5/19/22-5/21/22 PA -> WV -> OH -> IN -> IL -> MO -> KS -> CO -> UT (+ -> AZ)
32 hours. Almost a full work week of just driving. We’ve done a lot of road trips…LP -> UP; MI -> WI; and MI -> MD. Nothing quite to this level. But, for our national park pick for Christmas, our niece chose Bryce Canyon National Park. We thought about flying, but were committed to bringing Dori with us.
On 5/19 we went from PA -> WV -> OH -> IN -> IL -> MO -> KS. PA and WV were lush, green, foggy, and mountainous. We hit crazy storms and tornado warnings in Illinois. After we hit a clear patch of weather, we stopped at a gas station and had some backpacking food. On to St. Louis where we lost a lot of time in traffic. In Missouri there were June bugs everywhere!! They were unavoidable as we were stretching outside of the car. Our goal for the day was to get the boring stuff out of the way and get as close to Colorado as we could. We ended up at a rest stop in Kansas with bright lights shining on us and a drunk woman standing in front of our car swaying, reading a Kansas history sign, and eating McDonald’s fries. Definitely not a great night of sleep with Dori growling at people and the thick humidity.
5/20 KS -> CO. Kansas was so long I got the Kansas blues. We saw endless windmills and Wizard of Oz winery signs. The landscape goes on forever. So weird compared to the green tunnel that is the East coast. I literally teared up when we drove up to the “Welcome to Colorful Colorado” sign. We were finally in Colorado!!! The start of the drive in Colorado was so bumpy that we hit air in the Kia haha oops. While sitting in Denver traffic, Kealy was on the phone working on selling our Michigan home. Driving through Colorado was surreal, I honestly can’t even put it into words. We were driving up and over the most beautiful mountains with non-existant guardrails a lot of the time. In the mountainous areas, we drove through a snow storm, so a lot of what we saw was the tops of trees. We couldn’t actually see the mountains, but could see the spectacular Glenwood Canyon (we’ll be back). By this point, we were so mentally exhausted and tired of sitting upright. I got us a hotel room in Grand Junction, CO and we grabbed some burgers at Rockslide Brewing. Dori grr’ed at every noise in the hotel room.
5/21 CO -> UT. We made it to Utah!!! I have been dreaming of going to Utah for years. We actually had time to spare before the rest of our crew made it to the AirBnB so we explored Arches National Park (stay tuned for another post). Between swollen feet, sunburns, and dehydration, we made it to the cabin for dinner and a campfire (on camera haha).
There will be several blogs on our Utah trip!
