjoying family time. The next two days we will go into the city and do the whole tourist thing. For the third day I want to visit the Antietam Battlefield and then head into Baltimore. Day four we start to head home but not before stopping in Colonial Williamsburg and Historic Jamestown. From there it's i-95 all the way back to the Sunshine State, but in true road trip fashion we will take our time indulging in whatever scenic side trips and roadside whatevers that catch our eyes. It should be an adventure and I hope this is the start of a great family tradition.
Anyways we've decided to camp in Shanendoah National Park which is a little out of the way but seems worth it. I'm really not a fan of the over commercialized campgrounds and the kids are too little to go backcountry, at least in my opinion. (Ok lets rephrase that, I don't have the patience to take Mike, my biggest whiner, and the kids, who have yet to develop strong hiking legs, backcountry camping.) Anyways we are really excited.
My mom used to make the 18 hour drive from Seminole to Akron every year with us and from there we went camping all over the place. The last year we went at all I was 16 and we went to Niagara Falls. I haven't been on an extensive road trip since then, and the last time I went camping was in 2002 down in the keys with Mike. I'm practically jumping-up-and-down giddy that the kids are finally old enough to do this stuff with and that Mike is eager as well since he never did it growing up.
We will be leaving on June 4th. Mike and the kids will pick me up from the TIA around 7:30pm after a quick business trip and we will leave straight from the airport as soon as I can peel off my suit. We decided to make the first long trip a night trip to ease the kids into it. (Thank goodness my mom bought me a dual screen dvd players for the car a few years ago.) Doing most of the driving at night makes for fewer Mommy-I-HAVE-to-go-potty's and less highway traffic. Its a 15 to 16 hour trip so the kids will wake up while we are well into the mountains, something they have never seen. We should get to the park around 11, just in time for check in. We can set up camp and just chill for a while. We will probably do some hiking and exploring, but mostly just relaxing and enjoying family time. The next two days we will go into the city and do the whole tourist thing. For the third day I want to visit the Antietam Battlefield and then head into Baltimore. Day four we start to head home but not before stopping in Colonial Williamsburg and Historic Jamestown. From there it's i-95 all the way back to the Sunshine State, but in true road trip fashion we will take our time indulging in whatever scenic side trips and roadside whatevers that catch our eyes. It should be an adventure and I hope this is the start of a great family tradition.