Interesting Facts

Total mileage: 7,926
# of states: 17
highest gas price: $4.38 in LA
lowest gas price: $2.97 in Albuquerque
fastest speed: 91 mph
# of pics taken: 1,844
how many times Dan shaved: 0
cheapest hotel:  $23 at the Riviera in Las Vegas
books read: 5 1/2
earliest wake-up: 4:45 AM
latest wake-up: 11:30 AM
# of all-night driving trips: 1 (and never again)
coolers of food lost to wild animals: 1
longest distance on one road: 1,450 miles on I-70 East

Home Sweet Home

Yes, it is true. We made it home safely, almost exactly 4 weeks since we left. The final leg of our trip was filled with seeing friends and family, a great way to end. In Albuquerque, we spent time with Dan's Uncle John and Aunt Lucy, and cousins Drew, Brett and Kaycee, and their two sweet little guys Luke and Nate. We hiked in the foothills and around the top of the Sandia Mountains, toured around Old Town Albuquerque, and played several rounds of ping-pong. After all the fun, we left for the Great Sand Dunes. We spent the day climbing up and running down the massive dunes, definitely a work-out. Over the next two days we stopped in Colorado Springs to visit Dan's friend Danny and his family and in Denver to visit my cousin Lacey. It was nice to get to spend time talking and visiting together. After Denver, we went to Fort Collins to stay with Dan's friend Ben and his wife Jobi. We had a lot of fun hiking, playing with their adorable dog Dargan, and just spending time together watching football and talking. Dan and I also had time to drive into Rocky Mountain National Park, where we got to see some wild sheep and two huge herds of elk and a ton of snow. We left CO early and made the 13-hour drive to Illinois, just outside of St. Louis. We stayed with Dan's cousin Parker and his wife Laura and their two little cutie pies, Samuel and Willow. They were kind enough to show us around the city, including the St. Louis Gateway Arch and the art museum. We left Thursday around 6 AM and made the long 14-hour drive back to our sweet, little house in Brunnerville. And here we will stay because Dan has decided he is not driving any longer than 20 minutes at a time from now on!

We want to thank everyone who prayed for us while we were away. God certainly answered prayers because we made it across the country and back without any major issues. Dan was a great driver, no one froze to death or got eaten by a bear. We got to spend a lot of time talking and laughing just the two of us and with so many friends and family members. All in all an amazing journey!

<3 Dan and Kristen

For Ben

Ben has been complaining via text that we haven't been blogging enough, so this one is for Ben (and for everyone else who loves us, just don't tell Ben). We are in Albuquerque with Dan's Uncle John and Aunt Lucy and their family. It is relaxing to rest and spend time with family and eat wonderful home-cooked food again. Before New Mexico, we spent a good amount of time driving and camping all along the coast until we got to Los Angeles. We tried our best to spot a celebrity. Unfortunately, the best we could do was the wax museum. Not quite as exciting as seeing a real celeb, but still a fun afternoon. After LA, we went to Las Vegas and gambeled our life savings away. Just teasing. Sorry Grandmas. We did have fun taking in all of the sights and the elaborate casinos. We even got to see some of the World Series of Poker at the Rio Casino, which made Dan a very happy guy. After getting our fill of Vegas, we stopped at Hoover Dam and then spent the rest of the day taking a huge amount of pictures at the Grand Canyon. From Grand Canyon, we went to the Petrified Forest and on to Albquerque. Next stop, Great Sand Dunes in Colorado and Fort Collins to visit some friends. We miss everyone and, even though we are having a great time on our adventure, I think we are starting to miss our family and even our little house in Brunnerville.

 Around Monterey Bay

 Laetitia Vineyards and Winery

 Guiness World Records Museum in LA

 We've been eating a lot of junk food.

 Sorry, Dan.

 Sorry, again.

 We had way too much fun at the wax museum.

 It didn't really look like Will Ferrell, but that didn't stop Dan from being excited!

 Tom Cruise... isn't he a cute little thing?!

 A stare down with Steve Carell

 I <3 Hollywood

 Vegas

 Hoover Dam

 The Georges got too close to the edge of the Grand Canyon.

 Petrified Forest

Sandia Mountains in New Mexico

~* TRIVIA QUESTION #2*~

What is the largest hotel in the world?

Hint: It is located in one of the last two major cities that we visited.

Congrats to Kristy for answering question #1 correctly!

You get a postcard from us (but you have to share with Dave)!

On to LA

Hey everyone! We are taking advantage of the free wifi at our hotel in San Luis Opisbo, a stopover on our way to LA. We left Half Moon Bay and stayed one night at a little state beach called Sunset Beach. The name was well deserved. Then we drove about 4 hours to Yosemite National Park. The first item on our list of things to see was the Mariposa Grove of Giant Sequoia trees. We hiked for about 5 miles around the grove trying to see as many of the famous trees as we could. We saw the Giant Grizzly, the California Tunnel, the Wawona Fallen Tunnel, and several other incredibly large trees. We were definitely in awe of the size of these trees. They are not your ordinary MD or PA trees! After that we camped at the Wawona campground in Yosemite. We did not see any bears or mountain lions or coyotes, although they had all been reported in the area. We did however lose some sleep due to what we thought was a bear, only to realize it was the man in the campsite behind us snoring. We spent the next day touring around the rest of the big attractions at Yosemite, like El Capitan (the largest monolith of granite in the world), Bridalveil and Yosemite Falls, and Half Dome. Then because there was a chance of snow, we left Yosemite and headed back to the coast. We stopped in Monterey at Point Lobos State Park and saw the cutest little sea otters, harbor seals, and sea lions (who made the funniest sounds). Because it did start to rain and we were exhausted, we decided to stop here on our way to LA. Next on the schedule: wine touring, celebrity stalking, and becoming a game show super-star in Hollywood!

 Sunset Beach, CA

 Fallen Monarch

 California Tunnel Tree

 Kristen and the Georges

 World's Smallest Giant Sequoia Tree

 View of Yosemite Valley from Inspiration Point

 Bridalveil Falls

 The only black bear we actually saw

Friends of the S & S seal?



Happy Halloween from the West Coast

We left Reno Saturday morning, heading west toward San Francisco. Thankfully, this drive was a much more manageable four hours. We got into the city and found our hostel without much trouble. To avoid paying $25 for parking, we drove around town for awhile and eventually landed at the Golden Gate Park. It was packed with all the other crazy tourists, but it was a pretty oasis of a park in the middle of such a big city. Later, we drove to Presidio Park to watch the sunset by the Golden Gate Bridge. When it was safe to park the car, we found a garage and headed out on the town. We enjoyed some vegetarian Chinese food and walked around downtown San Francisco. Since it was Halloween weekend, we saw a lot of interesting characters in their costumes, at least we hope they were costumes. The next day, we headed 45 minutes south to Half Moon Bay State Beach for our first night of camping on our supposed month-long camping trip. It was actually so nice that we decided to stay another night, and here we are at McDonalds using their free wifi and eating nutritious food, of course.

Golden Gate Park

 Presidio Park

 Golden Gate Bridge

 A good looking man that Dan saw jogging

(I think San Francisco is getting to him)

 Downward facing Dan doing yoga

Stackable Snyders


*TRIVIA QUESTION #1*
What type of cookie was invented at Golden Gate Park's Tea Garden?

Yes, we are in Reno

So this is what we’ve been doing…

After spending the night in Cody, WY, we hit Yellowstone and the Grand Tetons. Both parks were amazingly beautiful, definitely better than I imagined. The day was sunny, but it had snowed the night before. Most of Yellowstone was covered with a light dusting of snow making it look like a Winter Wonderland. We took a lot of pictures of the landscape and wildlife, so we can put together a long slideshow to show everyone! Unfortunately, we were not able to camp in Yellowstone or Grand Tetons for a number of reasons: snow, cold temps, an itchy case of poison ivy for Kristen, and most of the campgrounds being closed for the season. Oh, so sad. After grabbing some dinner and a quick nap, we left Jackson Hole and headed to Reno. It took about 10 hours and all of the credit for getting us here safely goes to Dan, who drove straight through the night while I tried desperately not to fall asleep without any success. So now we are here in Reno just relaxing and enjoying some warmer sunshine, watching the World Series, doing laundry, and covering my itchies with calamine lotion. It has been a nice, little stopover. We’ll be leaving tomorrow and heading for San Francisco.

And Reno...

Hi from (almost) Yellowstone!

Well, a few people love us. Thanks Aunt Gwenda, Josanna,  Uncle John and Anonymous (perhaps Dave and Kristy)! So for you all and anyone else who is wondering, we made it to Chicago. We actually stayed just outside of the city in Wheaton with Donna, a friend of Dan’s Aunt Mary Lou. She was a great tour guide (and local celebrity!) and provided us with all sorts of information about Chicago, including the best pizza joints and the best place to get a veggie burger. The veggie burger was a delicious deviation from our strictly pizza diet. After eating our fill of deep-dish pizza and checking out the city’s main attractions (The Bean, Wrigley Field, Magnificent Mile, Lake Michigan, Willis Tower, and Navy Pier), we headed to Sioux Falls, SD. Dan drove about eleven hours straight, Kristen may have slept for five of those hours. We spent the night there and left Tuesday morning for Mount Rushmore. We stopped at Rushmore to get some pictures, then kept driving toward our next stop Yellowstone. We had some snowflakes along the way, but made it to Cody, WY outside of Yellowstone and stayed there in a hotel for the night. We just finished a delicious continental breakfast that was well worth the extra $10 we spent to stay at this hotel and are just getting bundled up to head to the park now. Temps are pretty low now, so we’ll keep you posted as to whether we will be camping or hotel-ing while in Yellowstone!

Here are a few pics from Chicago and Mt. Rushmore: