Our plan for today is to spend about 7 hours on the road. We are shooting for a double feature of A Very Grand Canyon Sunset followed by A Very Grand Canyon Sunrise before we take off for our last leg of the trip.
We have been having such a great time on our little adventure that it barely feels like we spent 13 hours in the car yesterday. That's right, 13. We settled into our hotel and decided to have a celebratory drink before bed. ::clink:: Cheers! We needed that. I'm pretty sure my mom missed her calling as a truck driver.
It was nice to see someone besides each other, gas station employees and truckers so we spent some time chatting with our bartender who was originally from Connecticut and recently moved to the southwest also. He assured me that I will love it. He also assured my mom that she will love flying and traveling. I'm going to believe him.
On day 2 of our trip, we visited Graceland. I can see why we were steered clear of staying in Memphis for the night. It felt like Wilkinsburg ...after a tornado? Anyway, go me for not booking a hotel near the attraction.
Rewind. As I'm sure many of you know, in 1999 I was in that Penn State bus wreck and watched it happen. Since then, I have stayed away from buses and shuttles because I am young enough to walk and sensitive enough to get car sick from the parking garage to the building where I work, it's true. Avoid avoid avoid.
Graceland pulled a quick one on me! There were giant walls that did not allow you to see what was inside until you got there. We payed for our tickets and the woman directed us to the photo booth and into a line for.... The shuttle. Crap.
Like everything else in life, I took it like a good girl and put on my big girl pants and a set of headphones for the tour. Once we boarded, we were directed to listen to the introduction by pressing 1 on our player while the driver crossed the highway into the area where we would see the Graceland Mansion. As she crossed over into the driveway, there was a small guard station to the right and a truck pulling down the driveway on the left. She hugged the station so close that I uncomfortably watched through the window across the aisle from us. As expected, she busted out two windows on the corner and I watched it happen, again. No fair. Glass shattered everywhere. Luckily no one was hurt but the woman closest to the windows had it in her hair and kept saying "I just need somewhere to go to empty it out of my bra" And again I gave my name and phone number to a stranger so they could assure everyone was not hurt.
We went on our merry way through the tour. It. Was. Incredible. We took lots of photos that I will post in bulk later but wow, I am glad I sucked it up for another shuttle ride and detour on our trip. It made me wonder, what musician today is that big where an attraction will be set up in his or her memory? We thought maybe Michael Jackson, but no one else really came to mind.
After our time in Memphis, we hurried through Arkansas and into Oklahoma for the night. Ick. My two least favorite states so far. The drivers in Arkansas were very aggressive and rude. "Hey! Don't you see this giant cargo bag on my car and my Pennsylvania plates" is what my eyes told every one of them, with or without a side of a finger. Whoops!
Oklahoma was the opposite. Very slow and laid back. I will forever remember it as dust, beetles and where Max finally took his first poo on the trip. Relief!
Yesterday, day 3, was our long day. Not much to report as far as adventure goes. We were toying with the idea of traveling north and catching route 66 to see what it had to show us. I bought an app for my phone that navigated us down but most of the pins reported "this was awesome to see, but it's up for sale" so we decided against adding 2 hours onto our longest day and just picking up 66 where it overlapped on our original route. Thank goodness we didn't go.
We left Oklahoma, had a picnic lunch in the shade at a gas station and high tailed it through Texas and into New Mexico. The scenery has been enjoyable to watch but became outstandingly different once we hit Texas. It was like someone knocked the walls down! I couldn't get over how flat it was and how far we could see. There really wasn't that MUCH to see, some grass, cows, windmills and armadillo road kill. I have yet to see a live one or a cactus. At one point my mom and I looked at each other like, "Did you fart?" We collapsed in laughter when we looked out the window and saw a beef farm with tons and tons of cows. A-ha! I might go vegan after that show.
Part of me is jealous because I was blessed with a shy colon. Apparently it came from my mom. We are having a race to see who will "go" first. All false alarms so far. Max won several states ago. Men.
We are just under 100 miles into our day and set to arrive around 3pm, MST. This will give us plenty of time to work on our race and freshen up in time for our double feature. Maybe it will even be a triple feature if we have a winner today.
Stay tuned. Love, hugs and plenty of movements to come.
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