Road Trip - Part I

I've been meaning to start posting about our trip since we left, but just haven't found the time.  I don't know how far I will get tonight, but I wanted to at least get started.  I fully suspect that this is the virtual equialent of watching someone else's vacation slides, so feel free to skip this one if that is not your cup of tea.

I had three weeks left of maternity leave and I was going a little stir crazy at home, so I decided to pack my 5 week old, my 3 year old and my 16 year old in our minivan, affectionately known as the "living room on wheels" and go see about 1/3 of the country. A little insane?  Probably, but I don't regret it at all.  Sadly, Jack and Vivian are not likely to remember much of it, but Nick and I sure will. Photo Challenge 21 is appropriately entitled, Memories. I'll share some of our favorite memories here.

Where did the idea for the road trip start?  Well, we had already decided that Vivian would be baptized at my grandparents' church in Georgia on June 24th.  Bernie had to work through June 22nd, so the plan was for me to drive to Blairsville and Bernie would fly in late on the 22nd so that we would be there to organize things for the baptism. We were invited to LaDonna and Dean's first anniversary party in Louisiana which was one week earlier; and at that point, the plans for a serious road trip really began to percolate.

After packing what seemed like everything we owned, we set out on Sunday, June 10th.  The plan was to drive about five hours to Hershey, Pennslyvania, visit Hershey's Chocolate World and then continue driving and stay overnight in Columbus, OH.  The very first day of the trip, I learned the importance of being flexible, if the trip was to be an enjoyable success.

The first thing we did when we got to Chocolate World was go on the free ride that tells you all about how Chocolate is made; Jack loved this:

Jack has recently enjoyed the movie, Charlie and the Chocolate Factory, so I thought he would like to actually be involved in the chocolate making process. I purchased tickets to the Create Your Own Chocolate Bar attraction, and we waited in line. When it was our turn, and Jack was told he had to wear a hair net, he flat out refused and that brought on a full-on temper tantrum. We ended up leaving Chocolate World without being able to experience very much of it, and with me questioning whether we should just cancel the trip and head home. From there, we headed for the Hershey Story Muesum.  Not knowing if Jack would actually cooperate and having difficulty finding parking that would accomodate the car top carrier, we headed for a playground instead.  We found Cocoa Castle, which was featured at some point on Jon and Kate Plus Eight (admittedly a former guilty pleasure, though I don't remember seeing this particular episode). It was a great way to allow Jack to let off some steam and then ultimately continue our journey.

The entire town of Hershey smells like Chocolate and is centered around that tasty treat.  There is even a Chocolate Workers' Union. 



I had planned to make it to Columbus, OH that first night but those plans were foiled when the GPS decided to take us on the Pennslyvania Turnpike.  The PA Turnpike is a disaster.  Almost the entire thing is under construction, which means driving through a very long state, east to west at a speed limit of 45 miles per hour.  Add in a ridiculous amount of tractor trailer traffic that seems to be driving at about twice what is allowed, narrow jersey barriers, and tunnels through mountains that appear to be unstable, and what you end up with is an unhappy momma that barely made it to the Ohio state line that first night.  I was apalled when I got to the end and they actually insisted that I pay them $14+.  It really made my appreciate the CT DOT, our roads are never that bad!

We ended up spending that first night in St. Clairsville, OH, in a room overlooking (of all things) the parking lot of a Toys R Us.  Lucky for me, we left in the morning before they opened, and Jack seemed satisfied with the explanation that the store was simply closed.  Nevermind that it was likely to open in about ten minutes!

The plan for Monday was to tour the Lousiville Zoo and meet an old friend for lunch.  Being so far behind schedule, neither of those plans materialized. Instead, we ventured on to our next destination which was to visit Bernie's brother, Gary, at the infirmary at St. Meinrad's Archabbey.

Here is a picture of Gary wearing his back brace otherwise known as his "turtle shell."  We are optimistic that he will only have to wear it for a few weeks.  Gary was very excited to meet Vivian, as she is his only niece. We wanted Jack to be included in this picture but he wasn't interested.

Jack has been very much into statutes so many of the pictures of this trip will include Jack standing next to some sort of inanimate object. Here he is imitating a statue at the monastery.

As we were leaving St. Meinrad, we drove through Santa Claus, Indiana.  This is a very small town where everything is centered around Christmas.  The Catholic Church in town was Saint Nicholas, the shopping center was Kris Kringle Plaza and there is an amusement park called Holiday World.  Like most three year olds, Jack loves Christmas.  We had to stop on the side of the road to take this picture:

We also stopped at the Santa Claus Museum, which was accurately described by a local as likely to be about the size of a postage stamp.  It was way more about the town than St. Nicholas himself, but Jack still enjoyed what they had to offer.  It took all of ten minutes to explore the entire museum.



From Indiana, the original plan was to head to Texas via Arkansas. I wanted to see the Clinton Presidential Library in Little Rock and Nick wanted to go to Space Center Houston.  I also wanted to stop and see my friend, Lesley, and have some Max'N Cheese at Max's Wine Dive. We were getting tired and Houston was about ten hours out of the way. So, we decided instead to head to St. Louis.

The St. Louis Cardinals were in town that evening, so we headed for Busch Field to watch them beat the Chicago Cubs, 7-6.  Right outside the stadium was a giant macaroni sculpture.  Since Bernie works for Kraft Foods,we couldn't resist this photo opportunity:

It was Vivian's first MLB game and Jack's first of the 2012 season.  Jack really got into things like clapping, yelling "charge," and doing the wave.  Nick and I were both presently surprised by the price and availability of tickets.  We bought them at the stadium at a kiosk right before the game started.  Most of the time for the Yankees, it seems the only way to get tickets is at inflated prices through Stub Hub, unless you know a season ticket holder, or log on to Ticketmaster right as they go on sale.  We had a great time.  Here are some pics of the kids at the stadium:

On Wednesday, June 16th, Nick wanted to go visit the famous Gateway Arch before heading south.

For those of you who haven't been there, there is a museum about St. Louis in the ground underneath the Arch. This is also where you can board the ride that takes you to the top of the Arch.  The ride is slow and manageable for most people.  I decided not to brave it with Jack and the baby.  Nick went by himself while we waited outside and he really seemed to enjoy it.  Here is a picture of what the pod looks like that takes you through the monument, and also one of Busch Field, looking down from the top of the Arch.

For lunch, my Dad had suggested us stopping at Reifschneider's Grill and Grape. I definitely wanted to check it out, but it was a little bit out of the way.  The plan was to drive from St. Louis to Jackson, Missisippi and stop at the Cape Splash Family Aquatic Center for a few hours to let Jack run around. When we pulled into the Waterpark, Jack was fast asleep and Nick was unimpressed.  We tried to wake Jack a few times with little luck, so we kept on driving.

We got to Memphis right around dinner time.  I had really wanted to see the National Civil Rights Museum, but by the time we got there, it were closed. We headed for Beale Street instead. My dad goes to Memphis every year for a blues competition and suggested we stop at Huey's Blues, Brews and Burgers. The highlight of dinner was when Nick took multiple attempts to shoot his toothpick through his straw and stick it in the ceiling with the hundreds of other toothpicks already up there.  This is just one small section of the ceiling:

It was bike night on Beale Street and we got there just as the crowd was gearing up for evening activities. 

The zipper to Vivian's diaper bag broke while we were here and everything was falling out.  We stopped into the Hard Rock Cafe and purchased a back pack to solve that problem. From Memphis on, we had to stop into all the Hard Rock Cafes in our path to purchase pins for the diaper bag.  Beale Street was very cool, but not so much fun with little kids and the giant jogging stroller.  It is definitely a place I will need to revisit someday.

We got back in the car, and Nick convinced me that instead of driving a few hours to Jackson, we could make it all the way to Baton Rouge and not have to spend much time in the car on Thursday.  Jack was content sleeping and watching movies, so we did it.  We got to Baton Rouge at 2:30am and had a really hard time finding a hotel room. I am convinced that many hotels will not let you check in after a certain time, because no one seemed to have any vacancy.  We finally called Holiday Inn and they got us into what appeared to be a decent hotel, but was ultimately not as clean as we would have hoped.  Being that late with three kids in tow, I was happy just to have a place to sleep. 

To be continued...