We left the hotel around 10:30 and, after gassing up, headed out on the Yellowhead Highway to Kamloops, BC. Within thirty minutes we'd had a bear sighting - a momma grizzly and her cub. We pulled off the road and watched them for ten minutes, but the mother did nothing but eat and the cub did nothing but sleep and occasionally poke his head up above the grass to look at us. This sighting made the count eight bear in three days. Soon after we exited Jasper National Park. Within two minutes we
We escaped from our hotel at 9:48 and gassed up soon afterwards. We went along the Bow Valley Parkway north to Lake Louise and Lake Moraine. We saw more than we could yesterday as far as scenery went, but there were still too many clouds for a completely clear view. We saw a lot of deer as we traveled the Parkway. The clouds looked a little more clear so we pulled into the Lake Louise parking lot again to see what we could see. We saw a bit more of the mountain-lake scenery than yesterday, wit
We slept in a bit more today and headed out at 11:00 in rain. We were going up the Bow Valley Parkway, which parallels the Trans-Canada Highway to Lake Louise northwest of Banff. Instead of trying to go on the fast-paced highway, given the amount of precipitation, we decided to take the Parkway for a smoother, more wildlife-filled ride. By 11:15 we'd seen an elk eating and walking over large downed branches on the side of a steep hill. We still could not see the tops of the mountains due to
We rolled out of the driveway at precisely 11:30 and made comparatively good time on a section of US 52 that is under a state of continuous road construction. After having such good luck avoiding road construction last trip, I was amazed at how much we ran into today. Virginia, for the hour or so that we were in it, was also bogged down by road construction. The right lane was blocked ahead, but we could have made much faster time if other cars had not continuously raced ahead to try to cut ah
It is with no slight degree of sadness that we bid adieu to the road-trip days of "Lulu," the black Buick that has taken us on more journeys than I can remember, from years before these Great American Road Trips began. She took us to Florida at least twice, to BrickFair for three years, and Toronto in 2011, not to mention the 20,000 miles from the first three mega-trips and countless hour-long jaunts to my grandmother's house. Lulu has been a great car for us, but with her mileage nearing 140,00
We got up in Flagstaff today and went to the Grand Canyon - or rather, right outside of the Grand Canyon. Earlier, we had reserved a helicopter flight over the Canyon. Our 11:15 start time was delayed by tour buses carrying obnoxious tourists. As they filed out to the back of the building and out to the chopper pads, my dad went to see what the deal with the nearly 20-minute delay was as my mom and I spoke with an older British couple who were absolutely ticked that they'd been waiting since 9:0
We were warned by our waiter at the Standard Diner yesterday that there would be winds today, and he was not wrong. As soon as we got onto the road, we were buffeted with high winds. Our first stop of the day saw us pulling off the road into a place called Fort Wingate, of which all the sings to it were covered in illegible graffiti. It took us into a reservation, but the fort (or what remains of it) was not open. We saw a historical mark outlining its history, and realized that its Native Ameri
We once again got up early and went to White Sands National Monument. White Sands is made of gypsum, not quartz, making it white, fine, and very soft. The gypsum literally comes from dissolved residue of mountains. The dunes are held together by sand that's underneath it, gluing them together so they don't blow away in the high winds. (My dad and I decided to test how hydrophilic this gypsum was, so we spat on the top of a dune - to our surprise, it semi-solidified, forming grainy but sort of ge
We woke up in Carlsbad early, and got to Carlsbad Caverns. It is eerily quiet at the top of the mountain where the visitor’s center is – the only thing you can hear is the gentle waving of the flag on its pole. They are redoing some of their elevators, so only two are in action, making the wait slightly longer than it would be otherwise. The Caverns are huge, and I mean huge. I’ve seen caves before, but this was just huge. The only part of the cave that is self-guided is the Big Room, which is
After spending the night in Amarillo (where my dad suggested that we get back home by way of Maine), we got back on the road. Like last night, though, there serendipity in navigating Amarillo's confusing street layout: we saw from our car the Cadillac Ranch, which is a number of upended Cadillacs, trunks to the sky, half-buried in dirt. It is the exhibition of Stanley Marsh III, a man who got involved with the pop art craze. He also reportedly has purchased a number of billboards in the Amarillo
I apologize in advance for any spelling errors this may inadvertently contain. It's after 11:30 and my body still thinks that it's an hour later. Today, we got up and went around Oklahoma City a bit. The burger joint we were to eat at - a little place called Nic's Grill, which came highly recommended by DeeVee - was closed due to it being a Saturday. We moved on quickly and got to our next stop, the OKC bombing memorial. It's highly moving stuff, it really is. Words really can't do emot
wait so we updated the forums huh Still full from the Neely's barbecue, we all just had a few glasses of juice for breakfast. We learned that the BBQ festival was more smell than eat, so we scratched it from our itinerary. We realized last night that we were staying near the famous Peabody Hotel, which is famous not for being swanky (which it is - everything is marble or intricately carved wood) as much as it is for having five ducks, which live on the roof and parade from the elevato
Today, seeing that the storm system we outraced in St. Louis was catching up, we got up early and on the road quickly. Our first stop of the day was backtracking to the stadium of the Lexington Legends, the first team we met that is so disorganized as to not have a pennant. (At least the Missoula Ospreys had a pennant, except there, we just couldn't find it for a long time.) However, they did have "circular pennants" as the fellow called them. He was most likely unaware that pennants are pennant
When we woke up, we saw the radar and knew that hailstorms were on their way. Fortunately, they were west of St. Louis, and we were safe from the potential threat that they would so intrudingly impose. We made good time into Illinois, then Indiana. I drove all the way from somewhere in Illinois, through Indiana, and then into Louisville. In Louisville, we stopped by the stadium of the Louisville Bats. The Bats, of course, were out of town, but we were able to get into the stadium, where we got a
We got up in Kansas City, and we thought that we might be able to hoof it over to St. Louis in time to catch the beginning of the Cardinals game. We got up too late, however, and we needed that sleep. Plus, the temperature and humidity both were going to be high. Considering these, we got a later start, eventually getting to St. Louis. While we didn't get to see any of the game, a nice man at the gate let my dad in to get our obligatory pennant so as to further add to our already bulging colle
Our first stop of the day was the Archway Monument, a building that Interstate 80 goes directly under. It is at - or at the very least, near - the geographic center of the United States. It opened in 2000 and had to be lifted over the highway in one piece, shutting down I-80 for eight hours as they used specialized equipment to place it in its proper location. Its interior is a well-done museum dedicated to the pioneers going west, from the Oregon, California, and Mormon trails, to the Pony Expr
Our first stop of the day was Scotts Bluff. Because of a scraping noise that we had heard emanating from somewhere within the vicinage of the front wheels, we took the shuttle up there. We saw for a long way up there, across to some small badlands that are around a portion of it, as well as all the way to Chimney Rock, which was small and barely discernible from the sky, but we saw it nonetheless. The bluff, while not the highest thing that we've seen, was stunning in the fact that it rose up ou
After breakfast in Rapid City, our first stop of the day was at Mount Rushmore. The famous heads of the four Presidents is just there in the side of the Black Hills. We discussed the construction of the sculpture with a park ranger who didn't quite know what he was talking about, but we got a few tidbits of information anyway. The sculptor of Mount Rushmore, Gutzon Borglum, originally wanted to build even more of the featured Presidents than what the final product turned out to be - Washington,
I forgot to mention yesterday that my dad ran over a squirrel which was limping across the road. Another car, which passed by us, spooked it, and while he swerved to avoid it, the right front tire clipped it with a thud. Like many of its kind, it had a death wish, and we can only hope we served a purpose in putting it out of its misery. Today, we did some planning over delicious omelets. Originally, we wanted to go to Mount Rushmore and the Black Hills as well as the Badlands, but since we're
We got up in Bozeman and headed on towards Billings. After getting a hat and pennant at the stadium of the Billings Mustangs of the short-season Pioneer League, we went to the site of the Battle of the Little Bighorn, where General George Armstrong Custer and his forces were annihilated by Native American warriors defending their ancestral homeland. The battle - and the war that it was in - was prompted by the way the federal government handled the Black Hills, which were considered to be sacred
We got up in Spokane today and went to the stadium of the Spokane Indians. Being a short-season team, they were not playing, but they let us in and sold us a hat and pennant all the same. We briefly went through Idaho afterwards - but through its thin panhandle, so we weren't in the state for very long. In fact, we went through only two counties. Getting into Montana, we had our sights set on Missoula, where we were going to get something to eat as well as see if we couldn't get a pennant from
Today's adventure started early in the morning - earlier than I think we expected. The fact that we are in Central Time has worked to our benefit. Breakfast - a meal that I would not otherwise remark upon - was interesting. They had a waffle iron at the hotel breakfast, and beside of it was a rather large dispenser that slowly oozes batter if you press the appropriate button. Well, I had a hankering for a waffle (there wasn't much else besides it, to be honest), so I made one. As it turns out,
Last night, craziness happened. As we got onto the elevator, a man who was dressed for the haunters convention that was held in the hotel pulled up his oversized cane and shot at us. We had heard this cap gun going off earlier on, when we were eating more maple ice cream, so we knew that it wasn't real ... but if we hadn't heard it earlier, my dad and I probably would have attacked him. We got back to our room and got to sleep ... but around 1:00 in the morning, doors slammed shut and rabid ca
BRICKS CASCADE EDITION Today, we got up early and headed down to the Oregon Convention Center for the first public day of Bricks Cascade. It was awesome. I got my BZP Staff shirt (which is awesome and I never ever want to take it off) as well as a BZP Staff brick for my brick badge, which is still in a drawer somewhere in North Carolina. I met Kakaru and Swert for the first time as well. (The former's awesomeness is recounted in the entry immediately prior to this one.) I got a purple Za
Today, we saw more Redwoods and more of the Pacific Coast. As we went along the highway, we spotted a sign warning of "Elk." Not but twenty yards from the sign was a gravel road, which we turned onto because, in the field beyond, 12-14 Roosevelt elk were sitting or ambling around in the field, and nearly all were male. We got a few pictures, then headed back on out onto the road. Later on, there was a special pullout where we came just a few yards from a female elk. We then got into Oregon, ev
