CA to VA

Well, I haven't been on in awhile. We had a scramble to get packed up and out the door to Virginia. Hubby is attending a school in Virgina for 18 weeks and we decided to keep the family together. Here was the planned travel schedule:

Saturday, August 12: Sacramento to Salt Lake City, UT - 668 miles: 9hrs 37mins (driving time)
Sunday, August 13: Salt Lake City, UT to Cheyenne, WY - 438 miles: 5h 59m
Monday, August 14: Cheyenne, WY to Omaha, NE - 496.9 miles: 6h 49m
Tuesday, August 15: Omaha, NE to South Bend, IN - 546.3 miles: 7h 45m
Wednesday, August 16: South Bend, IN to Hagerstown, MD - 541.5 miles: 7h 37m
Thursday, August 17: Hagerstown, MD to Stafford, VA - 106.3 miles: 1h 47m

Here was the actual:

Saturday, August 12: Sacramento (10:20 a.m. PDT) to Evanston, WY (2:55 a.m. MT)- 750 miles: By 11:15 a.m. Biggest asked how much longer to Virginia. By 12:50 p.m. Littlest was begging to go home. 5 stops - bathroom and gas and food. By Reno it was evident that I had a cold and Littlest was running a 101.5 temp. Got to UT only to find out that all (literally) hotels within a 150 mile radius of Salt Lake City were booked. There were car shows, conventions, concerts, a rodeo, all sorts of events going on. The closest hotel we could find was in WY and we got the last room in the place. Apparently it wasn't even supposed to be used because one of the beds was broken. I had to put the linens on it myself. The smoke detector was in pieces, nothing was connected and in the morning we realized there was no way to turn on the shower. The faucet handle was missing. They gave us a $10 discount so we only had to pay $55 for the room! Ah, but it was a room and we were exhausted.

Sunday, August 13: Evanston, WY (11:45 a.m.) to North Platte, NE (11:27 p.m)-512 miles: Had breakfast at a restaurant before pulling out. Littlest's fever gone. 2 bathroom stops and a dinner stop. Kids watched movies on the laptop and Hubby and I listened to The Great Gatsby on tape. As a family, we listened to My Father's Dragon - very cute little trilogy. By the time we reached North Platte I felt horrible. Full head cold.

Monday, August 14: North Platte, NE (12:30 p.m) to Davenport, IL (12:45 a.m.)- 607 miles: Had cereal in the hotel room and made trip to Wal-Mart for cold medicine before hitting the road. 4 stops, at lunch stop, boys and Daddy played football and frisbee. This was Littlest's 3rd birthday so after dinner we found a Cold Stone Creamery and celebrated with ice cream (he also opened presents in the hotel room before we hit the road). More movies and The Sea Wolf on tape (GREAT book!)

Tuesday, August 15: Davenport, IL (11:30 a.m.) to Sandusky, OH (11:30 p.m.)- 468 miles: Rough night. Littlest was very restelss and kicked all night. Phone rang twice with a wrong number at about 1:30 a.m. Woke up at 8 a.m. to maintenance stripping paint right outside our room. Fell back to sleep and housekeeping banged on the door at 9 a.m. despite the privacy sign on the door. Had cereal in room. Littlest kicked his over because he wanted pancakes instead. 2 stops; bathroom and dinner. Horrible traffic, lots of road work in Chicago area and into OH. Car started to overheat in IL traffic. Turns out a broken tire that broke my front grill over a year ago also broke the plastic overflow reservoir for the radiator. Had no clue until now. Was hoping to make it to Cleveland but got too late.

Wednesday, August 16: Sandusky, OH (11:30 a.m.) to Fredericksburg, VA (10 p.m.)- 467 miles: Finally feeling better. 1 stop for coffee in Pennsylvania, dinner in Maryland. Driving through the DC area at 9 at night was very stressful (though better than rush hour, I'm sure). Speed limit was 55-65 and everyone drives 80. Normally that would be just my style, it reminded me of drving through the SF bay area, but towing a trailer while unfamiliar with the route and crazy YAHOO! directions had me very stressed. By the time we hit the hotel my legs were shaking.

Thursday, August 17: Fredericksburg, VA to Stafford, VA - 5 miles: 10 minutes: We had breakfast at Waffle House in honor of a friend who regularly laments the fact that there are no Waffle Houses in California. Drove to the apartments and signed the lease. We're home!