The Great American Road Trip

Day 11 - Destination: Sacramento, CA

2006-07-27T23:34:00.000-05:00

Santa Barbara was still having decidedly "unseasonal" weather when we left the next morning as the town opened again. Susi talked to her Mom (yeah she did) in the other Santa Barbara Starbucks and then we walked down to Java Jones (cool atmosphere, free wireless, good pasteries and decent coffee -- we'd go again!) to try to post a bit. Ha. Ha-ha.

Back on the road, the foggy stuff kept us chilly, but also kept us from seeing the ocean for a good part of our drive. We kept our eyes mostly on the inland side, catching cool glimpses as the clouds cleared of wineries, wildfloweres and hillsides. I noticed that the best views were often the times when you most needed to keep your eyes on the road ahead of you. The road began doing the S-curve thing, and on the > part, right at the base of the curve, you were generally looking directly up a valley.

We listened to our California mix (thank you Stephen!) again, "driving down the 101 - California here we come!" and had a great time - unaware of what was to come. (Is the foreshadowing too heavy?)

One of the highlights of the day was noticing a little road sign on the main highway, for the town of Harmony. When we'd been planning the trip, we'd looked for towns near the midpoint of the drive to Sacramento, and picked this one as "sounding cute and fun". When we looked it up online, there were no motels, which makes a lot more sense, now that there's a road sign telling us 18 people live here! We got off the main road and found that the town of Harmony is a post office, an art glass shop, a pottery shop, a few abandoned buildings and a few houses. The glass shop was closed, but we mailed some postcards, bought some stamps (the post office had an impassioned plea to kind-hearted tourists to help keep it alive), read the town's history, did some shopping and oohing and aahing at the pottery store, and offered our souls as sacrifices to the gods of marriage. Wait. Did I write that last part? Oops. It was a fun little town and it would have been nice to stay there. The call at the post office (who also worked up the road in another town) said maybe next time we come through, there will be more here. No pictures of cool pottery, because I don't want to spoil the surprise of any presents. ;)

Then the drive started to get fun. This is what we were thinking about when we talked about about driving up the coast. The road winds, the sun shines, the music plays loud and the ocean sparkles all around us. We pulled into a couple of the "towns" (barely bigger than Harmony!) in search of gas and seeing that it was a one-pump station, full service only, with a price tag of $4.45 a gallon, decided to pass and keep driving. As we're getting close to desperate enough to stop, we see maybe the best view of the whole trip - and there's a restaurant right there.

As we come down the driveway and see people taking pictures from the rocks, I start to think I'm hungry. We figure, if it's too expensive, we just get drinks and take our pictures. Well, I wouldn't recommend Rocky Point restaurant for dinner for a budget-conscious friend, but it worked out great for us to get some cheesy bread (just thinking about it makes me hungry) and sandwiches and enjoy the patio. It was crazy windy, a little chilly and a much-needed break.

As we left, we found out that the next town up the road had real gas stations and grocery stores and stuff, which was a big relief. When we stopped there, we talked with a guy who travels a lot, who told us about a road closure up ahead, and told us we still had at least three hours to Sacramento. Since it was 6 already, and we weren't planning on taking the freeway type roads, it was looking like our destination wouldn't work out. Susi called our planned host, and we developed a new plan - San Fran! The pressure was off, we'd find a motel somewhere, we were free to keep driving as long as we liked and stop whenever we wanted. Which is how we found a beach above Monterrey to watch the sunset from. The beach to me has always meant miles and miles of sand - I'm not sure I like the rocky cliffs thing. I mean, pretty, yes, but also pretty inhospitable! Most of the time you can pick and scramble your way up or down, but if you forget sunscreen in the car... Well, this beach was a great mixture: bigger rocks of the southern edge, and a nice little sandy cove to the north, with small pebbles that caught the light and the waves beautifully, and made clacking percussion noises as the waves moved them back and forth.

As we loaded these pictures into the computer, each one made us think it needed to be a desktop image. Please. Click them, make them bigger. They like it. They want to be viewed! They're a small sampling of a large family, back on Sara's harddrive.

Back on the road, the detour because of the mudslide was well-marked and publicized, and not as worrisome and warning as it should have been (dum dum dum) and we rolled into San Fran around 9:30. I'm sure it would have been a fun city, but we just stopped a Starbucks in Chinatown and headed north again, excited for the Golden Bridge and all that lay beyond. We had coffee, we had a full tank of gas, we weren't hungry, didn't have to pee and foresaw a fun night drive. We were wrong. But that's another story, and I'll let Susi tell it another day!

Day 10 - Destination: Santa Barbara, CA

2006-07-26T16:31:00.000-05:00

once again, we were hittin' the road. i got up early, hoping to meet megan, who works as a nurse and keeps nurse hours (as in, she goes to work at 9pm and gets home at 7:30am, thereafter promptly going to bed. i don't know how nurses do it). i changed up the back window while i waited eagerly to catch her on her way in. and i was successful. :) we had a great chat (turns out, she, too, is a laura ingalls wilder fan) and then sara and i said goodbye to our little apartment. just want to say, i loved the decor:

we locked up, left our little hostess gifts for ted & megan and rich & melissa, and restuffed our little bug. here again, we were headed into uncharted territory for me as well as sara. i was excited for the drive ahead, and still giddy from our adventure into mexico.
obviously, we had to stop at the local starbucks (where we'd already spent a good deal of time during our stay). for once, i was more alert than sara, i think just from getting up earlier. we hung out in the shade for a little bit before getting on the road. i wanted sara to have a little time to get some caffeine in her system so she wouldn't miss anything.

about an hour into our drive, we got onto "the 1", the pacific coast highway, with visions of grandeur and oceanside driving filling our heads. it really was a beautiful drive. entering california from the west, like we had on day 8, you wonder at all those people back in the 1840's who thought of california as a new eden. everything was brown, dried up, and hot. unbearably hot. the desert seemed to stretch on forever--not a sahara type desert, with miles and miles of sand dunes and camels--but a dry, dusty, barren, mountainous desert, with brittle, vaguely green shrubs dotting sandy dirt. but somehow, you come out on the other side, to the coast, and life and beauty spring forth. southern california is still very dry and has plenty of brown. but all through it brilliant colors and unique foliage are woven through. it overflows with wild oleander in brilliant pinks, virgin whites, orange touched reds. palm trees and strange green shrub-like trees that shoot up straight, tall, and narrow interrupt the brown hillsides. beautiful. and the coast itself is even greener and abounding in flowers and trees and the ocean--deep blue--so different from the atlantic. you begin to understand californians better, just by being here and seeing what they see. at the same time, you can't help wonder: "do they still see the lovely corner of the world in which they live?" as i absorbed the culture around me, i couldn't help thinking that the atmosphere and weather, the landscape, even people's clothes, felt like carefree saturdays.

we weren't exactly sure what our plans were for the drive. we planned to take our time and if we saw somewhere we felt like stopping, we would. the first place that caught our attention long enough to make us stop was newport beach, where christy miller first experienced california. you know, christy miller, who moved with her family from wisconsin to escondido after visiting her aunt and uncle who lived in newport beach. of course we had to stop! we followed the signs for the actual beach and, lucky for us,
found parking (free) in a residential area near a public entrance to the beach. excited at touching and tasting the pacific for the first time in our very long lives (i mean, 25 is OLD), we slipped out of our sandals and walked down the sand to the shore. there were a lot of people on the beach, which, at least to me, was a little new, since i'm so used to the beaches of the outer banks. it looked like you imagine beaches are supposed to look when you're a kid. brightly striped beach umbrellas filling up the sandscape, kids running and screaming and splashing, dads lifting their little ones over waves at the very last minute, scantily clad teen girls self-consciously lying in the warmth and tanning powers of the sun...then we saw the jetty. the one where christy's friend shawn died when he decided to surf off of it while high on something. i made sara pose, although she was pretending she didn't really know who shawn and christy were. we all know better.

wading in the water wet our appetite for some real ocean swimming, but we were holding out for santa barbara. so we continued on the road. we'd been advised to get off the 1 through L.A., but disregarded this well-given advice. it wasn't awful or anything. it just was in no way a feast for the eyes. it was more of a fast for the eyes. or an offense to the eyes. run down outskirts, factory smokestacks looming in the skyline. and lots of lights. it did allow us to hit up a starbucks and nab an L.A. bearista bear. since i was driving through stop and go traffic, it was very impractical and often impossible for me to feed myself anything. so when i got hungry, sara kindly fed me large stacks of salt and pepper kettle chips. mmmmmm. yummy. we arrived at our motel around 4ish and found that we were both exhausted. without even unpacking our stuff for the night, we crashed in our respective beds and quickly drifted off to sleep. i woke up around 8. it didn't look that late outside, so i was a bit surprised we'd slept so long. i decided i'd make a pot of presspot coffee and bring in our stuff from the car before i woke sara up. i had to go across the parking lot to the motel lobby for hot water, and there i had a nice little chat about good coffee and tea with the chick at the front desk.

finally, it came time to waking up sleeping beauty, or we'd never get to downtown santa barbara for dinner. it took grumpypants a good while to manage coherent sentences, even after coffee on the front steps. naturally, i wanted to take some pictures to commemorate our evening and motel. grumpypants proved to be rather unruly and difficult, which never produces flattering pictures, but this one is the most flattering of the three i managed to take before grumpypants threw the camera in the toilet. haha. just kidding. but close. she threatened to throw it out the window, but i deftly maneuvered and muscled for rank, fuel running fast on an empty tank. finally, we pulled ourselves together and headed to state street, deciding we'd walk up and down the street until we found a nice little restaurant with character that tickled our fancy. well, when we actually started walking around it was about 9:30pm. on a monday night. the later it got, the more we realized that if we didn't just pick something soon, there'd be nowhere to pick, apart from some clubs and bars, serving alcohol and loud beats that reverberated half a block down the street. we picked a cute little italian place that looked promising. however, when we asked if they were still serving the response was a disappointing "no." this kind of became the theme of the evening, as our poor stomachs began arguing vehemently with us for real sustenance of some kind. we did come across some cool parts of the town on our search, though:

on our way back down the street towards the water, still searching for a wholesome meal, we made a quick stop at one of the two starbucks, figuring we nab the other one in the morning on our way out of town. we decided any purchase counts, and i didn't have to attempt further consumption of coffee (of which i had already consumed massive quantities), settling for a nice bottle of san pelle. and sara inspected the bathroom. it was fine. from what she told me.

finally, we found the santa barbara brewing company, which had the most important thing to us at this point: an open kitchen. we realized this might be our last opportunity to eat before the morning, so we got ourselves seated and were pleasantly surprised by a nice menu that wasn't horribly expensive. we both gleefully ordered fresh tuna: sara in wrap form, i in steak shape. i also got their raspberry cider which was as delicious as the wholesome food we'd been craving. i'm sure the waitress thought we were a bit loopy, because more than once we told her how much we loved them for having their kitchen open and having food. after that, we headed back to our room for some R&R. i really liked santa barbara. it's a very pretty, rich town. you get the feeling the worst crime they have is rambunctious and spoiled highschool kids, who are so bored they have to make something happen. but it also reminded me of a west coast georgetown. very cool. we spotted a java jones coffeehouse in our wanderings, and decided to stop there for some blog updating before we headed out of town on the morrow. as far as our ocean swimming, the area was having very strange, misty, COOL weather. no sunshine and warmth, not even when we arrived. i know at least i thought we might fit that in the next day. oh, how wrong i was...

--susi&sara

Detour: Vamos a Mexico!

2006-07-16T22:31:00.000-05:00

Well, from a safety and security standpoint, this was probably the most worrisome day of our trip. Yet, at the the same time, for me in particular, but also Susi, it was the most monumental and eye-opening. For all the time I spent in Western New York and the Northwoods of Wisconsin during college, (even the UP of Michigan for goodness sakes!) I had yet to travel outside of the country. We did all our research (you don't need a passport until 2008) and talked to all sorts of people about where to go, what to do, what to expect, and yet still felt unprepared.

But first, a sad story.
We had been recommended the Sovereign Grace Church in San Diego, and had checked their website to get the service time (although I hardly needed to ask - after all, it IS a SG church!) and directions and stuff, and had managed to get ourselves ready to go and stop by Starbucks and were still almost on time. Well, we pulled into the parking lot of the school that the church meets in, and there were lots of people, but they were all following signs for this suspiciously California-sounding other church. We walked up to the location the SG church meets in, and were commenting on how strange it was that no one was outside - I mean, we weren't really late at all! So it turns out that church was cancelled that morning, because the entire congregation was attending some event called "Together '06". Sadness. Susi called her brother to check if he could give us the location of his church, and when he didn't pick up, she called the people who let us into the place we were staying, but since they didn't pick up either, we figured church had already begun. We eschewed the California-sounding church, and went and had our own church at Starbucks. OK, not actually church. Just quiet times, but it was good to sit in God's presence again.

After caffienating fully, we were reading for our Mexican Adventure. Back down the road, to "the 5" (don't you dare call it just "5" or worse yet, "I-5" in California!) southbound towards Tijuana. We stopped at one of the last US exits for "$20 piece of mind" as my friend Josh called it, Mexican car insurance for the day, and then proceeded across the border. Apparently, Mexico has none of the concerns of the US and Canada (that story later!) about who it lets in. We just drove across, no stops, no questions, no inspections. We noticed that there was a considerable line on the opposite side, but figured we'd find out all about that later in the day. I haltingly used my high school Spanish to translate the road signs for Susi ("no something on the left") and was grateful for the dual speedometer readings that allowed me to drive the correct speed in kilometers per hour. (Hooray for the metric system!) We paid our tolls ("cuotas") on the highway down the coast easily - that portion of Mexico takes US dollars and pesos with equal ease, as long as you don't try to mix the two! This was our first viewing of the Pacific this trip, and it was fun to see the bright colors and smell the aromas and hear the noises of the towns we drove through. Despite Catholicism being alive and well, we saw "Jesus on the hillside" instead of Butte, Montana's "Mary on the Mountain". And made it to the Puerto Nuevo (New Port) exit. We had a little map from the insurance company, but Mexican roads are a little different from those in the US, namely that paving is rare and any indication of the road name (in any language) rarer still. So we fussed and fuddled our way down some bumpy dirt roads until we found what looked like a downtown area. As I was becoming nervous about parking, a man waved us into a spot on the street. There were no signs about meters or anything, but a man from across the street shouted to us to park over by him because his spot was free, whereas the nice man giving us a parking spot was going to charge us $5 or some such absurdity. I asked (in halting Spanish) if it cost - expect I couldn't think of the word for parking, so I just asked if it cost. He responded in English (What, two blond girls? Were we that obviously out of place?) that it was free, and he'd tell us why - he wanted us to eat at the restaurant we'd parked right in front of, and said something about margaritas and tequila. Ha. Well, we didn't have a better plan, so why not? I could see the car from our table, and most of the time we were eating, this same gentleman was sitting in a plastic lawn chair, so I wasn't too worried about anything (uncovered by the Mexican insurance policy) happening to the car. We ordered margaritas (yum!) and I got all brave and had lobster (which I don't remember ever having before, at least not where I got to pick mine before it was cooked! We started with some delicious tortilla soup and chips and salsa. Really good chips and salsa. Then my lobster arrived with Susi's carne asada and I sheepishly looked over at her and asked, "How do I eat this?" The tail meat has a great fishy flavor that's good on it's own, but even better when it's dipped in melted butter. I'd gotten the pequeno one, so I didn't even worry about the rest of it. Susi's meat was a little tough (susi: "a LITTLE?? i couldn't even cut it with a serrated steak knife!!"), but when our waitress noticed her struggling with it, she brought a new one and little baby margaritas (how cute!) and then we figured out how to ask for the bathrooms and the check (Visa... it's everywhere you want to be!) and thus ended our Mexican lunch.

As we approached our car, I was trying to figure out how to ask our parking attendant if we could leave the car parked there and walk around the town, but, of course could remember neither the word for parking (estacionamento) nor that for leave (devolver, I believe). Thankfully, he anticipated the question and asked if we wanted to walk around for a bit. Puerto Nuevo is basically a glorified city block. There're the four streets around the square, and one more, closer to the highway, but in that tiny space are packed easily 20 restaurants - all advertising lobster and margaritas. At this point, we started to see what purpose our parking attendant played for his place of employment. He essentially guards the limited street parking for use by customers of his restaurant. Nearly every place in town had a similar employee - all of whom were tasked with getting customers into the restaurant. Half a dozen of them shouted to us about their specials as we walked down the streets, and when we responded that we had already eaten, they would say, "Next time, then!" So we have our restaurant choices picked for the next 6 or 8 trips to Mexico! I really liked Benny's restaurant though! "Pretty ladies, come eat here!" comments aside. We stopped in a few stores to pick up trinkets for ourselves and friends - cool spotted shot glasses, a new ring for Susi and a silver bracelet for me (we haggled and got a pretty good deal!) We stopped for street mango, served sliced in a plastic cup with salt, lime juice and chili powder -- possibly the best fruit I've ever had! -- and fresh churros (so different from Price Club!) then headed back north towards the border.

When we got back to our car, our "guardian angel" (as we'd taken to calling him by now) was still sitting in his plastic chair, and we tipped him and asked if he would pose for a picture with us in front of our car. He got one of his buddies from a competing restaurant to snap the picture and then stopped traffic for us(!) so that I could back out and head back to the highway.

As we got closer, the traffic got denser, and with it, the number of people in the roadway. It started harmlessly enough, with churros vendors and a family selling bottled water. We moved farther into the backup and found Mexican newspapers, and people tying to wash our car for us. I was grateful for the exceptionally dirty state of our car, as it deterred most of them from even trying. We watched one guy wash a window of an SUV unasked, then, when the occupants refused to tip him, he squirted their window with his water bottle and stormed away. We rolled up our windows, tried not to make eye contact and shook our heads "no" when that failed. As we turned from the beach road onto the main highway they multiplied. There were no lane markings, but is was easy enough to tell where the lanes where from the pushcarts and people walking between. "Unreal" is a pretty good descriptor. The junk they were hawking intensified, from moderately useful (bottled water, gum, fruit ice) to inane (Mexican ponchos decorated with the insignia of US football teams, large tacky paintings, piggy banks or statues of every imaginable cartoon or TV character). We kept trying to snap pictures without seeming like we were trying to buy anything. Part of me knows it's calculating to capitalize on the pity of American tourists, but another part of me found it so eminately pitiable and heartbreaking. Watching families try to earn their daily bread, dads and sons selling whatever trinkets they've obtained, moms sitting on the barricade at the side of the road, nursing the youngest and overseeing the family operation, dirty-faced daughters looking into passing cars, holding their perpetually empty (and worn) paper coffee cups out to drivers and passengers alike and doing better impersonations of puppydog eyes than any child I've ever babysat, younger sons juggling fruit (for sale or for cash) that occassionally hits a windshield, or drops and rolls underneath a stopped car. It's sad, and it begs for something. Something I don't have in me. How do you hold out the love of Jesus in an hour-long line of cars to someone who doesn't speak your language and is only interested in your money? How do you have compassion when something inside you keeps saying, "They've made a choice to live this way. It's a calculated charade, an act designed to elicit the response you're so close to giving in to." Our windows stayed up. We drank the water we had brought with us and stifled our "desire" for a Spiderman piggy bank or a hammock for one.

The window went down again when we reached the border station, answered the questions asked of us (nope, no weapons of mass destruction in this little car!) and crossed back onto US soil. Susi got an A+ in Border Crossing 101 (according the agent at the head of our long line of cars) and I got a C- for relying on the license/birth certificate combo, but we both passed, and they let us back in. Of course, I missed the signs for "the 5" and instead tried to exit through the "secondary inspection" station, so a somewhat less cordial border agent "asked" us to back up and go either left or right. (Yes, we saw the sign that said secondary inspections, but we didn't see any other signs, so figured we had to drive through there to get to the actual exit!) Stopped at McD's for a restroom, called the folks to say, "We went to Mexico and we're back safely," and made it back to our place in Escondido. Ted (downstairs) had heard from Megan that we were going to Mexico and she asked him to check and make sure we came back!

What a detour! What a day!

love, -sara&susi

Day 8 - Destination Escondido, CA

2006-07-14T12:16:00.000-05:00

As sad as we were to leave Zion, we were also excited to get back on the road and head for California! Of course, we had tiny little pieces of Utah and Arizona to drive through, and the whole length of Nevada. It all looked pretty much the same: it got a little browner, a little harder to tell where the life really was. It's all lurking under the surface there, waiting patiently for a little rain, a cool breeze, something hospitable to welcome it out into the world. And then, suddenly, we were out of the mountains, onto this flat plain. I felt as if I were at the bottom of a fishbowl; all around, the edges of the world seemed to curve up around us. As Susi dozed, it got hotter and hotter, and I started to wonder if the car tires would be alright. Here we are, driving through Nevada around 75 mph, and it's 105 degrees. My lips were chapped, my throat parched, even my eyes felt dry and irritable. (And this was with the windows up and the AC running.) I wondered once again why people would choose this life, what the first people to see this land must have thought about it. Susi woke up as we rolled thorugh Vegas. I'm sure it's a lot more impressive at night with all the neon and flashing lights and sounds and people and noises. In the daytime it was just sad. A city that's staked itself on a pursuit that's meaningless and fruitless.

We needed gas and food, so we stopped a few miles from the California border and got some cheap food in a casino. Remembering my Grandpa's stories of adventures in Atlantic City, we changed out $2 worth of nickels and played the nickel slots.

I considered that as paid out money, with no expected return, so when we wound up winning back $1.60, I don't count it so much as losing $0.40, but as winning $1.60 of our own money. It's all creative accounting, I suppose, but it was fun to put in the coin, pull the lever (none of this EZ press button for us!) and watch the dials turn and turn. There's that tantalizing hope that you might win big! But as we looked around, despite the lights and the noise and the smoke and the booze (or perhaps because of them?) everyone looked unhappy. As we smiled and snapped pictures, we seemed to be the only ones having any fun, and we paid $0.40 for the privelege.

After that it was on to California (with Katrusi's cool California Dreamin' beat remix accompanying us). Susi drove, I rested, and the temperature climbed again, peaking at 110 degrees. We're grateful for the car, especially that it continues to work well, without problems and for the air conditioning! Can you even imagine the misery? We stopped at our first California Starbucks (they make Pomengranate and Targerine Soy frappachinos... vile!) and continued to Escondido, where we were welcomed by Susi's brother's neighbor who let us in to "our place": an apartment of our very own for a few days! But more on that later...

- susi&sara

Detour: Zion National Park

2006-07-13T23:42:00.001-05:00

this being our first stay in a motel, there were a few advantages: we could leave the place trashed and it wouldn't matter. ;) not really. we just didn't make the beds. YES!!

so we packed up our stuff, said goodbye to our room, and headed to perhaps the ONLY starbucks in utah. we love st. george!

after changing up our car window, we headed to our detour spot: zion national park (thank you, aunt bobbi and uncle dave, for your urging us to go!!). this was absolutely worth the late start. we went ahead and got a year pass to any national park in the country from our friendly park ranger and off we went.

it was amazing. when you're driving there you have a hard time imagining anything very exciting could be coming up around the bend, but the minute we started up the road we were awestruck. the only frustrating part is that the camera just couldn't do it justice. sometimes i felt like just throwing it out the window, because i knew it just wasn't capturing the glorious world that rose up around us. this terrain is so unique for me. i've never seen anything like it.

i guess maybe that's part of why utah struck me so much with wonder. i love colorado--it's spectacular. but i grew up in the alps. i know mountains. it doesn't mean i'm over them, it's just that i'd never witnessed land like this before.

i've been collecting bits of the states as we go through--flowers, rocks. i got some river rocks from the meramec in MO and some pebbles when we crossed the border into utah (and i had to pull over to take a picture of the sign). i decided i wanted a real piece of utah. something that would really represent what we saw. i found what i have affectionately named "Big Rock" Utah. he has a companion, pictured below, almost a miniature of him that i found that i named "Little Rock" Utah.

at one part of the drive there was one of many viewpoints that advertised checkerboard mesa. we decided to pull over and see what all the hubbub was about. it was about this:

at first, we didn't really understand why this was SO particularly interesting, although it was lovely. but then sara read about it and it turns out that the horizontal lines on the rock are a fairly common weathering occurence, but the vertical lines, particularly as regular as they are here (thus creating the "checkerboard" look) are extremely rare.

there are no sufficient words to describe this place. if you are EVER in the vicinity, go. it's worth it. God's fingerprints are all over it. we were so overwhelmed with the creativity and care of our Creator.

on our way back to get on the road, we made a necessary stop in virgin, utah. don't go making any assumptions about the fact that we're not IN the jail. we just didn't want to pay the admission. we figured hanging out in front of it counts.

we live in a beautiful world, folks. i'm beginning to understand america.

--susi&sara

reflections by susi: day 6 & 7

2006-07-11T11:18:00.000-05:00

kansas

in the land where the pavement wets
before your eyes...
the brown and green and gold
sprawls out
in wide circumference,
unchanging,
though the mileposts
would tell you otherwise.
old, worn-out train tracks
parallel their modern counterpart--
the freeway--
reminiscing on the good old days...
their glory days--
when iron steeds were pioneers of wild frontier,
harbingers of post-modernity--
new, then,
breathing youth and ingenuity.
the land is rough
and young.
it calls out to the strong,
requires the weathering
and rugged resiliance
lying dormant in so many
of america's great dreamers,
'til they gather up their courage
and brave the lonely hills and prairie fields,
and prove themselves
to this great land.
she's not so fair,
or well-fed,
or reined in and tame
as her old sister,
lush, green europe.
but she's hearty.
shell survive the wear and tear
of driving rains,
tornadoes,
prairie wind,
and the relentless sun.
this land
is america.

ode to colorado, part deux

rusted rock oozing from towering slopes...
evergreens
springing up from earth
like spearheads scattered wide
across these colorado peaks--
lush, imposing rises
of green, dotted by rock and stream:
waterfalls surprising passersby,
just beyond the bend.
boulders imbedded
in western prairie grass
that climbs between the trees
up mountain sides
for miles.
mountain men
(unruly beards
and buckskin overcoats)
traipsing through these woods
and cliffs,
back
to log cabins
where the smoke drifts lazily
from grey stone chimneys,
come to mind...
who else
could rough and ride
this unforgiving,
rough and glorious land?
america calls all her own
again,
calls out through peaks
and canyons
to her own.
and we will answer.

Day 7 - Destination: St. George, UT

2006-07-10T00:08:00.000-05:00

Ode to Colorado
Colorado, how I love you
With your skies so blue
and mountains so tall
and canyons in which to fall...

OK, I'll leave the poetry to Susi. If you insist. But I was grinning all day, just from the sheer joy of being in such a wonderful environment. I've discovered, over the years, that in certain locations praise to my Creator comes a bit more easily and naturally. As our friend Ken Davis says, "It's hard to go into the mountains and go, God, you're nothing, Those things are big!"

We took a detour "up" to Leadville, CO to visit my cousin Joe and eat lunch with him. (I made the mistake of saying we'd skip down to Leadville, since, you know, it's south on the map, and was informed that it's the highest city in the US, so I really should say up.) It's a fun town, with a good bit of history, but is now a small community of basically crazy people. Crazy about skiing, hiking, biking, snowboarding, whatever sort of mountain outdoor pursuit you can imagine. It was fun to see Joe and let him show us around town. We saw ski fences, the oddest colored paint jobs (including fairies guarding the front door of one house), the residence of the god Cosmos (a philosopher who contemplates the mysteries of the universe while hanging around outside various local coffee joints), the mining museum, tacky tourist gift shops... and all of this surrounded by views of some of the highest peaks and smells of the clearest air and reflections off of shining mountain lakes. I'm in love. Of course, I've heard the winters are a beast. So I'll put off plans to relocate. But I'm definitely coming back to visit.

After that, it was on to the end. We were starting to see signs for the junction of 70 with I-15 and I was looking forward to retiring this highway, being able to say we'd traveled each and every mile - at least every westbound mile. As Susi dozed, I prayed and drove. How amazing that the God who made all this, also made me!

70 joined up with the Colorado River as I drove the 16 miles through Glenwood Canyon, and I had to wake Susi up. This section of a trip is an enduring highlight for me. The road itself here is a marvel of engineering. As it follows the river, the interstate is basically a bridge on the side of a cliff face. As I drove, I couldn't imagine how anyone ever thought to build a road through here. It's the kind of view that you don't expect to see unless you're in a raft or kayak on the water itself. It felt like we were cheating nature a bit. The best, most beautiful places are often the most inaccessible, and here we are on a concrete roadway that's accommodated probably millions of other cars. The pictures we snap never do it justice, but my memory of this drive is vivid and clear.

Susi started driving just before the CO/UT line and I stunk up the border crossing shot. So, crazy girl, she pulled over to go back and take it. The mountains changed from green to brown and Utah was barren and hopeless. Although, with a high speed limit and no cars, it was time for a little fun. When it had been many miles since she'd seen any cars in either direction on the road, she figured she pretty much had the road to herself and took advantage of that. In the western portion of Utah, you repeatedly see exit signs proclaiming "Ranch Exit - no services" - which we take to mean, "unless you live here, don't bother." These would pop up every 50-100 miles, and other than that, there was nothing. (susi: "seriously, there were MAYBE seven or eight exits total 'til we got to the st. george area, which was hours and hours after we got into Utah). No animals, no farms or ranches, no silos, no churches, no cemetaries... basically no sign of human occupancy at all. It was rather eerie. We were also grateful we had filled up back in Colorado. Susi was as enraptured by Utah as I was by Colorado and pulled over at one of the many "View Places" off the highway, where we climbed a hill to see the extent of the valley and mountains before us.

We rolled through Cove Fort without comment. 70 just sort of becomes 15 without much ceremony and we just kept driving, eventually arriving at our hotel in St. George, where we sank into a deep restful sleep. Staying in a hotel is totally different than staying with friends or family. On one hand, "motel rooms are lonely places, seems like that Gideon's Bible is your only friend." But, at the same time, I felt free to rest and relax without worrying about who or what I was missing. When you're staying with people for one or two days, you want to pack in everything you can, and I think we were starting to feel exhausted by it. The crazy driving (over 2000 miles already) doesn't help either, I'm sure.

Love,
susi&sara

Day 6 - Destination: Boulder, CO

2006-07-09T23:15:00.000-05:00

OK, now I'm as big of a fan of the midwest as the next person (really, I actually enjoyed driving across Illinois on 70 - although that could have been just the memory of Katrusi's song for the state: I'm Just a Boy from Illinois), but Kansas was just boring. Seriously. The highlight of driving through Kansas was when Susi missed snapping the picture of the Welcome to Colorado sign and made me turn around (I insisted on waiting until the next exit, which was about 3 years - or 15 miles - down the road) so she could try again. So once again, here we are driving the right road, the wrong direction, proclaiming our craziness (or stupidity, depending on your point of view) to the world with the sign on our back windshield. So treasure this picture, because it was hard won.

A close second place is the few minutes when it was 70 degrees, and we were driving 70 miles per hour on route 70. Yes, it's that boring. On the other hand, my cousin Joe had warned us to expect a $25 toll (what IS it with the most lame states charging you the most money for the "privilege" of driving through them?) and it was only $2 to stay on 70 the whole way.

The east side of the Rocky Mountains is funny, because you actually wind up climbing up to Denver (above 5000 feet) without noticing it at all. After you get to the west side of Denver, it starts to look a lot more interesting. We stayed with Susi's Aunt Bobbie and Uncle Dave in the outskirts of Boulder, at the foot of the Flatiron Mountains, so named because of the flat face that looks like an iron standing up straight. Uncle Dave told us about some climbing places, and Susi and I agreed that we should make time for that next year. At this point, I've started to think about this trip as our "Introduction to the Great American Road Trip". We're not staying nearly long enough anywhere to see everything we want to see. So, Lord willing, we'll try again next year, and stay in Boulder long enough to go hiking in Rocky Mountain National Park, get to know a cool college town, with all of it's assorted coffee shops (yet, as Aunt Bobbie reminded us, no Dunkin' Donuts) and not get eaten by a mountain lion (which have, apparently, been around).

Aunt Bobbie and Uncle Dave were incredibly kind to us: taking us out to dinner (the Cheesecake Factory - yum!) and Starbucks, caring for everything we could need at their place (Uncle Dave even brought me towels to cover the lights from some of the machines in the room I was sleeping in), going over our maps with us and suggesting things we needed to see (more of that on Day 8 and 26!), making yummy toffee chip scones for us to take with us, giving us clothes (Susi got this cool, colored layered skirt that is totally her style, a shirt and some earrings, I got a pair of yellow crocs - gardening clogs), taking us out to Starbucks again, cutting my hair (Aunt Bobbie works at Bellissimo, a hip salon in Boulder) and even filling up our gas tank on our way out of town. It was totally fun for me to get to know them too. This was our first stop that Susi had arranged instead of me, so it was a bit different to be an unknown guest. Aunt Bobbie and Uncle Dave were fabulous. Of course, being related to Susi, how could they help it, eh?

And with the sun setting over the mountains in the horizon, thus begins my love affair with Colorado. More tomorrow. Perhaps an ode to Colorado. Where have you been all my life?

Love,
susi&sara

Day 5 - Chill Out

2006-07-09T22:09:00.000-05:00

The new soundtrack for our lives. Today (Wednesday), we listened to it on repeat for a good 4 or 5 hours. Somehow, we had either missed or ignored the announcement of this CD (a compilation of some of our favorite artists, including the inimitable Don and Lori Chaffer, singing songs inspired by a new "translation" of the Psalms) so we picked it up after the show last night and asked Don and Brandon to sign it. Susi's message from Don is "enjoy the drive" while mine is simply "road trip" which totally makes me grin with happiness. When we were asking Brandon to sign them, he got a bit distracted and asked me what he had written on mine. I tilted my head and squinted a bit and then hesitantly responded "Best Wishes?" It was actually his name, but whatever! As we were talking with him I asked if he had any advice on how to get his wife's old CDs that no one ever sells on eBay, because they all love them too much. He said they only had about 6 copies left and wouldn't be reprinting, but we could ask her ourselves. When we did, she offered to mail us a burned copy, which is the coolest thing in the world! So hopefully when I get home there will be a package awaiting me from Christena Graves.

Since Danielle was at work, this was a great day for us just to chill around her house. We had planned to meet her at her office for lunch, but changed it to dinner after work instead. We made coffee (hee), and after asking the dog to PLEASE go potty about a million times, were able to relax out in the shade of the back deck. Danielle had wireless and a washing machine, so we could take care of everything we needed.

Susi made a friend who also enjoyed War & Peace; I knocked out a chapter or two of the summer reading I have for school and we posted some of the previous few days. Thanks, Dani, for letting us hang out while you were at work. It was a much needed rest.

We met up with Danielle after she finished meeting all her deadlines for the day, and decided to only take one car out on the town to simplify matters a bit. Since my car didn't have a sticker for her company, we left hers and took mine. Of course, mine was full of all our junk. Seriously full. Susi happily volunteered to climb in the back (thank goodness she's not claustrophobic!) and snapped pictures the whole way out the back window.

In light of a stressful work day (for Danielle), and "boy troubles", we went with an Irish pub with rooftop seating for dinner in this cool area of KCMO called "The Plaza". It was great to sit back, feel the breeze above the city and look out over the town. After dinner, Danielle showed us around town. At one point, she mentioned that we were very close to the New Earth, made famous (at least to us) by being the site of the recording of the greatest live album of all time, and possibly, our favorite Waterdeep album. Both Susi and I were getting excited, just thinking about grabbing coffee at the New Earth, but as we drove further Danielle reminded us that it closed earlier this year. We eventually found the site of the late, great New Earth, a church basement, and lamented its passing. Sadness.

After picking Danielle's car back up at the office, she led us home by the route she usually takes. Kansas City is half in Kansas and half in Missouri, and in this section the dividing line is a road (named, accurately enough, State Line Road). We had talked to Don about this the previous night, and he had been joking around about how if you swerved into oncoming traffic, you could could say, "I'm in Kansas... now I'm in Missouri... now I'm in Kansas." We're a bit susceptible to the power of suggestion! It seemed like a good way to end the day, since traffic was minimal.
Tomorrow: back on the road! Colorado, here we come!

Love,
susi&sara

Detour: Waterdeep Live

2006-07-05T15:06:00.000-05:00

i think for both sara and i, this is one of the greatest highlights of our journey. being waterdeep's two obscenely greatest fans, seeing them in their own environment was always a dream of ours. we'd get emails from their site telling us about shows in kansas city and surrounding areas, and we'd both be like, "hey, let's go." unfortunately, so far, real life had been too real to allow us the freedom to hit the road and catch a much longed-for waterdeep show. yet again, another dream becomes reality.

danielle drove us to olathe, KS (about 20 min. from her house and pronounced "oh-lay-thuh"), where we promptly got lost for about ten minutes. adventure, adventure! that's what we're all about. ;) no problem, though. we parked a ways away from the church and took a shuttle (which is our abode in the photo above) over the grounds, where the openers had just started.

we hung out on our blanket in the grass, shaded by the barn which housed the stage and cooled just right by a continuous balmy breeze. between the openers and our boys, we got some brats and diet cokes, found hidden real batherooms, deftly avoiding the port-a-pottys, and found a "frappuccino" stand for an extra kick of caffeine to properly hype us up.

and at last, the show began...

brandon (left), don (right) , and luke (not pictured) gave a show well worth the money. well, it would have been well worth any money. as it was, it was worth faaaar more than the nothing that we spent on it. sara and i might as well have been the ones picking the:

~waterdeep set list~

1. new song (we do not know the title; we'll tell you in december)
2. 900 miles
3. rollin' like a semi
4. at least i got a car
5. everybody's guilty
6. you knew
7. sweet river roll
8. sing with great affection
9. let the name of God be high
--intermission--
(in which we went and bought the only cd of theirs we don't have and got it signed and talked to don, reminding him who we were)
10. confessions of a broken-down man
11. scared (technical difficulties, i.e. don's mic stopped working so we, the loyal fans, sang the chorus)
12. give me my walkman, mom (new)
13. crazy, crazy, crazy world (new)
14. gospel train
15. to chase away the birds
16. whether or not
17. 18 bullet holes
18. oh, that You would be
19. You are so good to me

it was absolutely incredible as sara and i sang along to every song, even picking up the new ones. afterwards, we got another copy of the cd so that we could both have signed copies, and after chatting some more with don about having to swerve into oncoming traffic on state line drive (i think) in kansas city in order to drive in both states and other things, we hailed brandon from the stage where he was putting away his drums. he came over, and we reminded him of who we were (jammin' java, apple pie, etc.), got his signature, talked for a good while, and asked him if there was any way we could get a hold of his wife christina's old stuff. so then we talked to her and she promised to burn us a copy and mail it to us! they are awesome people. so down to earth. so real. that's a lot of what we love about them. they liked our road trip thing, too. it was the perfect end to a perfect evening, and sara and i were on top of the world!

~susi and sara

Day 4 - Destination: Kansas City

2006-07-05T13:34:00.000-05:00

(... the Kansas side)

This was our shortest driving day, so we woke up, made coffee (are you seeing a pattern?) and said our goodbyes to Jeff, Nanette and the kiddos. Lots of hugs. Goodbyes are sad, but not forever with these folks. And then we were "on the road again". Started off the listening pleasure with some good truth from the book of Galatians - very good for our souls - while once again driving in the wrong direction. Since (a bit of) the point of our trip is to drive the entire length of I-70, we had to go back and pick up the piece we had missed coming into town. While Susi drove, I snapped some pictures.
This one is in honor of the (umpteenth) anniversary of Jeff's proposal to Nanette. Fourth of July, revolving restaurant, fireworks in the background...very romantic. Congratulations, you kids!

The rest of Missouri was beautiful - lots of rivers, hills, farms, trees. Very peaceful. Aside from a few annoying drivers, who haven't learned the intricacies of the passing lane, it was great driving. Both Susi and I are delighting in seeing more of the country than we knew. It's a strange feeling of being simultaneously "a stranger in a strange land" and completely at home.

On Nanette's advice, we stopped in Columbia, MO, where Susi's parents did ministry for a number of years before she was born. We were looking for "The Cool Cafe" based on a road sponsership sign we saw, and as we turned on the main drag, we saw this:

I know we usually call her "Hot Stuff", but I think this works, too. Totally chill store (great tunes!) and the help was able to point us in the direction of the local hip coffee joints.

Excerpt from Susi's travel journal (shown to the left):

It feels so good to hit the open road again...Hungry for Bum, for the wind in my hair, unconscientious cigarettes and good music. Freedom. No contraints but the speed limit and our wills.

We are sitting in a little coffee house called Lakota in downtown Columbia, MO. Mom & Dad's old stomping grounds. This cafe feels like the college town that Columbia is.

Brick walls, local artwork, good quiet music (boy & his guitar genre) strumming in the background, rustic wood chairs and tables, internet hookups, and college kids...

There's a good mix of non-college locals here as well. A man, about 60 or so, with a huge white beard is lounging at the bar with his granddaughter. I hope.

reflections by susi: day 4

2006-07-04T13:46:00.000-05:00

there is nothing like the feel of the miles passing beneath my feet. the open road, the windows down, the music up. as we left st. louis and road spread out before us, i realized i'm fulfilling a dream. the beautiful part is that the fulfillment is as good as the dream itself was. better, actually. my soul's been hungering for this freedom for so long, this latent craving lacing every day. i'd grown so used to ignoring it, i'd forgotten its burning in my bones. but that first day on the road rekindled the forgotten forest fire, and my soul is finally finding the freedom it sought. me, my sara, and my jesus on the road, saturating ourselves with america. i want to get to know this country in which i live. i realized, on day 1, that i really don't know this country. it feels foreign, though it is familiar. and every place we stop, i pick up the feel of the town, the city, the people. and i love it. so far, so good. i'm bound away, across the wide missouri...

Day 3 - Off the Road

2006-07-04T13:16:00.000-05:00

War wounds: Sara took a spill (it looks worse than it feels, I promise) and Susi hung her arm out the window all day on Saturday without sunscreen (ouch!)

On Day 3, we engaged in a favorite Missouri past-time: playing in one of the many rivers in the state (we were informed that the many rivers are why Missouri's liscence plate has a squiggly blue line underneath). We saw the mouth of the caves here and bought some cool things from the little store inside -- including great ice cream! We kept seeing signs proclaiming that this was Jesse James' hideout (seems like it would be pretty easy to find him!) but no one ever told us why he was hiding or from whom. We took a short boat ride on the Meramec river, almost towing a small child who really wanted to be in the water!

Then we changed into our suits and swam and floated for a while. Minor mishaps: locked the keys in the van (oops! thank goodness for AAA) and one of the kiddos got caught in some fishing line and had to be cut free, with the scissors that were... locked in the van. Thank goodness for the kindness of strangers with utility knives! Home and to bed early to prepare for being back on the road!

Love, Us

Day 2 - Off the Road

2006-07-04T13:05:00.000-05:00

Made coffee (like we do every morning) and headed off to church.

Stopped by the Muny (outdoor opera house) as you see in the picture above and then went to Fitz's for lunch.

Yummy burgers, great root beer (they bottle it on site!), good times in the outdoor seating. It's in the "cool" part of town, right by Wash U (hopefully, one day, my future alma mater). Naps were definitely in order, then later the grown-up girls went out for custard at Ted Drewe's.

It's actually on Highway 66 and a staple of St. Louis attractions. We stayed up way too late, but it was good to have a restful day after so much driving on Day 1.

Love, Us!

Day 1 - Destination: St. Louis

2006-07-03T00:19:00.000-05:00

After awaking at "o'dark thirty", and seeing the beautiful sunrise to the left, we got gas, back-tracked to Baltimore to pick up the beginning of 70 (which is a giant u-turn! really cool) and we were on our way! On our back window, Susi used window marker to write:

The Great American Road Trip
Current Destination:
St. Louis

So for the very first leg of the trip, I'm sure people thought we were crazy, since we were driving the wrong direction! It was just crazy enough for us!

This is the sign that inspired the road trip. Last summer, I was picking up Susi from the airport, and we got on very close to the beginning and saw this sign, and we kinda half-joking said, "We should go there!" And then we figured out that Cove Fort is NOT in California (as would be expected) but in the middle of Utah. An anti-climatic ending to a road trip if I ever met one. So now there's a new master plan that invloves 22 states:

(Sadly, the signs for Maryland, Illinois and Missouri were missed and will be shot later and added)

Other highlights from the first day:

A totally random 30 minute standstill right before Ohio began. There didn't seem to be any reason at all, even after we started moving again. There was some travelers' cameraderie as we all decided whether or not to bail and drive the opposite direction on the shoulder back to a cut across to the other direction.

Making an "Ohio buddy" in the form of a trucker who we were keeping roughly on pace with for a few hours. He was really excited to see us and kept waving at us every time we'd pass each other and even let us merge in once when we were trying to figure out how to stay on the right road. A ton of other people would wave or honk and give us a thumbs up, but this guy really made our day.

The giant cross. By this point, Susi had pulled out the Gameboy and was ignoring the scenery (I know, it's a travesty, but the Gameboy is new and a novelty, so I'll give her some leeway). So I tell her to look up because there's a giant cross. She takes her dear sweet time, and when she finally does look up, she's like, "Whoa. You weren't kidding!" It's seriously huge. You get some idea from the van in the foreground, but it's not like this set back far from the road. It's some kind of memorial or monument.

And finally, arriving at our destination. After a scenic detour (the directions from GoogleMaps wanted us to bail on 70!) I managed to remember the way that we'd come into town at Thanksgiving and we were greeted by lovely smiling faces, lots of hugs and a great dinner. For our longest day, we were both surprised by how good we felt (especially with only 4 stops!) A lot of it was what we were eating (really healthy stuff: fruit, veggies, cheese, whole wheat pretzels, and fruit-sweetened drinks) and the rest must have been the music. We had fantastic music, including (props to Sissy) a mix CD with a song to listen to at most of our state border crossings and other points of musical interest. We heard things like the Indiana Jones theme song, Meet Me in St. Louis, P-A-T-A-S-K-A-L-A and new songs we'd never heard before but were surprisingly cool! Hope you're all having as much fun as we are (even though you couldn't possibly be!)

Love, Us

Tomorrow...

2006-06-30T20:59:00.000-05:00

Tomorrow, I love ya, tomorrow, you're only a day away...

This is it, folks. In 8 hours, we will be embarking upon the journey of our lives (aside, of course, from our journeys of faith, which would more accurately merit that superlative). Please keep us in your prayers: our safety, our growth and grace to the people we visit and meet. Both Sara and I (this is Susi speaking, by the way - except for parentheses) are running on adrenaline and 3 - 4 hours of sleep at the moment, and we have a long drive ahead of us tomorrow, so this will be brief. Besides, we both just popped some Nyquil to ensure a decent night's sleep. So if I (we) keep writing, this could get pretty absurd very quickly. (Plus, the longer I type the more typos I make.) We will try to keep everybody updated and be posting some pictures soon. Stay tuned. Tomorrow, we'll be on the road again (the life we love is making music with our friends, so we just can't wait to be on the road again.)

One Month from Today

2006-06-01T20:50:00.000-05:00

We'll be away, on the great adventure (yeah, Susi, I'm totally making a mix with that song on it for our first day!). First stop, a great place, with great people!

"Goin' to Missouri, won't you come along with me? Well, there's lots of friendly people and Missouri loves company..."

More New Attitude

2006-05-30T00:09:00.000-05:00

Pretty Louisville, looking out over the river at a park near where we had lunch... (thanks, new friend Mindy, for taking a great shot before the battery was "exhausted" - just like the rest of us!) We found the "super-secret" Subway, the one that's "off the map" of locations that the conference told us about... but only by a half a block. So we got there, and there was NO line, and the AC was kickin'. We had a good time, reminding ourselves of the truths God had revealed to us this morning.
My Care Group - or at least the portion of us who came. My Care Group is now almost 30 people, not quite a "small" group. It was good to be with these folks at the conference though!

Trial Run

2006-05-28T23:39:00.000-05:00

OK, so I'm really just testing out the photo-posting thing, seeing if this will work well for our trip in July... I think it will. Although, it would be easier if we take all of our pictures the usual way, so they are right side up.

To the left you see the wonderful design that kept us company as we used our bathroom the past day. "We're grateful for the roosters!" We're on our third hotel room in as many nights (Connie's on her fourth - she switched once before we got there!) and now have a great room. The last one was a little more difficult to find things to be grateful for. :)

The World As We Know It is Ending

2006-05-11T11:16:00.000-05:00

So despite the fact that I haven't posted anything of meaning on my xanga site for about 6 months (or it least it's starting to feel that way), I'm totally disoriented by the site being down today. All is not right in the world...

Comments Change

2006-05-10T11:23:00.000-05:00

Per Katrusi's request (or angry rant, depending on how you look at it), I've changed the comment policy so that anyone can comment, you just need to do the silly word verification thingy so that it's not all filled up with information about enlarged body parts that neither Susi nor I possess.

And Susi, why DID you delete a comment? If you need help figuring out how to actually post, I can show you next time you're up here (or I'm down there).

Gas prices

2006-05-09T21:47:00.000-05:00

Gas is under $2.50 in Casper, WY right now. Oh, great Kahuna of the map and plans, are we going there? Can we?

Countdown

2006-05-06T17:58:00.000-05:00

55 days until we leave!

For the month of July, Susi and I will be giving the major oil companies a major boost as we travel across the country. The current plan is to leave July 1 and travel the entire length of I-70, then making our way to San Diego and up the coast to Seattle, traveling back by way of I-90 to Chicago and then home again. We're excited. You should be too.