On the Trail of Manny, Sid, and Diego

Yesterday was Easter Sunday, so we went to the church we attended when we lived here in Chicago. Easter breakfast has been a long-standing tradition, so it was nice to have a chance to chat with many old friends and family before the service.

After church, we went back to R's aunties' to pack our bags for a quick trip up to Wisconsin. Then we headed over in the late afternoon to crash the gathering at R's cousin's son's house. (This is his dad's side of the family that we usually see when we come back to Chicago, as well as in Vegas at our reunions.) Most of the cousins' kids now have littles of their own, so it was fun to watch them scramble around the backyard to hunt for Easter eggs! We hung out for a bit after dinner (so much good food!) and then hit the road straight from there. Once on I-90 west, it took us about 2 hours to reach our hotel in Madison, WI.

Circle the Wagons

In the 1800s, a wagon would have taken 8-10 weeks to travel between Independence, MO and Santa Fe, NM along the Santa Fe Trail. Thankfully, we were able to drive it in four days and see/do lots of fun things along the way!

Altogether, we spent 11 days on this trip - two in Chicago, two visiting my parents, and seven on the road between Illinois and California.

3117 miles

Take It Easy

The penultimate day of our drive back home to California put us back into familiar territory, for the most part. We've driven this stretch of I-40 before, except for the section between Grants, NM and Sanders, AZ, when we took a slight detour to visit El Malpais National Monument and El Morro National Monument in 2016.

385 miles, 6.5 hours

Stuck in the Middle with You

When we road trip, we are usually sleeping in a different place each night. Throw in exhaustion from the previous day's activities on top of disorientation from only being semi-conscious, and it's almost guaranteed that I will narrowly miss bashing my face into a wall as I try to find my way to the bathroom in the dark without my glasses. Today I woke up in the middle of the night especially confused, thinking that we were home because the winds were howling outside just like the Santa Anas in Southern California. 

And they were still gusting at about 30 mph(!) this morning at Fort Larned National Historic Site when we arrived around 8:30AM. After getting our obligatory pic of the entrance sign, we drove in to the parking lot and walked about a quarter-mile to the visitor center. 

Hang on!

Stamp On

In my post about our trip back to Illinois last September, I blogged about trying to earn the Silver Master Traveler Award from the National Park Travelers Club by visiting at least 35 units across 5 regions and collecting 75 stamps minimum in 2023. Sadly, R's dad passed away just two weeks after we saw him in Chicago, so the rest of our fall travel plans were put to the side as we grieved our loss and settled his estate. The four of us returned again in November to celebrate his life. 

Then R and I both got an early Christmas present (COVID - ugh!), so the last few weeks of December were spent recuperating on the couch instead of visiting parks and getting stamps.

2023 final count:  31 units | 5 regions | 79 stamps 

The Road Less Traveled

Having stuffed ourselves over the past three days, my only regret was that we didn't have another meal (or stomach space) left to squeeze in a pizza from Monical's. Next time. *sigh*

We polished off the leftover bao for breakfast, and then loaded up the car to head back up to Chicago. But we couldn't leave before taking the usual photo of the boys with the grandparents.

March Madness

Since both the college freshman (M) and the "how-long-until-SAT|ACT|AP-tests are over" junior (J) have spring break this week, we decided to take a quick road trip. Not sure how many more opportunities we'll have to travel like this as a family, so I'm thankful that they still want to go places with us. J's only request was that we visit someplace "Instagram-worthy". 

Hmmm, that's a tall order, son...

Looking for Lincoln

So, we're here for our annual trek back to Illinois. The primary purpose for this trip is to watch M conclude his summer-long drum and bugle corps tour with Pacific Crest at DCI Championships in Indianapolis. We're also spending some time with family, too. Unfortunately, we won't be visiting any new NPS units. 😢

But there are always NPS passport cancellations to collect, which is what brought us to Atlanta, IL today.

First stop - Atlanta Public Library for the Abraham Lincoln National Heritage Area stamp!

They Might Be Giants

Not many things could bring us to visit Las Vegas in the sweltering heat of summer except a family reunion and basketball. With the NBA Summer League expanding to all 30 teams, we're getting the most bang for our buck on this trip!

Like the last family reunion, we are down a man again. M is missing out on this one because he is touring all over the country this summer with Pacific Crest Drum and Bugle Corps. We'll catch up with him in August at Drum Corps International's World Championships in Indianapolis.

More on that later. Let's get back to Vegas...

Wonderful Waterfalls

As I was looking into things to do during our short time in Portland, a segway tour of the city sounded it could be really fun. But a segway tour of Portland in the cold and rain?

Not so much.

So, we moved on to Plan B for today: driving the scenic Historic Columbia River Highway. 

Melting Points

By the numbers...

• 3057 miles
• 8 states
• 15 new NPS units
• 38 NPS passport stamps
• 19 NPS Centennial stamps
• 2 state capitals
• 6 smushed pennies
• 4 cans of spray paint

Flint and Spray Paint

This morning we were up early again and on the road to our first destination, Lake Meredith National Recreation Area. The park offers ranger-guided kayak tours on Monday mornings, so M was disappointed that we were visiting there a day too late. (He really enjoyed the one we did in Whiskeytown NRA in 2014.)

I had made reservations for a 10:00AM ranger-led tour at nearby Alibates Flint Quarries National Monument, so the extent of our visit to Lake Meredith consisted of stopping by the visitor center (for my passport stamps) and then heading over to see the lake. From the boat launch, it was very apparent how much the water level has dropped.

Flying Saucers

Carlsbad, NM is only about an hour or so away from Roswell. Being a nerdy geek (is that redundant?!), of course I had to visit! So, our very first stop this morning was the International UFO Museum and Research Center.

Bats and Horses

From Abraham Lincoln Birthplace NHP, we headed north to Louisville. Our next stop was the Louisville Slugger Museum. Many years ago, before basketball was king, the boys played a few seasons of Little League. And at the time, Uncle K talked about us all going to Louisville to check out the factory. So, it was especially fitting for us to visit now.

Put me in, Coach!

Miners and Gunfighters

Kartchner Caverns had been highly recommended to us, but since we knew we were going to explore the cave at Coronado National Memorial, we decided to see the Queen Mine in Bisbee instead. Glad I made reservations for the 10:30AM tour a few weeks ago because it was sold out when we arrived! 

Ancient Ruins

What do you do when Christmas break is approaching, you have a Best Western free hotel night voucher about to expire, and you're itching to get away? If you're me (and last time I checked, I am), then you look at a map to see where the closest national park units are that you haven't been to yet *AND* you price hotels for the most expensive place to cash in the voucher. That narrowed down the choices to...

Barn Sour

We woke up on the western edge of Minnesota, but the boys were determined to make it to Chicago TONIGHT! So, today was just "go, go, go"!

Before leaving Pipestone, we headed back to the monument visitor center so that the boys could get their Jr. Ranger badges (and I could get my picture of the sign!)

As for the Rest of South Dakota...

We spent the night at the Sunshine Inn, a small motel in Wall, SD. Normally I'd pick a chain place, but this one was half the rate and even still, had excellent reviews on TripAdvisor. I'd definitely agree with the other reviewers - the room was clean, the couple who own the motel were nice and gladly filled up our ice chest, and it was only a block away from Wall Drug! I'm also going to take some space here to give the TripAdvisor website two big thumbs up! It has been invaluable in choosing places to stay, as well as finding things to do -- not only for this trip, but also for others that we've taken. The forums are also a great place to get advice from local experts.

All done with the public service announcements, now back to our regularly scheduled programming...

Black Hills in a Day

I knew when I started planning this trip that we were not going to have time to see everything. The hardest part was deciding what things were going to make the cut. There is so much to do in the Black Hills area of South Dakota -- we would need at least a couple more days to cover what we missed. Hopefully we'll make it back someday...

Les Trois Tetons

We had a beautiful morning driving up through Logan Canyon. The Logan River was running pretty fast – I think it was near flood stage, but I'm not sure if it has crested yet or not. When we came over the summit, we stopped at a rest area with a scenic overlook of Bear Lake.

Bear Lake