Missouri Here I Come!

I’ve struggled trying to figure out the best way to chronicle my trip from California to Missouri. Do I keep to the same format as all my other blogs? Or do I simply write a narrative such as I did for my very first entry. What would make it easiest for a reader? After much thought, I’m going the narrative route with separate blog entries, in my usual format, for those places we visited.

  Last October, I got it in my head that I wanted to drive from California to Missouri. I would take off in April and go at a somewhat leisurely pace visiting anywhere I wanted. I was going to stay in Missouri for an extended period of time and my planned retirement date would come and go while on vacation; that being June 24^th. 

I used RoadTrippers to plan out my trip. It’s a really cool app that has all kinds of things such as attractions, gas stations, hotels, places to eat. And you can decide how far off your route you are willing to go to visit an attraction. I planned out all the places I wanted to visit, not really considering timing…what time of day I would hit any certain place. You’ll see later, this didn’t pan out so well for me.

 This was going to be a very long drive and I was a bit nervous as I had never personally driven more than 3 hours at any one time. Most people have found that hard to believe but sadly…it’s true.

To make the trip more of an adventure, I invited my sister. Hmmm…is the adventure my sister or where we were going? Both of us had to wonder since we can argue when we drive one mile never mind the 2,000+ this would be.

It was unfortunate but I had to work every day leading up to this trip and at the last minute, I was asked if I would change my mind about retiring. I told my employer’s I would do that but I wouldn’t give up my trip that I had been planning on for 6 months. 

There was a lot of stress leading up to the date but none more so than the envelope that greeted me on Friday evening when I left work for my extended vacation. The dreaded DMV…it’s time to renew my car registration AND it needed to be smog tested AND it was due before I was planning on returning to the state.

There was no choice…I would have to delay the beginning of my trip until I could take care of this. And of course…I couldn’t pack the car not knowing what would happen. 

Very early the next morning, I was at SmogBusters in Roseville at 8:15 waiting for them to open. I was the first one there but a gentleman in an RV showed up and stood at the door. I was afraid I was going to have to wrestle him to the ground in order to be first. But no worries, I was taken first and my car passed the smog test with no issues.

Rushing home, Dana and I packed the car up and the delay in the trip was only about 3 hours. Perfect.

Both Dana and I were excited as we took off. 

Day 1…

423 miles from Roseville, California to Barstow, California

I knew the first place I wanted to stop would make sure the trip wasn’t too taxing…Quady Winery in Madera, about 3 hours from home. This is a winery that deals almost exclusively in sweet wines. I walked in with one wine in mind and walked out with another. Not sure if it was late in the day or what, but the guy doing the pouring didn’t seem to have a whole lot of information about the vineyard. 

 
 It was one of the fastest tastings I’ve ever been through. Or maybe it was because this was the first time I was the only one tasting. In the past I’ve had Dirk or Daniel with me…easy to slow down tasting and talk. Dana doesn’t drink wine although I think I have her to the point of being able to take a taste without making that scrunched up face of a kid who has eat something distasteful.

Our next stop was to be Forestier Gardens in Fresno, but when we got there, they were closed for renovations. I was disappointed, but on we go.

Going down Highway 99, I saw a car moving in and out of traffic rather quickly..passing everyone up. When it got beside me, I looked in disbelief…here was one of those tiny little Smart Cars. Are they really that fast? And that doesn’t seem so environmentally responsible, using gas so recklessly...*she says sarcastically*.

Ok, so I have this thing on the roads…well, no, everywhere. I am a bit competitive. When we used to drive two cars to lunch…I always raced my friend back and was never particularly happy if I got beat. Life is a competition.

I bet you’re thinking I raced that little Smart Car? No, I showed great restraint and let them zoom pass me when I was already doing 70 MPH. Well, restraint plus the CHP I had seen ahead of us.

One of the places I really wanted to stop was Indian Point OstrichFarm but it was closed by the time we got to Tehachapi and did not open until 11 am the next day. We talked about it and decided we didn’t want to wait for it to open so late in the day as it would probably mean spending an additional day in California.

 Next place on my visit list was the Borax Visitor Center in Boron. This is earth’s largest deposit of borax…who wouldn’t want to learn about that? But alas, it was 5pm so of course it was closed too. Another site passed by.

It had become increasingly windy since we left Highway 99 and it was a definite “two hands on the wheel” kind of drive. Tumble weeds were flying across the road and I was missing it all…then one blew into the road, stopped and just stayed until I hit it and pieces flew to the left and right of the car. Dana found this very funny.

My first thought was my reputation in the family for hitting birds. I’ve probably hit 7 or 8 birds…but the stupid things don’t fly away and I am always so sure they will. On vacation one time, I started insisting that I haven’t hit anymore animals than anyone else. After a quick survey of the family, we found that I have indeed hit more animals…but, except for a rabbit….they have all been birds.

Later, when we stopped in Barstow, there were pieces of the tumbleweed stuck in my grill and because we’re strange that way, we decided to see how long we could keep it there.

And speaking Barstow, that’s where we spent our first night. Barstow is the butt of a lot of jokes for being desolate, but it sure wasn’t when we arrived. We could see a lot of lights on their main drag as we pulled into a hotel. It didn’t take us long to find out what was going on as sirens got louder and a car went speeding by with 4 or 5 police cars in pursuit. Obviously what we had seen before was a roadblock.

We got our room and when we stepped back outside, the sirens again got loud…and here comes the whole entourage again. Ok, what kind of criminal goes in circles?

Day 2

372 miles from Barstow, California to Tusayan, Arizona

My sister and I have this thing about terrain. She loves mountains, I love the desert with its very straight, very flat roads. Probably a direct result of motion sickness. Having spent all my life fighting motion sickness, we’ve figured my love for the desert came from my desire not to be sick. Makes sense to me.

 

The drive into Arizona was extremely windy and I learned a good lesson in gas mileage. I had a ¼ tank of gas leaving the Havasu area figuring I would get gas in the next big town. Then the already heavy winds got worse and road turned so that my car was heading into them. Then we started climbing…and climbing…and climbing. I could see my gas gauge dropping visibly and I started worrying whether we could make it to Kingman, the next town with any services. Holding my breath, we limped in to Kingman with the gas gauge light on and me swearing to always fill up whenever I get to a ¼ tank from this point on.

Our next big decision was whether to stay in Williams, AZ where we could stay in the less expensive hotels but then we’d have to travel the 50 additional miles the next day to get to the Grand Canyon National Park, or we could go into Tusayan and spend a little more money but save time the next day.

No real hard decision and we stay at the Grand Hotel at theGrand Canyon. A really nice hotel and the bed was so so comfortable.

 That evening, we went to National Geographic’s Grand CanyonCenter and got an overview of the geology of the canyon, the peoples who have inhabited the area and those who came after.

Day 3

267 miles from Tusayan, Arizona to Gallup, New Mexico

I’ll be covering the Grand Canyon in another blog but let me just say one word…breathtaking.

We left the Grand Canyon around 2:00pm and our next stop was to be the Painted Desert/Petrified Forest but again, because of timing, it didn’t work out. And I have to admit, I was worried about Dana being bored. So far she had seemed to be interested in everything but I know a lot of people become bored with the stuff I find fascinating so I am always on the lookout to make sure we don’t get in that situation.

 

Driving down the road, we started seeing billboards for Meteor Crater and Dana wanted to stop. Again, this will be another blog.

Finding a hotel had been so easy the last few days that I expected to find the same in Gallup, especially since it’s a bigger city. But we got in there after dark and big cities also have areas with hotels that are just not all that great to be in late at night. And true to my nature, if I get stressed, I usually lash out. Sorry Dana!

Day 4

176 miles from Gallup, New Mexico to Moriarty, New Mexico

 Our first stop of the day was in Albuquerque. They have one of the oldest Catholic churches in the Nation and a rattlesnake museum that I really wanted to go to. As with my other major sites, I have separate blogs for each.

I can say I was totally underwhelmed with Albuquerque’s Old Town. After having spent time in San Diego’s Old Town…I guess I was expecting the same. They have a tour, just like San Diego's, but I can’t figure out why they don’t have a stop in the Old Town area. You have to catch it at a hotel about a mile away and I prefer the on/off type of tours. I had planned on having lunch in Old Town, again, thinking of San Diego, but TripAdvisor didn’t have much to say about any of them other than they were expensive.

As we left Albuquerque, we started seeing billboards for a wild life rescue zoo and Dana really wanted to go and since I’ve never seen one…what the heck…I have another blog for this one but I just wanted to say this was one of the saddest places I have ever been.

Moriarty, New Mexico. First thing that came to mind was….did they name this place after Sherlock Holmes’ nemesis? A little checking and I found out that it was actually named after the first permanent family to settle in the community.

Day 5

395 miles from Moriarty, New Mexico to Elk City, Oklahoma

I’ve felt pushed to get into Oklahoma because my relatives in Arkansas were expecting us to arrive on Friday. Honestly, I needn’t had worried as we had plenty of time at the end of our trip but having never done anything like this, I didn’t want to chance it.

When we hit the Texas border, I posted in FaceBook…”in my best Jessica Rabbit voice…’well, hello Texas, they say everything is bigger in Texas’”

We made it through Texas in about 3 hours. Now granted, we were going through just the panhandle part of Texas but my sister and I have memories of traveling with our parents to North Carolina in our 60’s VW Bug. *Cringing at the thought of that scratchy back compartment*

 

Anyway, we’d go to sleep and we’d be in Texas. We’d wake up and we’d be in Texas. All day would go by, and yes…we’d be in Texas. To little kids, it seemed to take forever to get across Texas. Probably the same feeling as traveling the North/South route in California.

Dana and I got to the hotel we were staying at nice and early. They had a laundry area so we, or rather, Dana did our laundry. Thanks Dana!

A footnote to the day…our tumbleweed that I had hit on Day 1 finally fell off.

Day 6

217 miles from Elk City, Oklahoma to Tulsa, Oklahoma

Our plan had been to go to the National Route 66 museum in Elk City until I started reading some of the TripAdvisor comments. Although the place got decent ratings just about everyone said the women working there were really rude; downright mean. One review mentioned the Oklahoma Route 66 Museum so I checked to see if that was on our way.

Change of plans…went to Oklahoma Route 66 museum which was in the direction we were going but the details will wait for another blog.

I think I mentioned my stress level and it went through the roof going through Oklahoma City, probably the biggest city we’ve been through since leaving home and what happens? The GPS quits and again, major growling at Dana.

Day 7

105 miles from Tulsa, Oklahoma to Lincoln, Arkansas

Many years ago, when the American Can Company in Los Angeles closed up, they offered my dad a position at their other Can Company in Sacramento, but the family didn’t want to move. Ironic that I know work in that exact building. I wish my dad had lived long enough for me to tell him that.

But I digress…My dad chose to retire early and being a small town guy, he wanted to go back to that. My parents found a 40 acre farm in a small town in Arkansas and moved when my sister graduated from High School. They lived there for 10 years until my dad became too sick to take care of the place. I think he hated moving back to California although by this time my mom was more than ready to move back.

My Aunt followed my parents and bought a place in Arkansas. She did not move back and she has children, grandchildren and great-grandchildren in the area now. It was a visit to these relatives that brought us to Arkansas in the first place.

By the way, we have absolutely no family history in Arkansas…it was simply where my parents could afford to get some acres and live a good life.

The ride there was uneventful and we passed several historical markers and by now Dana was pretty used to stopping when we could…and I had come to find that Dana enjoyed history as much as I do.

 

Once we arrived in Arkansas, we spent a pleasant evening with one of my cousins and her husband including walking their dogs past their pond. This pond is full of all kinds of fish and my cousin feeds them nightly. The interesting thing is that when they walk up to the water, minnows start crowding the edge followed shortly by snakes who don’t mind a bit of fishing on their own. 

Day 8

We awoke to the news that the Aunt we had come to visit wasn’t doing very well and had been admitted to the hospital. While her children were trying to find out what was going on, Dana and I went to the Prairie Grove Civil War Battlefield and yes, it’s another blog.

The family was supposed to have a get together but that quickly fell apart with my Aunt in the hospital. We were able to visit her in the hospital and found her in decent spirits. I’m really glad we got to spend time with her.

We had a quiet dinner with my cousin. Hey, did I happen to mention she makes her own wine and beer? A very creative mind and I left there with a case of wine, including Dragon Blood, Peppered Blackberry, Cherry Zinfandel, Red Muscadine, Concord Grape, Strawberry, Cantaloupe and finally, Tomato. She also gave me a bottle of Fig & Raisin Mead for Dirk. Thank you Vicky and Ron for the wine and the hospitality!

Day 9

111 miles from Lincoln, Arkansas to Hollister, Missouri

Made it! 2,066 miles! And I found I really enjoyed driving. In fact, Dana probably only drove, maybe, 4 hours but she was a great companion. Thank you for a fantastic trip! 

You can tell when Californian's travel. We are just not used to so much green. When I finally loaded the pictures Dana took, I must have a hundred or more of just greenery. And funny, you get used to how dirty your windshield is because a lot of Dana's pictures are through windows with all kinds of bug debris on them. 

Hmmm…just thought you guys might be wondering why I was thanking Dana for what seems ½ a trip. Dana flew back to Sacramento and I’m hanging around Branson, Missouri for a while…but I’m sure I’ll be adding more to my wanderings while here, just with a new traveling companion…Hello Dirk!