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Published: August 2nd 2008
Eureka Springs
The only way to get in this church is through the steeple. Weird!As the title implies, we just took a road trip. Though we didn't traverse ALL of USA, we covered a significant chunk of the beautiful land. Somewhere around 5000 miles actually. We left Tucson and headed west. Our first stop was in Roswell, NM. Though this was definitely not the fastest, most direct route it was definitely gorgeous. We were not expecting New Mexico to look like it did. We were expecting adobe buildings, cacti--you know, like AZ. We were pleasantly surprised by the mountains and trees. Even Roswell wasn't what we expected. It had more of a midwest feel than the southwest. Very cute town. Or is it a city? After we ate lunch in a park and visited the UFO museum we headed out on the road again. Seeing as though we were on a budget, we brought our own food and took turns driving while the other slept. FUN!!!! Our first destination was Eureka Springs, AR. We stayed there a few days with my cousin Joe, climbed through the steep streets, ate great food, saw an awesome band from Austin and generally relaxed in this quaint town that we fell in love with when we visited last year.
Chicago
Alexander Calder's Flamingo Sculpture Seriously, if you want to go to a place that completely kills stereo types of how you think a certain state is--go here! After a few days in Eureka we headed north to Missouri. There we ate lunch with my old friends & their adorable daughter. After a few hours of catching up we headed towards Illinois. We did our travelling very soon after the flooding of the Mississippi River. When we drove through St. Louis and surrounding areas you could see the waters were still high. Then the rain came. And it came. Jeff took me through Normal, Illinois where he lived when he was a kid. After what seemed like days of driving we finally reached the Chicago area. We stayed with and visited a lot of his family and of course we had to go into the city for the obligatory sight seeing (even though we've both been there numerous times). Somehow I'd never been in the Sear's Tower so we headed on up. I've heard so many scary stories about how loud & windy it is in the elevator and how you can feel the building swaying when you are on the viewing deck. I'm negating
what all of those people have told me! I found it to be extremely serene. It really didn't seem that high up. And the hustle & bustle on the streets below was muted by the height. It was almost as though I was staring onto a still movie set. It seemed fake. If it weren't for the hundreds of tourists swarming around me, I could have easily sat against one of the windows and daydreamed out them for hours. After spending a few days in the burbs, we headed to Jeff's gramp's lake house on Cedar Lake in Indiana where we spent the 4th of July. Then we were off again to my hometown of South Bend, IN. For those of you who live there or have lived there, you know there's not much to the place. But it was still great seeing everyone and showing Jeff around my old 'hoods😊 While we were in SB, we took a side trip (with my one of my sister's & our friend Jenn from Tucson) to Cedar Point Amusement Park in Sandusky, Ohio. If you love amusement parks, this one should be numero uno on your list! Six Flags doesn't compare! At
CP we met up with some other friends who drove in from New York. After Cedar Point we went to climb the dunes and frolic in the crystal clear waters of Lake Michigan. Is that even possible? Yes! Lake MI can actually be clear!! And the skies were so clear that day that you could see the skyline of Chicago across the lake. After spending more time in South Bend we drove south to Chattanooga Tennessee to spend some time with Jeff's parents. We did lots of sightseeing and had a wonderful time! After about 3 weeks of travelling we said goodbye and headed back to AZ. While driving through Louisiana we visited a safari park. I usually have issues with zoos & places like that because I feel bad for the animals going from thousands of acres of land to a small cage. But this place seemed to have good sized acreage for the animals to roam. And the place is part of programs that help some of the extinct & endangered animals within it's confines.
It was definitely a long trip, not cheap because of gas prices, but so worth it because not only did we get
to see so much of the gorgeous landscape, we got to see old friends & family we hadn't seen in a while😊 For those of you we missed or weren't able to spend lots of time with--we'll catch up again sometime in the near future!
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Nichole
non-member comment
Amazing trip
The pics are great and you were able to go to some cool places. Chicago is one of those cities you can go to a hundred times and walk around and sight see. It's one place I'll definitely miss when we move there. Every time I'm there I feel like a kid at a circus and I have to take in all the sights and sounds. And yeah...people are totally over exaggerating the elevators @ The Sears Tower, yeah they are fast, but not scary! I'm glad you got to get out this way, it was awesome to see you and Jenn and finally meet Jeff. Can't wait to see you all again real soon!