Road Trip

My children and I took a road trip yesterday to see my sister, her husband, and their little boy in Florida. Kris is home knocking out a list of house projects.

After too short a night, we set out at 5:50 AM, a mere 50 minutes beyond when I had planned to leave. Not bad for a 9-day road trip.

I did have to wait for the dryer to finish, though. You see, the night before, I washed and dried a load of clothes, one which had a couple items I wanted to take, then realized I had forgotten to use detergent in the wash. Not a first for me, but it is rare. I remember one other time doing that same daft thing.

With a hug and prayer from Kris, so began a long trek down Interstate 65 to Florida.

Why didn’t we fly? If we had a shorter time-frame, we probably would have flown. For a 9-day span, though, I just really enjoy seeing the country side at ground level.

Southern Indiana starts getting a little hilly, then we cross the bridge over the Ohio River into Louisville, Kentucky (that’s the city where you have to let the name fall out of your mouth as if you can’t catch it; proper enunciation is prohibited).

The hills really start in Kentucky and continue all the way through Tennessee. Nashville driving can get a little crazy. That’s to be expected.

The norther part of Alabama is as flat as parts of Indiana, then the hills start the farther south you go in the state. There are more fields in the part of Florida we first entered.

Now we have landed at my sister’s house. I’m sitting on her lovely porch typing. There are thick woods across the road from a strip of newly developed houses. Birds chirping. Construction happening somewhere in the distance. It’s heating up nicely. I put on jeans, but will be changing to shorts before too long.

Back to the trip, Kal, Kara, and I kept a notebook with a list going of anything we found to be interesting as we drove, and here it is:

• Titus Bakery in Westfield, IN. This is a new favorite place that my parents introduced to the kids first, then to me another time. Yummy heaps of sugar and caffeine with a friendly smile.

• Hot air balloon. Floating in the sky as we sat in the parking lot of the bakery arranging our heaps of sugar for the road.

• Gym for dogs. Cool idea. Somewhere in Indy.

• Rainbow. Kal saw this.

• Church guy flipping off a semi driver because he couldn’t merge. At least, I assume he was a church guy. It was Sunday morning, and he was dressed up.

• A Ferris wheel.

• The Ohio River and the massive bridge spanning it. I’m always impressed with engineering.

• Bathroom that smelled like it hadn’t been cleaned yet this year. Then there was a funny sign on the door saying who to tell if the bathroom was less than clean. Why bother? It’s too obvious to point out.

• Iron Order motorcycle riders. We saw groups of them all along I-65.

• Dead tree at the McDonald’s where we stopped for pre-lunch. Pre-lunch happens at 11:00 in the morning, except you’re in a different time zone so it’s really 10:00.

• Patches of poppies, daisies, and Queen Anne’s lace along the highway.

• Yellow Corvette, blue Corvette. Especially interesting to Kal, my 12-year-old boy. He also pointed out other sports cars, but I couldn’t always take notice as I was trying to keep from getting hit by crazy drivers.

• Corvette Museum in Kentucky. We said hi and bye as we drove by. That will be another trip.

• Dinosaur statue.

• Rocket ship at a rest stop near Huntsville, Alabama. Yes, a full rocket ship. Neat-o. Huntsville is a big NASA place.

• American flag suspended high above the treetops from a crane. I love my country.

• Piggly Wiggly. We live in Indiana. Kroger, Martin’s, used to have Marsh, Aldi. We don’t have Piggly Wiggly, and the picture made the kids giggly. Had to make that little rhyme.

• Roads cut through rock. I am amazed at the genius of an interstate road system. The volume of people and goods that can go anywhere in a relatively short time is amazing. We were driving over areas that Davy Crockett trekked through on foot for months at a time.

• Big water. Somewhere in Alabama.

• Big peach water tower that looked like a big peach butt.

• A beautiful tree with droopy leaves and pink flowers resting on top. All over southern Alabama and Florida. I’ll find out what that tree is.

It’s heating up. 73F degrees. I’m not used to this in Indiana yet. It was 42F degrees when we left out house yesterday.