The Journey
The Journey Begins
August 1, 2009, 6:30am. We packed all night. Literally had been awake 24 hours by then. We moved boxes. So many, many boxes. Aria's word of the day to write on the boxes she packed .... FRAGILE. Everything she packed was fragile. LOL! A joke or three about one legged fishnet lamps were had. By 8:30am we had everything unloaded from the truck and into our awesomely cool shipping container storage unit. That thing rocks! It's nice and big, easy to load and very weatherproof! It made me think sadly of folks living in those to reach these shores though. :(
By 11am we had found a motel that could accomodate us all, parked the kinds in front of the TV and Garion, Aria, Lawrence and I passed out for about 6 hours. We were not in any condition to take photos, but we looked rather like this poor soul. We woke up long enough to order some pizza, take some showers, kiss the kids and put them all to bed. We slept for another 11 hours.
August 2, 2009 we loafed all day. We had zero energy for anything. Finally went to the store in the evening and purchased more processed, microwaveable foods then we have ever bought at one time in our lives!!! Then we feasted. That poor microwave has probably never worked so hard. LOL!!! We needed it though. We just ate and ate and ate. We had been going days with little food, little rest and our bodies seriously needed to refuel. Then, we slept again. There were two cars in the parking lot with Texas license plates.
August 3, 2009 we got up a bit late. Getting ourselves organized, doing laundry, putting in a part on the 15 passenger van we've yet to name. Re-organizing our bed stuffs, getting a tent, repacking our camping supplies and getting ready to be on the road tomorrow. Route? Looks like we'll head south on I-25 and visit Trinidad, Colorado and camping near Mt. Capulin. After that? Driving towards Austin! Not sure where else we will head.
Still August 3, 2009. Garion and Lawrence went to replace the brake booster and as Lawrence was manuevering into an awkward position under the steering column he heard and felt a * pop * in his ribs. Yikes! So he may have re-cracked a rib he cracked a few years back. Comfrey and wrapping will be had today. We may visit a doctor before we leave tomorrow too. The motel we are staying at is across the street from our local homeless shelter. So we wandered across the street to see if anyone there might be interested in a few bucks for helping us fix this part since hubby is now completely uninterested in leaning on his ribs. Lo and behold, an older gentleman, Pat, was only too happy to do so. In fact, he was replacing the exact part on his own truck! His brother is a Dodge mechanic and Pat and him have swapped mechanic stories and tips through the years. He not only knew exactly how to get the part off, he had most of the tools on him. When we asked him for his help he jumped out of his truck and said, "I know exactly how to fix that!" We told him we were only too happy to recompense his time with some cash. "Oh, I'm not worried about any money, don't you worry about that at all. Let's just fix your van." We paid him anyway. He was just overwhelmed. He also owns a few places in Houston and Gavelston. Homeless by a set of unfortunate events that placed him right in our path, a good heart we found. Life is awesome.
August 4, 2009. It's Germaine's birthday!!!! She is 8 today. We played our special birthday song. We are up fairly early for us, but we were up late last night getting back to town after buying our tent and some other necessities. Hubby is still hurting, but not too bad. Slathered him in comfrey and wrapped his ribs. Keeping an eye on him to make sure he's ok.
The kids are getting restless being in a motel room for a few days. Soon we'll be on the road and camping! We found the coolest tent at Target. First time we've shopped at Target in years and years and years. Seriously... it's been about 19 years. Anyway it's this one.
Very nice! We'll let y'all know what it's like! We also got a nice camp stove that came with the cutest little lantern! And... we needed to get a tupperwear thing to put our big bag of Oolong tea, the bag it came in epic failed in the car. * sad *
Long day today. Checked out of the motel at 10, repacked the van. Went to storage and repacked the van and the trunk of the car. Loaded up the rest of the laundry that needed doing and took it to the laundromat. Washed $37 worth of clothes, towels, etc. Wrapped up a few loose ends in town, took clean laundry that we are storing back to storage and then left Wyoming!
We made it all the way 30 miles south to L's mom's house. Pitched our tent in the dark and slept outside. We saw about 3 Texas plates on the way.
August 5, 2009. Spent the rest of the day visiting with his mom and sis then wandered down to Fort Collins and spent a little time with Rina. Wonderful few hours chatting. Shopped at Wal-Mart and ended up spending the night just a few minutes away at a rest area. Sleeping in the car can be done. Not always comfortable though. We did meet an interesting man sleeping on a picnic bench though. He was hitching across the country just because. He lives on a small stipend from a trust fund, but likes to just wander around seeing the sights and meeting folks.
August 6, 2009. Got up very early in the morning and shared our breakfast sandwhiches with our fellow traveler. Toured the Colorado visitors center, had a cup of coffee and then headed south. Outside of Denver we stopped and fueled up, got some stuff from Safeway and made reservations to stay overnight at a campground in Capulin, New Mexico. We continued on our journey south.
In Colorado Springs we visited the Garden of the Gods. It is just so beautiful there. After visiting the visitor's center we had lunch. We devised a wee harness for our kitty, Greyrocks, so he could get out of the car for a while. He enjoyed all the scents and pee mail. After lunch we continued on south and made it into Trinidad in the evening. Forgot they had moved the Wal-Mart, visited Wal-Mart for a couple more forgotten things and pushed on down to Capulin. We saw 9 Texas plates today.
Capulin. We got there about 11pm and the wind.. wow. Brother Wind was really traveling in a hurry when we got there. It definitely made putting up the tent an adventure! Aria and I asked Brother Wind to please calm down and welcome us to Texas gently. Amazingly... it did. We got the tent up and the sleeping bags out and everyone in bed by 1am. Late night.
August 7, 2009. Got up at 7am and took down the tent and repacked the van again. This time to make room for all the kiddos but Garion. Our little car is HOT, the van has AC. Took showers and re-organized. The sweet man running the campground only charged us $25 for tenting it instead of the reasonable $33 we expected.
We explored Mt. Capulin after we got all packed. It was a truly beautiful sight. It is an extinct volcano and the center of it is filled with capulin plants or chockecherries. All along the ridge the pine trees were filled with ladybugs. Millions of them! You could scoop them up with your hands there were so many!
After taking some pics, we traveled down the mountain and went to Folsom, NM. This is where they discovered the Folsom points, spearheads that point to human occupation on this continent way earlier than previously thought. We toured their little museum and there was all kinds of cool stuff in there from the early century. There was also a very interesting story of the town's phone operator. Apparently in 1908 a rare flood came down the Cimarron. This brave lady stayed at her post, calling families down river to warn them of the flood and perished herself in it. They found her body the next spring some 8 miles down river. The town was named Folsom after the maiden name of the wife of President Clevland who was born there.
We departed Folsom and continued on our journey. We crossed into Texas a lot sooner then I had expected! If you were behind us you'd have seen a lot of hand waving and cheering. :P We made it as far as Amarillo that night and stayed in Camelot. 'Twas a silly place.
August 8, 2009. The road from Amarillo to San Angelo took all day. We left Camelot at check out time, 11am. We slept in, reorganized and headed out. Found a Wal-Mart to stock up on ice and lunch meats. Meandered our way out of town and headed toward San Angelo. Talked to Kitty in Lubbock and ate lunch/early dinner at a road side picnic area. It was really pretty out there and the stone area the picnic table was on was in the shape of Texas. Very awesome.
We made it to some small town and looked for a place to camp. Epic fail on that score. Finally made it just outside of San Angelo and passed out at a rest area.
August 9, 2009. Lawrence's 42nd b-day!!! It was an earlyish morning. We woke up early but between stretching and snacking and potty, it took us an hour or so to leave. Made it into San Angelo and had breakfast at a BK. Off to Austin!
Stopped at some little town and topped off fluids and such, a nice couple asked us if we needed help. We didn't. Off to Austin again and stopped off for fuel and found out we are only an hour and a half away!!!! * joy * Went through Llano and poured ice water all over us and the kitten. He loved it. We loved it. Fricking HOT! Drove past a small wildfire. Ashley called just as we were getting into the city limits of Austin.
Thanks to some excellent navigational advice, we made it to Blake's and Ashley's intact, hot, sweaty, tired, but in Austin!!!
Oh, and hubby got a kilt!
August 1, 2009, 6:30am. We packed all night. Literally had been awake 24 hours by then. We moved boxes. So many, many boxes. Aria's word of the day to write on the boxes she packed .... FRAGILE. Everything she packed was fragile. LOL! A joke or three about one legged fishnet lamps were had. By 8:30am we had everything unloaded from the truck and into our awesomely cool shipping container storage unit. That thing rocks! It's nice and big, easy to load and very weatherproof! It made me think sadly of folks living in those to reach these shores though. :(
By 11am we had found a motel that could accomodate us all, parked the kinds in front of the TV and Garion, Aria, Lawrence and I passed out for about 6 hours. We were not in any condition to take photos, but we looked rather like this poor soul. We woke up long enough to order some pizza, take some showers, kiss the kids and put them all to bed. We slept for another 11 hours.
August 2, 2009 we loafed all day. We had zero energy for anything. Finally went to the store in the evening and purchased more processed, microwaveable foods then we have ever bought at one time in our lives!!! Then we feasted. That poor microwave has probably never worked so hard. LOL!!! We needed it though. We just ate and ate and ate. We had been going days with little food, little rest and our bodies seriously needed to refuel. Then, we slept again. There were two cars in the parking lot with Texas license plates.
August 3, 2009 we got up a bit late. Getting ourselves organized, doing laundry, putting in a part on the 15 passenger van we've yet to name. Re-organizing our bed stuffs, getting a tent, repacking our camping supplies and getting ready to be on the road tomorrow. Route? Looks like we'll head south on I-25 and visit Trinidad, Colorado and camping near Mt. Capulin. After that? Driving towards Austin! Not sure where else we will head.
Still August 3, 2009. Garion and Lawrence went to replace the brake booster and as Lawrence was manuevering into an awkward position under the steering column he heard and felt a * pop * in his ribs. Yikes! So he may have re-cracked a rib he cracked a few years back. Comfrey and wrapping will be had today. We may visit a doctor before we leave tomorrow too. The motel we are staying at is across the street from our local homeless shelter. So we wandered across the street to see if anyone there might be interested in a few bucks for helping us fix this part since hubby is now completely uninterested in leaning on his ribs. Lo and behold, an older gentleman, Pat, was only too happy to do so. In fact, he was replacing the exact part on his own truck! His brother is a Dodge mechanic and Pat and him have swapped mechanic stories and tips through the years. He not only knew exactly how to get the part off, he had most of the tools on him. When we asked him for his help he jumped out of his truck and said, "I know exactly how to fix that!" We told him we were only too happy to recompense his time with some cash. "Oh, I'm not worried about any money, don't you worry about that at all. Let's just fix your van." We paid him anyway. He was just overwhelmed. He also owns a few places in Houston and Gavelston. Homeless by a set of unfortunate events that placed him right in our path, a good heart we found. Life is awesome.
August 4, 2009. It's Germaine's birthday!!!! She is 8 today. We played our special birthday song. We are up fairly early for us, but we were up late last night getting back to town after buying our tent and some other necessities. Hubby is still hurting, but not too bad. Slathered him in comfrey and wrapped his ribs. Keeping an eye on him to make sure he's ok.
The kids are getting restless being in a motel room for a few days. Soon we'll be on the road and camping! We found the coolest tent at Target. First time we've shopped at Target in years and years and years. Seriously... it's been about 19 years. Anyway it's this one.
Very nice! We'll let y'all know what it's like! We also got a nice camp stove that came with the cutest little lantern! And... we needed to get a tupperwear thing to put our big bag of Oolong tea, the bag it came in epic failed in the car. * sad *
Long day today. Checked out of the motel at 10, repacked the van. Went to storage and repacked the van and the trunk of the car. Loaded up the rest of the laundry that needed doing and took it to the laundromat. Washed $37 worth of clothes, towels, etc. Wrapped up a few loose ends in town, took clean laundry that we are storing back to storage and then left Wyoming!
We made it all the way 30 miles south to L's mom's house. Pitched our tent in the dark and slept outside. We saw about 3 Texas plates on the way.
August 5, 2009. Spent the rest of the day visiting with his mom and sis then wandered down to Fort Collins and spent a little time with Rina. Wonderful few hours chatting. Shopped at Wal-Mart and ended up spending the night just a few minutes away at a rest area. Sleeping in the car can be done. Not always comfortable though. We did meet an interesting man sleeping on a picnic bench though. He was hitching across the country just because. He lives on a small stipend from a trust fund, but likes to just wander around seeing the sights and meeting folks.
August 6, 2009. Got up very early in the morning and shared our breakfast sandwhiches with our fellow traveler. Toured the Colorado visitors center, had a cup of coffee and then headed south. Outside of Denver we stopped and fueled up, got some stuff from Safeway and made reservations to stay overnight at a campground in Capulin, New Mexico. We continued on our journey south.
In Colorado Springs we visited the Garden of the Gods. It is just so beautiful there. After visiting the visitor's center we had lunch. We devised a wee harness for our kitty, Greyrocks, so he could get out of the car for a while. He enjoyed all the scents and pee mail. After lunch we continued on south and made it into Trinidad in the evening. Forgot they had moved the Wal-Mart, visited Wal-Mart for a couple more forgotten things and pushed on down to Capulin. We saw 9 Texas plates today.
Capulin. We got there about 11pm and the wind.. wow. Brother Wind was really traveling in a hurry when we got there. It definitely made putting up the tent an adventure! Aria and I asked Brother Wind to please calm down and welcome us to Texas gently. Amazingly... it did. We got the tent up and the sleeping bags out and everyone in bed by 1am. Late night.
August 7, 2009. Got up at 7am and took down the tent and repacked the van again. This time to make room for all the kiddos but Garion. Our little car is HOT, the van has AC. Took showers and re-organized. The sweet man running the campground only charged us $25 for tenting it instead of the reasonable $33 we expected.
We explored Mt. Capulin after we got all packed. It was a truly beautiful sight. It is an extinct volcano and the center of it is filled with capulin plants or chockecherries. All along the ridge the pine trees were filled with ladybugs. Millions of them! You could scoop them up with your hands there were so many!
After taking some pics, we traveled down the mountain and went to Folsom, NM. This is where they discovered the Folsom points, spearheads that point to human occupation on this continent way earlier than previously thought. We toured their little museum and there was all kinds of cool stuff in there from the early century. There was also a very interesting story of the town's phone operator. Apparently in 1908 a rare flood came down the Cimarron. This brave lady stayed at her post, calling families down river to warn them of the flood and perished herself in it. They found her body the next spring some 8 miles down river. The town was named Folsom after the maiden name of the wife of President Clevland who was born there.
We departed Folsom and continued on our journey. We crossed into Texas a lot sooner then I had expected! If you were behind us you'd have seen a lot of hand waving and cheering. :P We made it as far as Amarillo that night and stayed in Camelot. 'Twas a silly place.
August 8, 2009. The road from Amarillo to San Angelo took all day. We left Camelot at check out time, 11am. We slept in, reorganized and headed out. Found a Wal-Mart to stock up on ice and lunch meats. Meandered our way out of town and headed toward San Angelo. Talked to Kitty in Lubbock and ate lunch/early dinner at a road side picnic area. It was really pretty out there and the stone area the picnic table was on was in the shape of Texas. Very awesome.
We made it to some small town and looked for a place to camp. Epic fail on that score. Finally made it just outside of San Angelo and passed out at a rest area.
August 9, 2009. Lawrence's 42nd b-day!!! It was an earlyish morning. We woke up early but between stretching and snacking and potty, it took us an hour or so to leave. Made it into San Angelo and had breakfast at a BK. Off to Austin!
Stopped at some little town and topped off fluids and such, a nice couple asked us if we needed help. We didn't. Off to Austin again and stopped off for fuel and found out we are only an hour and a half away!!!! * joy * Went through Llano and poured ice water all over us and the kitten. He loved it. We loved it. Fricking HOT! Drove past a small wildfire. Ashley called just as we were getting into the city limits of Austin.
Thanks to some excellent navigational advice, we made it to Blake's and Ashley's intact, hot, sweaty, tired, but in Austin!!!
Oh, and hubby got a kilt!
