We just moved our blog to WordPress – moving forward we’ll post our “travel journals” here.
If you are interesteed in reading our past jerney, read our old blog “The Thies Travel Journal“.
We are going to blog about more than our travel experiences with the new one, so come visit again!
Pumpkin (left, new addition) and Chu-Chu
Tip of the Day:
Spend the extra money on a nice hotel after you drive all day. It is well worth the extra $40.
Inori had her first IV experience!
Early this morning Inori woke up with severe stomach pain. We had to find a hospital. They took x-rays and conducted blood tests. Everything is fine, and they gave her some IV, shot to her butt and some pills to control stomach spasms. It may have been food poisoning.
Chu-chu got special t reatment yet again! Nice to be cute and petite.
12pm Left the crappy town of Elkhart, IN
Stopped in Joilet, IL for a pee break.
Today we passed the birthplaces of Ronald Regan (Dixon?) and John Wayne.
I am still adjusting to driving an automatic again. Several times I jerked the car as my foot searched for the clutch.
Passed through Iowa City.
We grew tired of the music on the iPod so we started to listen to the Berkley lecure podcasts I subscribed to. I envision myself listening to this on the bus to work in Portland. These are all free and quite educations and more entertaining than I expected. The professor for the Geology classes has a particularly humorous voice. I enjoy replying to his retorical questions out loud. As usual with my antics, Inori is initially amused, but that quickly fades.
I noticed at a rest stop that on their map they had Des Moines spelled as Dos Moines. Nice.
Stopped 20 miles outside of Des Moines, IA for Chu-Chu’s medicine. We called ahead to Portland to have electricity and cable on when we arrive. It was really night because the utilities work together so once you are finished getting electricity ordered they can transfer you to the cable company (Comcast), and they maintain your information so you do not have to tell the cable company also. Comcast told me someone would not be out to turn cable on until the 9th, but turned out on Thursday someone arrived, even though I told them we would not even be in town before Friday, but still a very good customer experience. We decided to push on to Omaha, NE.
We stayed at a Best Western. This was the best place we stayed at the entire trip. We were really tired, but got our strength back overnight at this real nice hotel. We got take-out from the Perkin’s in the hotel. While taking bags up to the room they played ‘Timewarp’ from Rocky Horror in the elevator. In the morning, while taking bags to the car, there was a cleaning lady int he elevator polishing the inside of the elevator. I’ve never seen that before. That is the mark of a really nice hotel.
Monday, October 30th, 2006
Distance Covered: 400 miles
Stops: 4
We had a lot to do Monday before we could leave. We got up early to get to the post office to send 21 cases of books media rate (cheap, but slow). This took two trips.
Inori dropped me off at the post office with 12 cases, that we had loaded into the car the night before, and headed home to get the remaining cases. She returned awful quickly, turned out I forgot to give her the apartment key. So after Inori make three trips to an from the post office we went to Time Warner to return the DVR and cable modem. This time I forgot the remote control. Damn!
We returned home to finish clean-up/packing before the landlord arrived for check-out. The appointment was originally scheduled for 10:30, but we re-scheduled that morning for 12:30. We also called earlier in the morning to schedule pick-up of the U-Pack.com ReloCube. They said they would arrive 3-3:30. As we took another 15 minutes to finish when the landlord arrived. Immediately after check-out was complete we drove away from our apartment for the last time, passing the irritated crew cleaning out the over-full dumpsters we helped fill with all the stuff we threw out. We returned the remote to Time Warner and stopped at Walgreen’s to get ice, batteries (for camera), and sunglasses. As we entered the highway U-Pack called to say there where on their way to pick up the ReloCube. We drove out of Buffalo, for the last time ever at 2pm. Inori was driving. As we passed the Galleria Mall for the last time I was hit with a minor shock that we were really leaving, quite possibly never to return to Buffalo ever again. We are now homeless. At Blasdell we made our first stop to eat. We avoided Sliders (McDonald’s – it slides right through you). I had a chicken wrap and a Mountain Dew, while Inori enjoyed a Chicken Quesadilla. Shortly after we were back on the road Inori had the first lemon bar. 26 miles from the PA line we were listening to the travel CD from our friends, MikeO and Laura. The CD ended with Star Wars, and we dubbed it the official song of the trip.
3:39pm last NYS toll, $2.60 (paid them $1.60 of that in change)
As soon as we crossed into PA we saw an Adult superstore. Nice.
5-6pm hit rush hour in Cleveland; stopped to get fuel, bathroom, and directions; saw really large guy (300+ lbs) crammed into Mustang; Chu-Chu, having slept the entire trip firmly awoke when we started moving to attack his hedgehog
6:27pm Amherst, OH (we are not real creative across the country are we)
7:15pm stopped to pee and get Starbucks at Lake Erie Island, OH; Chu-Chu ate his pill like it was hard candy
8:50pm entered Indiana; Inori hates the “stop soon” bumps on the road
9-9:30pm stopped near Fremont, IN; Chu-Chu feeds, then shits and pees on Inori’s foot in the dark (“hmm, something is warm”); call to make hotel reservation
10:30pm stopped for the night at Red Roof Inn
