East Coast Trip
a trip by 50 States Before They Graduate
From: August 2nd 2013
Until: August 18th 2013
![Here we go!]( "Here we go!")
Here we go!
August 2nd 2013
Our family, out of an interest in maps, travel and our country, have decided to travel 50 states before our kids graduate (at least by the time our youngest graduates high school). We have separated the country into doable parts and our first summer vacation trip is through the East Coast via Niagara Falls. We will travel from Michigan with stops in Niagara Falls, Albany, NY, Burlington, VT, Boothbay, ME, Boston, MA, Mystic, CT, NJ, NY, Delaware, MD and finishing in Philly and Pittsburg, PA.
While planning this trip, we were trying to figure out what our next vehicle would be and whether it would be comfortable to drive that long distance. After looking at Tahoes and Suburbans and Yukons and Explorers, they just didn't thrill me. They are just big. Then I looked at the Explorer Conversion Vans to rent for the trip. After seeing how nice they are, I asked my husband what he thought about buying that instead. Let's just say they are less money, more luxurious and same gas mileage as the SUVs. So, here we are today driving a conversion van, aka, Ginormica, the Beast, the Beotch (Modern Family episode). We lovingly refer to ourselves as the Griswolds.
Our kids LOVE the van. All kids LOVE the van. Adults think we are crazy. Let me tell you, it is so comfortable and so easy to drive. The front end is much shorter than an SUV making it easy to corner and park. It has a 26 inch tv and looks like a limo inside. The seats also turn to face each other. Selling feature. Our kids aren't allowed to watch tv except on special occasions like new kids in the car, sometimes a hard working week at school and birthdays.
Which brings me to our trip. I have purchased videos about the states we will be visiting and some of their history. They will be able to watch those along the way. We will also bring some of their favorite videos. I have created booklets that I have used in my classroom for each state. "You have won a trip to Maine!" They have to fill in information using maps, looking stuff up on the ipad (we will turn on our wifi hotspot on our iphone so the ipad can be used on the trip and NOT for only Minecraft). I will share pics and files if you'd like to use them.
I have spent hours researching each state to figure out what location best represents each state and where to stay. Not easy but fun. I am good at this. I plan all of our vacations. I have also been using http://www.roadtripper.com to plan the trip. It shows you all of the restaurants, hotels and attractions along your route. Pretty cool.
We may be hitting the Jello Museum, a Spiderweb farm, Diana's Baths Waterfalls, Ben & Jerrys and more. We like to do off-beat things along with some touristy things. We limit the high cost things. We will be seeing Potted Potter Off-Broadway in NY and doing the Boston Trolley/Duck tour which are higher cost things. I will share more along the way. We are also going to attempt the Geocaching treasure hunt along the way. People hide treasures around the country for you to find using a GPS. We'll see how that works.
So, follow us on the first leg of our US adventure. Share comments and questions.
Trip Length: 2 weeks
Blog Entries: 17
Photos: 215
Words: 10289
Blog Entries
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