FROM SEA TO SHINING SEA

We’ve just returned from a pretty amazing road trip, embarked upon out of a desire this summer to see our kids. We began by considering flying to New Jersey to visit Dave & Angela in their new home. As we discussed the timing and cost of such a trip, we determined that if we drove, we’d be able to visit Tara & Joseph and Heather & Ryan as well, along the way. So we traveled first to Washington state, where it took about a minute for us to remember why we love the Pacific Northwest so much. We spent a wonderful week there with Mindy and Eric, then backtracked to Utah and left the next day for the other side of the country. With stops of a day or two in Kansas and Ohio coming and going, a week-long visit in New Jersey, and more stops in Ohio and Kansas on the return trip, we covered 5,852 miles and spent over 120 hours of actual driving time. More vital information below:

Earliest departure time: leaving Kansas City on July 3rd at 4:30 a.m.
Latest arrival time: arriving back home Sunday, July 20th, 1 a.m.
Lowest gas price paid: $3.89/gal.
Highest gas price paid: $4.19/gal.
(In our original estimate of expenses for the trip, we sadly figured we might as well plan on paying $5 a gallon for gasoline by the time we hit the road – thankfully, it wasn’t that bad. On the other hand, how gross is it that $3.89 a gallon is actually a good price?)
License plate game: 45 states, three Canadian provinces, and the District of Columbia.
States we missed: Hawaii, Nevada (no kidding), New Hampshire, Rhode Island, Vermont
Technology we really appreciate: DVDs and video games in the car.
Movies viewed: Pearl Harbor, The Mask, The Bourne Ultimatum, Stick It, The Remains of the Day, Sense & Sensibility, Artificial Intelligence, Just Like Heaven, Sahara, Goonies, Spiderman 3, Casino Royale, National Treasure, Batman Begins, Phantom of the Opera, The Count of Monte Cristo, She’s the Man, Saints and Soldiers – there may have been more, you can see a lot of movies in 120 hours!
Movie quotes heard most often: “Come on, Benny, my clothes are goin’ out of style!” “I’m baking like a toasted cheezer!” both from The Sandlot, and “According to the map, we've only gone about two inches!" from Dumb and Dumber. (Disclaimer: I may not get the movie quotes exactly right, but the kids always do....)
Funniest line of the trip: This one had many contenders but my personal favorite was Kendra to Mindy, saying over dinner preparations: “I totally understand about being a vegetarian, and I feel really sorry for the animals, but they just taste so good!”
Cutest and smartest grandchildren in the entire country: K and J in Kansas (and now A), L in Ohio, and B in New Jersey. We know this: we have just traveled from coast to coast, we've observed other people's grandchildren, and it's true.
Historical sites visited: Independence Hall and the Liberty Bell in Philadelphia, Valley Forge, the Statue of Liberty, Madison Square Gardens and Penn Station in New York City, Arlington Cemetery, our former home and elementary school in Virginia, Capitol Mall in Washington D. C., Gettysburg
Other points of interest: the network of community swimming pools and my first laser tag experience in Kansas, the National Air Force Museum in Ohio, lots of fun at the shore in New Jersey, about five minutes spent walking New York City streets about a block from Times Square, and for Scott and Kendra, the Bon Jovi concert in Central Park!
Fond memories: all of the above except the gas prices, plus (in no particular order)
¨ Early morning walks in Mindy’s neighborhood, perfect weather, beautiful views of the Sound
¨ Dashpoint Park on the Puget Sound…….. to the New Jersey shore – left coast to right coast, and they were both shining seas!
¨ Eric’s barbequed ribs. Enough said. I have four pages of handwritten notes of Eric’s recipes and cooking techniques!
¨ Holding Little L, who smiles and blows bubbles and is not so little anymore – quite a different baby than the one-week old I last saw in April
¨ Sitting on the lawn after an impressive fireworks display in Ohio, singing America, the Beautiful (Ray Charles version) and being asked by the police to leave (because the park was closing, not because of our singing. At least I think that’s why)
¨ Beautiful scenery—Snoqualmie Pass, the Columbia River Gorge, the lush, rolling hills and farmlands of eastern Ohio and Pennsylvania were, I think, my favorites. At one point, Bruce took a wrong turn and ended up with an incredibly scenic drive through the Appalachian mountains, but alas, the rest of us were asleep……
¨ J-boy, wanting to participate in laser tag, using Tara’s gun as she, wearing the vest, followed him around. Be sure to picture Tara nine months pregnant as you visualize this :-)
¨ Being rolled, dragged, and beaten by the waves on the New Jersey shore, and laughing so hard that I couldn’t get up – this was following a weekend of hurricane warnings
¨ K asking me to tell her stories about when her mom was a little girl
¨ Scott’s oft-quoted line, every time we’d wake him early for the day’s adventure or the next leg of the trip: “I’m on vacation!”
¨ Playing 1 – 2 – 3333333 with Bailey, watching her refine her walking skills, having her all to ourselves while the others went to the Bon Jovi concert
¨ Scott drooling over the lifeguard at the Best Western in Virginia – “lotioning and oiling, oiling and lotioning, smiling ….. I can’t take it no more!”
Things we didn’t have time for and will have to see on the next trip: too many to list
Wonderful people who are so worth driving over 120 hours to go and visit: Mindy and Eric, Tara, Joseph, K, and J-boy, Heather, Ryan, and little L, Dave, Angela, and Bailey

I'll get pictures posted soon, meanwhile, look at Dave and Angela's blog for a slide show of our time in New Jersey!