theme: roots

Every year for about twenty years, my mom's best friend Althea has joined us for Thanksgiving. She has been friends with my parents since college, and she is warm and fun and smart and I've known her my entire life. She's always been around, except the years she was away with Peace Corps, where she met her husband David. They have two kids now, who are exactly ten years younger than Greta and I. They've grown up coming to our house for Thanksgiving, and we go to theirs for New Year's. That's just the way it is.

Thanksgiving is the holiday we open our house. My uncle, the ever-adventuring bachelor, usually makes an appearance. It's often the first introduction boyfriends get (and the only one that matters). Various friends have passed the day with us, and folks stop by throughout the day. We make a spread of appetizers for lunch (this has been my job since I moved out), play games, watch football, and enjoy a dinner at a moderately late hour, followed by more wine and card-playing. The house is filled to capacity with people and love. It is absolutely my favorite holiday.

This year had an extra-special touch. If nothing else, it was the first time I'd been back for the holiday since before moving to Ohio. The first year I was gone, Chris & I were on a great new adventure and had a grand old time throwing Thanksgiving in Ohio. Last year Ian worked all day and I cried a lot. I have since made a pact with myself (an addendum to the general Pact To Have Adventures) that no matter the adventure I am on, I will make it back for Thanksgiving ever after. This was my planned adventure trajectory before we knew my mom had to have surgery.

My personal adventures aside, this year we were all the more appreciative of the value of the ties that bind. We all clung to each other a little more tightly, rejoiced in each other's presence. Made sure to laugh, relax, play games, surround ourselves with love and family. That word, family. It's an emotion that no adjective can replace. It defies categorization. This weekend, we all knew we were family. Language fails me here; I wish I could convey that feeling, that sensation, that utter comfort of knowing others so well, so deeply.

I have been in Eugene for two weeks now, and have focused on: rest here, help my mom rest, recover, and prepare for what's next, soak up family time, and help and grow in any way I can, while maintaining my own balance. I got up early Thanksgiving morning, ran a 5K in Springfield, and busied myself in the kitchen. I had made bread and biscuits the evening before, chopped veggies before I left for the 5K, and had a well-organized to-do list. Every so often, my mom or Althea would ask if I needed a hand. I only needed them to help out by playing cards. I bustled through the day in that manner, and suddenly it was dinnertime, and I had cooked all but the turkey and turkey gravy!

Here is what I made:
Mashed potatoes, mushroom gravy, stuffing, wild rice with walnuts, quinoa salad, garlicky greens, roasted root veggies, corn, candied yams, green salad with lemon-miso dressing, biscuits, spelt dinner rolls, fresh cranberry sauce. Dad made turkey + gravy.
For lunch we had spinach dip (dad made), hummus, roasted beet dip, guacamole, hummus, two kinds of salsa, tofu pate, Crumbs rye crackers that I brought from Ohio, spelt focaccia, fresh bread from Metropol in Eugene, carrots, celery, and all manner of chips. I bought the salsa and Toby's Tofu Pate but made all the rest.

I hardly mean to brag. I am happy that I was able to give this gift to my mother, the gift of resting on Thanksgiving, surrounded by loving friends and family. Two different friends I grew up with stopped by, catching up with my mom and I, bestowing hugs while I bustled in the kitchen.

In this weekend's other main highlight, I revisited my old stomping grounds. A few months ago, I talked my friend Erin into buying obstructed-view seats for the Oregon v. Arizona football game. What a great game that was! It was a weekend of great college football; as an aside, I was sad to see Boise State lose, but it was an exciting game to the end!

Erin and I spent the game on our feet, damp, cold as night fell on Autzen and 60,000 screaming fans. Essentially, typical gameday weather. Little has changed at Autzen, other than the high numbers we put on the scoreboard now. The atmosphere was electric, especially as we pulled away from Arizona, and cemented once again our position as #1 in the country. Nobody in attendance could quite believe it - we are really, really ranked first. #1. Oregon. Most people west of the Rockies would struggle to place Eugene on a map. Fewer still pronounce in correctly.

(Here is the most common response, when I tell someone where I'm from: "Oh, I've never been to Ore-GONE." Yep, I know you haven't. Maybe now that the team is gaining national repute, people will learn to say "Orygun.")

I mostly took pictures of the marching band. What a whirlwind! Gameday is gameday; it felt the same as the countless previous Saturdays I'd passed at Autzen. When I was here in July, I was primarily aware of how much had changed in the two years since I moved to Ohio. So far on this trip, I've been in awe of how much everything is the same. So it goes.

My theme for Month Four of the Summer of Adventures was "roots," and that provided an excellent transition into this autumn, the autumn of dreams. I think this is the November of the Future - but where is the future without the past? We must be in touch with our roots to move forward.

I still can't quite grasp that I am truly in Eugene, in Oregon, at my parents' house. I have begun to miss Athens terribly. I am trying to embrace not having a plan, but these are thoughts for another day.

Everything is an adventure

This I need to keep reminding myself. I have been on a new sort of adventure since my arrival in Eugene ten days ago. In this adventure, I primarily spend time with my mom & dad, at their house, going to the grocery, or on a really exciting day attending a litany of doctors' appointments. The most interesting part is, despite my rather droll description, how effortlessly the time has passed! I am grateful that I can be here and help, even in little ways. Nevertheless, I have had to try extra hard to retain the spirit of Sarah-adventure, and make sure that, full as my days currently are, I make sure to find time to fill them with Sarah-things, too.

Eugene does funny things to me. It's the general hometown blahs; it's the way my "normal" has changed since I've lived in Ohio. Eugene is ten times the size of Athens; most of my friends have moved elsewhere; I'm doing different things at the moment than I did when I lived here, which again are different things than I have done in Athens. At the same time as the past ten days have passed rapidly, equally it is easy to feel like it was ages and ages ago that I was in Athens. I know that I miss adventuring, miss being on the road, and yesterday I started to painfully, dearly miss Athens.

Part of this adventure, as planned, was the adventure of resting. The adventure of making myself not plan. This is one reason why I really do not know when I will be back in Athens. Yes, I love making plans. Yes, I might have a notebook full of lists and ideas and interesting things to do across the country and how long it takes to drive different places. But I want to make sure that I am a person who knows how to relax, and thus I have forced myself to not plan the remainder of this adventure. Everything in moderation, even moderation - this I have been told. I tend toward extremes, so perhaps this adventure of relaxation will balance out the years and years I have already spent being over-employed. Ideally, after these weeks/months (who knows?!) of purposeful non-planning, resting, being busy in other ways time, I will be able to strike a balance!

On this Thanksgiving eve, I am thankful for so much. The opportunity to be here, now. The skills I possess, the things I can do. Family around me. My mother's strength, knowledge, wit. That we are all alive, breathing, laughing, annoying one another. Thankful for the adventures I have had. For love. For friendship spanning a continent, old friends, new friends, the connection I feel even as I write this. For nature, winter weather, pioneering spirit, a return to homeland. Tomorrow I will rise early and run a Thanksgiving 5K, and I am thankful that I have the means and ability to do this.

Love!

Adventure phase 2: Oregon!

Oh, I have so many more thoughts to share about my journey into and through Oregon yesterday!

Once I was on that leg of the journey, I had to backstep on two of my goals for the trip: to not drive on interstates, and to not drive on any road I had driven before. I had actually been following the interstates almost non-stop since Denver, which is the unfortunate thing about deciding to cross the Rockies in November. Technically, this was new road, since the previous two times I drove on I-80 through Wyoming and I-84 in Idaho and Utah I was heading east.

I had never piloted a car from Boise to Eugene, and again, I will rave about what a must-see it is. It was so beautiful. Beautiful doesn't even begin to describe it. If I had seen northeastern Oregon in its splendor, with the perspective of a person who has traveled west and west and west, I don't know if I ever would have dreamed of leaving.

Every part of that drive was enjoyable, and the route takes you through the whole spectrum of the region's geography. I saw snow-capped mountains, granite bluffs, sagebrush, fields, farms, rushing river, more evergreens than I could count, bicyclists and roaring pickups, changes in elevation of several thousand feet, curving highway and windy straightaways.

A slight rain began to fall as I passed through Hood River, about fifty miles east of Portland, so when I first saw Portland, it was through its classic gray veil. I reflected on learning how to drive in the rain to the point where the first few times I drove without needing the windshield wipers I just couldn't figure out what I was doing wrong!

I skated around Portland on I-205, which ultimately connects the driver to I-5 (but is not always the quickest route, thanks to the location along it of the airport and several populous Portland 'burbs). Unexpected tears - of joy? homesickness? sheer lunacy after nine days of travel and not enough sleep? - shot out of my eyes as I found familiar Portland stations on my radio dial, and the Max sped by above me. The lanes briefly clogged with late-afternoon congestion, and even for that I was happy, that chance to sit in a lane on 205 and take it all in.

In keeping with adventure rules, though, I consulted my map, and jumped off 205 at OR-213, heading due south. This would take me through some smaller, farming communities, and was a road I had never driven on! Over the years, I have had the opportunity to drive on many of Oregon's back roads, but this was a route I had never taken. I especially relished the opportunity to observe rural Oregon vs. rural Wyoming, Kansas, Ohio, etc. 213 curved through many small towns whose names I found entirely unfamiliar.

Over the past half-century, Oregon has experienced with logging what other parts of the country have experienced with farming and coal - a sudden need to shift dependence away from this traditional economy. The small towns I drove through south of Portland, however, showed none of this. Logging mills and shipping lanes were alive and well, and though some of the towns emanated this poverty of change, it was not nearly as entrenched or generational as I have seen elsewhere. It was also not very rural; the Willamette Valley holds the vast majority of Oregon's population, so even spots such as tiny Marquam, Oregon, and tinier Liberal, Oregon (yes, that's its real name) are hardly isolated. I suspect I'd draw different conclusions after exploring other parts of rural Oregon -which, naturally, I fully intend to do at some point on this adventure.

I cut across to I-5 at Salem, by which point it was getting dark, and all of my options for getting to Eugene were roads that I had in fact actually traveled before, and countless times at that. I practically have the Eugene-Portland drive on I-5 memorized, down to the exit numbers and knowing what was around each bend in the road. I found great comfort in this, and again experienced a rush of mixed emotions on the approach to Eugene. As I veered off the exit ramp for my parents' house, my body relaxed in ways I hadn't realized it was tense. I pulled up to my parents' house and I could hardly believe it: months ago, I thought to myself, "Wouldn't it be crazy to drive to Oregon and be at my parents' house with my car and whatever belongings I need?" AND THERE I WAS. I ran up the walk to the front door, and let myself in. It was 6:05 pm, and my mom and dad were waiting to greet me. My adventure was complete.

Sunday mileage: 582. Total mileage: 3036.
Thank you, adventure-mobile!

On a personal note, I have one more paragraph to write tonight. I created this blog to share of my adventures to Oregon, and now I am here, having a new sort of adventures. When I conceived of this trip, I longed for the adventure of resting in Eugene for an undetermined amount of time, reconnecting with family, friends, homeland. I had spent a week here in July; my mom paid me a visit in Athens in late August; and by the end of September I was desperately homesick, despite my love for every element of my life in Athens. So, long story short, I quit my job and planned a road trip, buoyed by visions of quality time spent with my mom.

(Okay, more than one paragraph.) In late October, mere weeks before my planned departure from Ohio, my mom called me with news. After an irregular mammogram and follow-up appointments, doctors had found a tumor in her breast. Surgery was to be early in November. So, I moved up my departure plans - that, that is the reason why I was so strongly pulled to Oregon. I knew I had to be there. New updates keep arriving in this situation, and upon my own arrival in Eugene last night, I received more updates still. Tomorrow morning, my mother is having a full mastectomy of a breast that now has four cancerous, albeit small, masses in it. From there, we will learn what to do next. This is extremely new territory for all of us, and any words, advice, love, energy is appreciated. My mother is a very strong woman, and I know and believe that she will make it through this, and I believe so strongly in the healing power of love and energy of those around us. She has touched and inspired so many, and we are already feeling that warmth from all directions. This is part of my Oregon adventure, so I will keep updates. It's not the most swashbuckling of adventures, but life is but one extraordinary adventure after another, is it not?

Good night - sending my love across the miles.

to the promised land

The sky was gray and misty, the air the slightest bit chilly, as I left Boise this morning. Nostalgia for the trip I was still yet to complete poured over me as I drove through downtown and accelerated west onto I-84. I have come to love this adventure so much, and the first leg of it is now over. Now I am on Adventure Phase 2: Oregon, in which I spend a prolonged amount of time hanging out in Eugene, resting, reconnecting with friends, family, homeland. That is another main goal of this adventure. And I have no doubts that it is exactly where I need to be right now, but even so I am sad to see my days on the road go.

I have pretty much decided I want to be a professional adventurer. I figure if I come up with enough spiffy ideas of adventures, and write books about them, people will buy my books and then I will have money to go on said adventures. I already have a few adventures I want to go on: One where I go to all 50 U.S. capitals and write about them (update: I can now say the states and capitals in reverse alphabetical order), one where I see a sunrise and sunset in every state, and one where I drive across the country only taking back roads, even if I have to go far out of my way and have adventures. Those are just my ideas for today.

Coming out of Boise, you are at a fairly high elevation, and you still have a ways to go. The Blue Mountains stand between our intrepid traveler and the waiting greenery on the other side. I continued my observation as to the distinction between central and west, plains and mountains. I also mused quite a bit on the pioneers who traversed these routes before me, and I was once again grateful that they did the dirty work. I feel like I have a little bit of perspective, now, on how they must have felt as they neared their Oregon treks. After driving straight west for a few thousand miles, you start to notice these things.

And, let me tell you, Oregon must have looked like the promised land to my forebears. After spending a few hours winding through northeastern Oregon's mountains in high anticipation of what was to come, I dropped down into the Grand Ronde valley, and there it was - the sun shone brightly through the clouds which were now far above, and the valley's bright colors danced. Around another bend, a ridge to my left was populated with more varieties of verdant evergreens. I knew that, as I continued, I would see the great Columbia River, and what a sight this whole scene must have been to the weary adventurers making this trek without knowing what they would find! No wonder Oregon is so ingrained in our collective consciousness.

But before I get too far ahead, let me back up - I saw a ridge populated with evergreens. TREES. That is my answer! That is the difference! That is how you know you are out of the mountains, past the infinite grasslands! Goddamn TREES! (This is what I may or may not have been shrieking as I made this discovery - after nine days on a solo adventure, you talk to yourself a lot)

I had forgotten what it was like to have so much greenery everywhere. I had never noticed how many varieties of trees we have, and what massive contrast that is to elsewhere in this country.

And the Columbia River! I tried to imagine what Lewis & Clark must have been thinking when first they discovered this mighty waterway. Could they have sensed that it would lead them to their long-sought-after destination, the Pacific Ocean? Even not knowing this, they surely stood in awe of this majestic river, certainly aware of its power. At the first chance I got, I pulled over and ran along a retaining wall, letting the gusts of wind whip my hair around as I exclaimed with joy and breathed in the magical air coming from this river. I spent a lot of time during the Summer Of Adventures rejoicing in the Ohio River, flinging myself on its riverbanks at various junctures along its course, spending hours pondering its historical and geographic significance. I feel much the same way about the Columbia - oh, the mighty Columbia! And what it means to the generations of adventurers who have traveled all the way across this great continent - relief, hope, destiny.

So why do I feel this pull westward? Is it simply my own personal roots, that the genesis of the Sarah Nelson story lies mixed up in these valleys, rivers, rainy winters and evergreen-lined streets? Or is this a deeper instinct, one that runs deep among my fellow countrymen and countrywomen, that manifest destiny, that compulsion westward that led most of our ancestors to populate this continent? (From a European standpoint, certainly, but for the sake of argument let's continue) Christopher Columbus, for all that he was not, he nevertheless stood on a shore in Europe and felt the need to explore westward. Words fail me in trying to describe my own feelings on this: "right," "true," "correct," "accurate" - these words do not sum up how I feel, but suffice to say that traveling west has felt like one of the most absolutely right things I could be doing.

This realization, in turn, breaks my heart. Athens is not west of here, and I love it so dearly. How will I reconcile this? What do I do now that I have gone almost as far west as I can? I have a few months to chew on this dilemma, and by then I might be more than ready to turn my sails to the east. I know I'll certainly be itching to get on the road again (with sails?), for I know that that has felt right.

more adventures in boise

First off: I am in Eugene now! It is exciting, surreal, and so much more.

My posts have lagged for a few reasons. One, while in Boise the last few days I mostly busied myself resting and visiting! This was delightful, but I didn't give myself enough time for Sarah-things like jogging and writing. Ah, well! Other kinds of adventures!

I've also been finding myself somewhat frustrated with the raw-ness of the blog. On the one hand, it's fantastic for the sort of adventuring I'm doing, and I love the exercise of it so that I can hone my writing skills a bit more and just for keeping a record of what I'm doing. On my rest days in Denver, though, I did a bit more writing on the side, of writing something cohesive. In a blog, I rarely even proofread, let alone pay attention to structure, layout, format, theme - basically, any sort of doublecheck to see if my point is getting across at all. So I'm not sure how I feel about it, but I have found great joy in writing about my adventures. Onward to Oregon we go!

I had quite a lovely time in Boise. I stayed with a friend I marched a few years of corps with, and it was delightful to catch up and peek a little at what his life in Boise is like, the usual sort of things I enjoy exploring. I think that's one of my favorite things about adventuring like this. I generally have a running list in my head of places that my friends live, and I like to go visit them. Like I said, I really enjoy seeing what other peoples' lives are like, and what it's like to live in a certain place that makes it unique. I especially love visiting people in different contexts, such as seeing drum corps friends in "real life," or visiting friends who have moved to new cities.

In Boise, I also stopped in on my great-aunt and great-uncle. That, too, was a delight! They have lived in Boise for years, and when I was young they had a cabin on scenic, gorgeous land outside Stanley, Idaho. We visited there a few times growing up, and they remain as close to my dad as they can. I hadn't seen them since Earl's 80th birthday in 2003, and I had a blast catching up and sharing half a day with them. They are vibrant and inspiring!

Saturday night was the Oregon game. I was so excited to finally be in a state that bordered Oregon so that I might watch it.....except I was in Boise! Boise State fans are not especially fond of Oregon these days, not the least of whom were the folks I was staying with. So, I donned my trusty Oregon shirt and went down to Buster's Sports Bar, which was just really the closest bar to my friend Jeff's house. I have a long history in recent years of watching Ducks games in "unfriendly" environments, so it was a great adventure. I'm not going to say the Ducks played gloriously, but hey, we won! Go Ducks! Yeah, that's right, go ducks! I then spent a few hours experiencing the Boise downtown Saturday night bar scene, since, hey, I was on an adventure!

On that note, one of the things I miss most about the Northwest when I'm in Ohio is the beer culture. In the Northwest, there is just such a greater appreciation for what goes into good beer, what beer tastes like (and how superior it is on draft!), and the general idea of sitting around with your friends over several pints of tasty beer. So, yes, while in Boise I spent too much money (I'm still operating in Adventure Mode, and Adventure Rules dictate thriftiness in every way) drinking delicious beer on draft with friends, but it had been so long since I had done something like that! I marveled most at how natural it seemed to them, to just sit around on a Saturday night and try different beers on tap. We don't really do that in Ohio.

Well, I am going to end this post here, since it seems to all (generally) be in the theme of my Boise adventures, relatively unspectacular though they may be. I'll save today's journey to the promised land for a separate post.

boise, id (after the fact)

There are many questions I have posed to myself throughout this trip. Some of them are more like study questions you'd find on an impossible midterm. Take, for example, the one I chewed on yesterday while driving from Denver to Boise: What is different about Ohio and Oregon, aside from the fact that Ohio is new and Oregon is old? Does our main character like Ohio so well solely because it is different from Oregon? Watch her as she tries to explore Oregon with the same wide-eyed wonder she has explored Ohio.

I realized a few months ago that, magical though I believe Athens truly is, I had never looked upon Oregon with those same eyes, that same dedication to peering expectantly around every corner and rejoicing in what I found. I really hope that I can learn to do that in Oregon.

Perhaps it was the several days I've already spent on the road; perhaps it was the fact that I drove almost entirely on interstates; perhaps it was the fact that I was driving on roads I had driven before in states I had been to more than a handful of times. I don't know, and I hope it wasn't exclusively the latter, but I could feel my adventure-enthusiasm melting away as I drove west yesterday. I caught myself gaping less at sights equally spectacular to those I had stumbled upon in Kansas. I was focusing less on the journey than the destination.

Granted, I had set a high bar for myself yesterday - Denver to Boise is some 800-odd miles, and because of the extra day I'd spent in Denver, I was feeling extra itchy to get on the road and make up for so-called "lost time" (though I certainly wouldn't characterize it as such). Therefore, I spent less time dilly-dallying, soaking up roadside vistas, stopping in the middle of dusty back roads to snap a photo, etc.

I did partake in some beautiful vistas yesterday, though, and I pulled over a few times to snap pictures of snow-capped peaks rising through the endless sky, of red granite bluffs towering over the ribbon of highway (and seemingly little else; in Wyoming, Utah, and Idaho, it is uncommon to find more than one exit every ten miles).

I had my first taste of home, driving north out of Denver on I-25. I looked to my left, and something about that exact combination of elevation and browned grassland reminded me precisely of eastern Oregon. The moment passed, but it was the first time on this trip that I started to feel like I was getting closer to home, odd though it was that it was sparked by a memory of Oregon's high desert.

Where do the prairies end? Where does the West begin? I pondered this as I drove north, where often to my right I saw the endless grassland, sweeping all the way to Kansas and beyong. At the same time, to my left, snowy mountain peaks towered above me. Right then, the answer seemed clear: Interstate 25! As I made my way into Wyoming, however, and subsequently Utah and Idaho, I discovered that there is no clear dividing line. Rather, the west is composed of a jumbled, beautiful mix of sagebrush and snow, elevation and expanse. Perhaps that is the wild west?

The interstate is such a sterile driving experience, and determined though I was to make it from Denver to Boise in a day (easily done), I still lamented the end of my relationship with back roads. I did cut across a corner of Colorado, taking US-287 from Fort Collins to Laramie. The weather was agreeable, and it was absolutely stunning. I would come around a curve, and be greeted by rolling buttes that seemed like they would be soft to the touch. I saw enormous red granite peaks that came right up to the road. Everything was covered in the finest dust of snow imaginable.

After my hour on US-287, though, I picked up I-80 and never left the interstates since. Wyoming was windy, but sunny. It's almost always sunny at 7,000 feet. I continued to muse upon this question of where the west begins, and I still didn't quite draw any conclusions; I think that is a blog post in itself.

I-84 cuts across a little corner of Utah that is actually quite beautiful, though mostly unpopulated. You pass through Ogden, though, a city whose size I had forgotten. Anymore, though, I think my perception of a "big" city is a little skewed (Salina felt enormous to me, but don't get me started on how befuddling Denver was!). I only got out of my car once in Utah, and that was just to snap a picture or two from the side of the road. You slide right into Idaho from that, finding more farms and interminable fields stretching under mountain peaks.

So far, that is the most universal thing I have found: everywhere has farms. And cows, and hay.

I eased into Boise right as the Boise State football game began, and met up with drum corps friend Jeff at a bar downtown. The rest of my visit in Boise was comprised of a little bit of rest and a lot of visiting - hence my slowness to post. I'm still going to keep each day in a separate post, though.

Total Friday mileage: 855 miles. Total mileage: 2405 miles.

another rest day in colorado!

Yes, it is true - today my adventures took another form, the kind where I practice resting. I may have mentioned this before, but I'm notoriously bad at resting. One of the goals of this entire trip, of the whole general plan of "quit my job to have adventures" is to become okay with idleness. Generally, the reason I fail to be idle is that I just find so many things that are interesting and different ways to keep myself occupied that I forget to notice that I never stop at rest. I find there can be a fine line between "staying busy because everything is interesting" and "working all the time." So, I did my best to welcome the day of rest.

When I awoke this morning, snow was swirling and there was a thin layer of it upon my car. Every direction we looked, the sky was laden with ominous dark clouds. The radar map was a sea of light blue and every other color that might indicate treacherous winter weather. I had already had my fill of metropolitan Denver yesterday, so I was more than content to park it in Englewood (a suburb a little southwest of the city) for the day.

Once I realized that the several inches of snow were not actually going to accumulate, and in fact that was probably because it was only about 33 degrees out, I went for a jog. I'm currently staying in what appears to be a generally average residential neighborhood built sometime in the last half of the twentieth century. But only a few blocks away lies an extremely well-to-do subdivision, where I saw absolute behemoths of houses, all recently constructed. Most of these were actually rather hideous to look at, to say nothing of their size.

Other highlights of the day: I went to Staples to try to talk to them about my camera, but they couldn't fix it, or swap it out, because I had bought it on clearance. They said I could return it for a refund if I came back with all the cords and whatnot, but I figure I can try my luck at a few more Stapleses, and continue practicing expressing myself through ways other than a digital camera.

I spent a lot of the day writing, catching up on other things I've been intending to write about. With every day that passes on this trip, I remember more and more how much I love writing. For the majority of my childhood, I dreamed of being a writer. Since about senior year of high school, though, my writing skills have mostly aided me in achieving high grades on papers where I knew nothing about the subject content (oops), and writing lengthy letters and blog posts. I don't know if I could strictly be a writer; I might require more constant social interaction than that. Nevertheless, it was good practice.

I also changed a headlight on my car! This is a feat I have accomplished before, but it's a task I had been putting off for a few days. I was so thrilled by accomplishing this extremely small feat that I wanted to run around and make sure that everybody who owns a car knows how to do this, because it is so empowering. I felt like an old rusty mechanic!

This evening, Shannon had her monthly bunco game. Bunco is a dice game that mostly exists so that women have a chance to get together once a month, eat snacks, and laugh heartily. That's the definition so far as I understand it, anyway. There's absolutely no skill involved, though I suppose the exact technique you use to throw the dice could make a difference. My mom played in a bunco group for years when I was younger, and I often got to sub in. Tonight, Shannon's group needed a sub, so I got to go play bunco in Colorado with a cadre of mostly kindergarten teachers and aides. Some of the scoring was different than with my mom's group, and I had Miller Lite and a baked potato rather than soda and M&M's, which was the typical offering before.

Today I found myself dreaming of Oregon quite a bit, and wishing I were there already.

Tomorrow I am on the road again, and if the weather forecast is to be trusted (and who knows, really) it should be clear sunny skies the whole way. I am excited to be on the road again, and it does feel nice to have a day of rest. I did laundry and tidied up my car, so we are ready for more adventures. After five days on the road, apparently my car and I became a "we." Now that's a relationship I'm ready for!

time to pull up the wagon train and rest a day!

Today was a planned no-driving day. Along with Chris & Shannon, who I've been staying with and we have known since my mom was pregnant with Greta (a really long time), my mom's cousin Bill lives in the greater Denver area, so I wanted to make time to visit with both, as well as to actually check out the city a bit. I figured Denver is rather large, so I should devote a day to it.

It was surreal, though; I can't believe only yesterday I was on the road.

The weather was cool and crisp, but sunny, so perfect for walking around downtown. I took the light-rail into Denver from the suburbs. The 16th Street Mall is the focal point of downtown Denver, and the source of much fame because, I suppose, it is pedestrian-friendly. It is also extremely tourist-friendly, lined with chain bistros and discount clothing stores. The free hybrid buses that traverse it are pretty neat (though unnecessary - 16th street is not that long). Kerouac's Denver this is not.

Naturally, I found myself thinking of Kerouac quite a bit as I explored the area as best I could by foot. I will say I was a little surprised not to find a single bar or bistro working the beat angle, exploiting all the starry-eyed travelers who surely wander off the road looking to recreated Kerouac's adventures. I, for one, finished reading "On the Road" the day before I departed Athens. And I rather wished I had kept a copy of the novel with me, if for nothing than reference points in Denver.

I remembered Larimer Street from Kerouac's writing, and walked the length of it, wondering what he would think. Larimer runs into University of Colorado's Denver campus, and is lined with fusion bistros, upscale boutiques, and swanky cocktail lounges with valet parking. Somehow I doubt the folks sipping $10 cocktails are musing about the beat generation. So it goes.

Around the corner from Larimer, down a block or two on 16th, lies the Tattered Cover, a large (though not as large as Powell's!) independent bookstore. They gained some local fame recently when the Homeland Security folks wanted a list of all those freethinkers buying books from a non-conglomerate, naturally they refused, and it went all the way to some high court or another. I actually bought three books, which may be my first splurge of the trip, including a memoir by Mark Vonnegut, ol' Kurt's son.

I also took myself on a brief self-guided tour of the capitol building, the highlight of which was the spectacular view you get from inside the rotunda atop the building. In Denver, the horizon seems to stretch endlessly. My mom's cousin took me up to the top of an even higher ridge; he was fond of tossing around elevation numbers in the thousands like it was no big deal. The National Center for Atmospheric Research is housed in a funky building designed by I.M. Pei, high above Boulder, and from there I swear you can see all the way to Utah.
(I didn't take this picture, though the above one is from my cell phone. Thanks, google image!)

I rode the city bus out through Boulder to meet up with my mom's cousin, and I don't recommend it. Perhaps it's because they see so many repeat customers every day that they are unconcerned with first-time users, but the Denver public transit system leaves a little to be desired. I had three new books to occupy me, though, so I didn't mind all that much.

While waiting for the light rail this morning, I picked up a free newspaper, and leafing through it, found that Reel Big Fish was playing! In Denver! Tonight! Now, I've seen Reel Big Fish play two other times, but - come on! I'm on an adventure! And Reel Big Fish is consistently in my top-five favorite bands. So I found myself a ticket, and after dinner made my way back into downtown to catch a show at the Ogden theater, somewhat south and east of the Capitol. Many thoughts and ruminations about music swirled through my head, but I'll save those for later. There were two opening acts: Suburban Legends, who I quite enjoyed, and the Aquabats, who I got bored with after a while.

The other news of the day comes in weather form:

All that blue stuff? It's snow. And ice. And probably lots of wind in Wyoming. I'm not making any decisions until tomorrow morning, but there's an 80% chance I'll be in Denver another day! Maybe I will find a jazz bar serving cheap whiskey after all...

from sunshine to snow; denver, co

I love Kansas back roads THIS MUCH!

Seriously. I stopped to take this picture right before I had to get on I-70, a few miles before Goodland, KS, if you're playing along at home, which is about 20 miles before the border with Colorado. I was sad to see the vast Kansas prairie go, as well as the back roads which I had so greatly enjoyed traversing.

The sky goes on and on; it is so huge and yet so close you feel you can touch it. The ribbons of road, the fields of green, of brown - they are interminable, but somehow comforting. I loved every bit of my travels on the back roads of Kansas.

I woke up in Salina this morning, not quite in time to catch the full prairie sunrise, but its reds and oranges still tinted the clouds in the early morning sky. Even the clouds look windswept, and it was a windy morning, the prairie winds pushing me along as I jogged around the block. Salina (pop. 45,000 or so) is home to Kansas Wesleyan University:
and - seriously, even here! Check out the sky and clouds! That's all the more I have to say.

Leaving Salina, I hopped on I-135 for a minute just because it made more sense. I-135 ends at I-70 (hence the whole "crossroads of America" idea) and becomes US-81, which I followed north until I could meet up with Kansas Highway 18. Kansas is the Sunflower State, so all of its state highways are marked by the number in a nice yellow sunflower picture. So I drove on Sunflower 18 for quite a while today. Again - wow. Do not ever listen to anyone who tells you Kansas is boring. Here are some towns I drove through today: Tescott, KS (blink once and you'll miss it); Lincoln, KS, where I got gas and ice; Vesper, KS; Denmark, KS; Lucas, KS; Luray, KS; Waldo, KS; Plainville, KS (home of Kansas' US Rep Jerry Moran); Zurich, KS; Palco, KS; Damar, KS, where I stopped to check out an old church - the only stop sign in Damar is the stop sign to get back on bustling KS-18; Hill City, KS, where I picked up US-24; Hoxie, KS; Colby, KS, where I stopped to look at a towering complex of what I suppose are grain siloes.

This whole drive I was so engaged with everything I saw; it was so interesting, and so beautiful. I wish I could encapsulate the grandeur of the sky, of the rolling fields of grain, of everything I wondered about as I drove.

This is a picture of Damar, Kansas, a zero-stop-sign town. Oh yes.

I was again graced with beautiful weather this morning. The sun shone high in the sky as I climbed in altitude, and the temperature again rose into the 70's. It's hard not to love everything you see when the weather is like that!

Eventually, US-24 merged with I-70 and I had no choice but to get on the interstate. Seriously, the interstate is where the drive begins to feel like drudgery. The interstate lacks the character of the back routes. But, you get to go faster - in Colorado, the posted speed limit is 75 mph. Ah, the wild west!

Today I amused myself by memorizing the state capitals in alphabetical order by state (Montgomery, Juneau, Phoenix, Little Rock, Sacramento, Denver, Hartford, and so on). The sweeping plains are still beautiful, and the sky looms ever larger, and I press on westward.

In Burlington, CO, I needed gas and a bathroom break, and I got tricked into stopping at a Wild West museum. In Kansas, I had gotten pretty good at spotting historical markers and stopping at them, so I felt I ought to check it out, but the museum was mostly hokey and I wasted about twenty minutes telling the ladies there why I didn't have the time to make it worth my six bucks admission cost. Ah well, I bought a few postcards, and was back on the road.

Suddenly, I realized that I was under 180 miles from Denver, and that meant I would be there in under three hours. Now, wait a minute! I wasn't even tired yet! This is Cocky Energetic Sarah speaking, the one who thinks "Well, I only drove eight hours today! What's wrong with me?" The same Sarah who insists upon getting up at six a.m. every day Just Because, who runs a half marathon and hosts a dessert party (in heels, I may add) the same day. Anyway, while driving I do a pretty good job of talking down Cocky Energy Sarah, and in this case I did so by reviewing the map and seeing how there really was no possible back road I could take to get to Denver anytime today, and I would just have to suck it up , take the interstate, and -gasp- arrive before nightfall and before I was utterly exhausted!

So, time for a pop quiz: Which of these things did I encounter at the exact moment I reached the suburbs of Denver (a very large city, with lots of cars): a) road construction b) rush hour c) snowstorm d) all of the above

Oh, yes. It is a good thing I am an intrepid traveler. The instant I merged onto I-225 in Denver, huge flakes of snow interspersed with heavy rain began pelting down, cars came from everywhere, lanes were closed due to road construction that wasn't happening because the workers went home because of the weather, etc. Good thing I have an adventure-mobile (which happened to turn 169,000 miles in the midst of this chaos) and we made it through!

I am currently in Englewood, a suburb of Denver. I'm staying with Chris & Shannon, who my parents met in Montana when my mom was pregnant with Greta. For the record, that was a long time ago. It has been wonderful catching up with them, and who would have guessed it, I was exhausted as soon as I got off the road anyhow. I did drive for eight hours today, after all.

Today's mileage: 471. Total mileage so far: 1570.

PS: I had intended to include daily mileage counts in my previous posts; they're included after the fact, now, in case you hadn't been following every last word.

PPS: This is how you host a dessert party in heels after running a half marathon, in case you were wondering.

westward expansion; smack dab in the middle in salina, ks

I'll admit it: I didn't take this picture. But I took one almost exactly like it, like probably every tourist who has stood in this spot before me. Today I felt like Lewis & Clark, and countless other westward-turning pioneers before me. For one, I am very grateful that they did all the hard work, because driving across the country gets tiring enough as it is without having to blaze your own way.

This morning in Rolla, MO, I got my first real taste of what was ahead of me on my journey west. Rolla (pop. 18,000 and home to University of Missouri: Science & Technology) sits atop a series of rolling hills in the northern Ozarks. I took a quick jog on some of these hills and, even from there, I could see the country stretching out before me. Once on the road, as I wove on US-63, up and down, through rust-stained trees beckoning with autumn, I began to see it: some grassy brush here, wide open skies there. Ah, yes. The Great Plains. Unlike Lewis & Clark, I knew how many hundreds of miles lay ahead.

Before I effuse too much more about how spectacular and beautiful today was, I should also mention that in Missouri and Kansas today it was 75 degrees without a cloud in the sky. This may have influenced things a little.

Missouri, as a state, is somewhat of a mixture. Geographically, it is caught between the neverending prairie, the lush Ozarks, and the flat cornfields of the Midwest. I visited the state museum at the Capitol building, and learned about Missouri's history; likewise, during the Civil War, Missouri was never quite Union and never quite Confederacy. In the major battles in Missouri, it quite literally was brother against brother, and if you picked a different day or different city the prevailing sentiment could easily have been different. Missouri technically was never a slave state, even though Governor Claiborne Fox Jackson wanted to join the Confederacy (when called to vote, it lost by the slim margin of 98-1) and picked up his government and fled as Union troops descended upon the capital. Anyway. I find myself continually fascinated, and heartbroken, by the Civil War.

US-50 was effectively the first coast-to-coast highway; at any rate, its creation preceded the interstate system by a good thirty years. I have somewhat of an affection toward it because it runs through Athens, so I made a point to travel on it again. I picked up 50 just before Jefferson City, and rode it all the way to Kansas City. Along the way I drove through many small towns: Vienna, pop. 628; Freeburg, pop. 423; Westphalia, pop. 320; Tipton, pop. 3,261; Syracuse, pop. 172; Sedalia, pop. 20,339. Stopped for gas in Warrensburg, MO. I love small towns.

And I will underscore again and again the vast superiority of traveling this way compared to the interstates. I was happy while I was driving, grinning from ear to ear as I drove through the countryside and watched the hills give way to the plains, slowing every now and again to catch a snippet of small-town America. I doubt it took much longer than sticking to the interstate, and I never got bored. As the weather warmed up, I was able to roll down the windows (didn't think I'd do that again before spring) and feel the breeze in my hair. Country music played on the radio. I headed due west. I was in America.

I had to loop around Kansas City on I-435 (five lanes of rushing traffic - ick and double-ick) but as soon as I got around the city I cut onto US-56, another great old route that took me right into the great plains, the wide open prairie, the grassland, and the sun. Oh, the sun.

The prairie sun burns white-hot, shooting its yellow rays seemingly forever into the distance, and as it sinks toward the horizon those rays become wide ribbons of light that make the prairie look larger and larger. I was driving straight into it, this huge, ethereal sunset. These white-hot ribbons dashed between the unending sea of prairie and the descending blue cloak of sky that was at once daytime and nighttime. I drove on. The sun sunk a little further, and suddenly it was a glaring neon orange, larger still, and utterly inescapable. I drove on, shielding my eyes, and absolutely surrendered to nature's vastness. The sun sank, reddening, and drawing the cloak of night. Dusk fell, but the intensity of sunset's rays made use of headlights futile yet, and it stayed this way for another half hour - the sky darkening, the sun hanging on, as if it personally had to extinguish day in every corner of the plain. This sight took my breath away; my eyes filled with tears; this is why I headed west, so I could see a wild prairie sunset and feel what Indians, pioneers, and Kansas folk for years have felt.

Eventually US-56 veered south, so I found Kansas state route 4, which effectively got me into Salina with little fuss. Salina is right where I-135 and I-70 meet, which some term the "crossroads of America" (although it seems many places stake claim to this name) but at any rate it is pretty much smack dab in the middle. Once the sun finished setting, it was pitch black in the way it really only can be out in the middle of nowhere, so the bright lights of the city and the zoom of the interstate were finally welcoming. I am grateful for the beautiful weather today, because it looks like I'll see some snow heading into Colorado tomorrow. Today I followed the Old Santa Fe Trail for quite a bit of ways, and so far, as ways to cross the great plains go, I have enjoyed Kansas much more than I enjoyed Nebraska two years ago.

One other advantage to being so exactly in the middle: I am really, really on my adventure now; there is no turning back, and the only solution is to press on to Oregon! I can't express how oddly right it feels to be boldly going west, following signs that say "west" and knowing that I'm heading for Oregon. So many things to ponder while I spend the day alone in my car....

I am so happy to be on an adventure. I am happy to be an adventurer. I found myself laughing out loud more than a few times today, because I was just so thrilled to be on this adventure, or at some little discovery I had made.

Day 3 mileage: 422. Total mileage: 1099.

"Buenos dias, senor." "No es el dia, senora. Es la noche!"

What did you do today? Yeah, I learned the first four tapes of teach-yourself-Spanish while driving through Indiana. That's what I thought.

It's a good thing I posted two pictures from yesterday, because I spent today in a fight with my camera. Apparently the reason it was on clearance at Staples is because it eats batteries, and I just do not have the patience to reason with a camera which asks you to put new batteries in every five pictures. I'm heeding my friend Lisa's advice and opening up my other senses, trying to absorb my experiences in other ways.

I had a great morning in Lexington. It was a tiny bit frosty, just like it has been in Athens, but #1 on my list of Adventure Rules is to go for a jog every morning in a new place, so I bundled up and went for about twenty minutes around the downtown-ish area. Sunday mornings are perhaps my favorite thing about jogging. I love watching a town slowly wake up. I made double-apple-cranberry muffins for Dave and Rose, which we enjoyed over coffee and the Lexington Herald-Leader. And we had an extra hour of sleep, so we were off to an early start!

The springs where Lexington was founded are part of a greater watershed system of artesian wells that ultimately lead to the Kentucky River. We enjoyed a nice brisk walk and learned about the foundation of the town (lots of British colonials) and then I skipped off to Frankfort, the capital of Kentucky. I got a little twisted up driving around Frankfort, so I didn't spend much time kicking around, but I did walk around the outside of the Capitol building. You can really feel the colonial influences in the architecture and history of Kentucky, which I wasn't expecting. I followed US-60 into Louisville (also known as Louvul), where I got on an interstate for the first time in my trip.

The trouble with interstates is that they are sometimes the shortest line between point A and point B. This was the case for the next leg of my journey, but at any rate I was getting a little tired of the slower pace on the back roads. Some interstates are delightful, anyway; I-77 and I-79 through West Virginia, for example, make a splash as far as challenging twists & turns and scenic beauty go. So I suppose I'm undecided on the subject of interstates.

I'm starting to wish I had a tape recorder with me, because I come up with all manner of lucid things to say while I'm driving, and by the time I sleepily sit down in the evening, they've flown away. So it goes.

I had to drive through southern Indiana and Illinois to reach St. Louis and Missouri. I made short order of Indiana, thanks to I-64. November is almost a sad time to travel; I pass through town upon town that is caught between fall and winter, mourning the vibrance of summer and not yet in the groove with cold weather. I passed empty fields that only a month ago were surely high with corn and now were flat, flat, flat, the last entrails already cleared away to give the ground rest. The trees, too, are caught in this limbo, some still flush with green, some turned autumn's rusty bronzes, and others entirely barren.

I stopped at a rest area just inside of Illinois to eat some lunch. By this point, I was beginning to tire of the interstate and its homogeneous monotony, so I pulled out my atlas and picked a back road that would easily get me into St. Louis. I was so glad I did! Even though I wound up taking a little bit more time, it passed by much more quickly! I drove through Ashley, Illinois, pop. 450, and assorted other small towns amidst farmland.

This is something that I am especially proud of for this trip thus far: I have planned out my routes. Using maps. And reading them myself. It's very easy to go on your own personal map quest, and you don't even need a computer! All you need is a map (or more, depending on how big your map is) and you find out where you are and where you want to go and then you figure out which roads will get you there. And then you get in your car and do it, and if you get confused just pick the one that says the general direction you want to go, such as "I-44 W" or "I-44 E."

Darkness came early tonight, as two things had changed: daylight savings time ended, and I was now on the eastern edge of Central Time. I think the sky was utterly dark by 5:30. I saw a gorgeous sunset and moonrise, though, as I drove through rural Illinois. The sky was an ocean blue-gray that met in a perfect line with the orangeish rising from the horizon. Hanging in the middle, the slightest crescent of a moon. Enrapturing.

I rolled into the greater St. Louis area just as night fell, and only got a little turned around trying to navigate all of the freeways and highways and not wanting to miss the exit for I-44 West, so many different routes all coming together, and so many cars zipping by, five lanes across. My head was spinning - and then! Suddenly I was on a bridge crossing the Mississippi River! The mighty Mississippi! An impressive divider! The radio stations now start with K! A surge of elation passed through me; I felt butterflies in my stomach. Here I am, on my grand adventure road trip, crossing the Mississippi in St. Louis, Missouri!

I am now safely in Rolla, Missouri, having adventured my way into the Ozarks (I think I'm in the Ozarks now) another seventy miles to the west.

One last monologue for the evening: on destiny: that shall be one of the themes of this adventure, the reminder that we are always the masters of our own destinies. It didn't really hit me until today. I have been actively dreaming of this trip for months, vaguely conceiving of it for years, and here I am! I am on a driving road trip across the country, seeing places I haven't seen and going places I haven't been. Still giddy from crossing the Mississippi, I smiled and pointed my car under the sign that said "West."

Westward ho!

Day 2 mileage: 455. Total mileage: 677.

bourbon county, ky

SO FIRST, I have to write about the other most exciting thing that happened yesterday. It is so exciting it gets its own post.

What is this a picture of? you may wonder. It looks just like any other high school gym across America.

....


.... why yes, yes in fact it is just any high school gym across America. The sort that you might stay in if, say, you were on tour with drum corps! And that is exactly what it is.

You may not be able to believe this, but when I would go on tour with drum corps, I kept a journal where I wrote an entry every single night, noting at least the location, name of high school, etc. Those we stayed at for a few days stood out particularly in my memory, or ones with unique names or where interesting things happened. Well, in 2006, for a few days after the Atlanta show, we stayed at....

Yesterday, on the spur of the moment, I decided to take route 68 to Lexington. Bourbon County is one county to the northeast, and as I drove over the county line it hit me that I could find this high school. I was instantly on alert for anything resembling a school, and as I slowed for a light in Paris, Kentucky, there it was, straight ahead: Bourbon County High School. I parked my car and ran around the grounds as wave upon wave of memories flooded back to me. I exclaimed upon finding the hillside where we'd had horn arc, the parking lot we'd done visual ensemble in. It's really quite fascinating that each school would hold its own character even though we held rehearsal there pretty much exactly like we did in dozens of other schools around the country, and how years later I could remember it so clearly.

One of my adventure goals is to re-visit all of the states that only got crossed off my list because I made a midnight rest-stop visit there on tour, or because I spent a day or two rehearsing there. Next stop, Missouri....

lexington, ky

I am on my adventure now!

I decided that I will post one picture each day, so that I will not make my whole trip focused on taking pictures for my blog, but I did take some other delightful pictures today, which will find their way into a facebook album in the near future! I figured I should make an epic sign for my window so that I can feel extra pumped up! I am already pretty pumped up.

This week went by really fast and really slow all at once, so of course I was madly rushing around this morning getting everything packed up. The bad thing about having a grand adventure with lots of time to plan is that most of the things you really can't do until the last minute so you spend a lot of time before that antsily twiddling your thumbs. The good thing about having a grand adventure with plenty of time to plan is that once you do get to pack up, it's really easy. Seriously! I have been dreaming about this adventure since summer, and I don't think I forgot a single thing, and everything fits in my car exactly right.

Nevertheless, I left Athens this morning as planned. And by "this morning," I mean "two p.m." It's ok, though, because in my original plan I was going to hop on over to West Virginia and Virginia to visit my dear friend Sara and my cousin Emily, and continue to Lexington from there, but Sara was busy this weekend and then I realized that Roanoke, Virginia, is not actually on the way to Oregon, or to Kentucky. (Lexington isn't technically on the way to Oregon, either, but who's counting?) Once I removed this detour from my route, I found out that Lexington is only four hours from Athens! That made my life a lot easier. I also won't have to worry about trying to cram everything I'm interested in about Lexington into this visit, because I can totally come back later since it's so close! Hurray for everyone!

The drive is beautiful. I invented my own route of non-major highways. I have a general goal for this trip of not driving on highways I've been on before, as much as I can at least. (I'm waiting for them to build that second interstate in Wyoming....yeah..right.) I took US-32, the Applachian Highway, out of Athens. This is the best way to get to Cincinnati, and it's lovely. Just through Jackson, I cut south on US-23 heading toward Portsmouth and the Ohio River. I followed that great gorgeous river just on the Ohio side on US-52, which curves along with it. It's officially an "Ohio Scenic Byway." It is scenic in its views of: the river; the farmland; the coal factories; the rolling hills; the shacks; the greenery, even in November; the near-lifeless towns.

I found US-68 and crossed over into Kentucky. At this point the sun was getting lower in the sky, infusing everything with glorious magical rays of sunlight. Kentucky is horse country. Kentucky is near the Allegheny Mountains. The rolling hills and vast horse farms did not disappoint, and the evening sun glinted through bare branches and dilapidated barns as I wove my way southwest to Lexington. It was stunning.

I also noted something important, I will probably remember every day around five p.m. the rest of this trip, is that when you are driving due west, or close enough, and trying to mostly drive when it's light, you are going to drive straight into the sun. A lot. Oh well!

I met up with Dave and Rose in Lexington. They were going with friends to a Diwali celebration. Diwali, from my limited knowledge, celebrates the new year in India. It is the celebration of lights. It was a huge celebration at a convention hall, with delicious scents wafting in the air, children playing, men serving samosas and aloo gobi from banquet trays and barking at one another in Hindi. We watched a series of dances in the next room, and they were lively and the costuming was gorgeous. There was a lot of hustle and bustle, but everyone was happy and full of love and light.

We explored a little bit; checked out a dimly-lit bar called Charlie Brown's lined with books, one of which is rumored to have a $100 bill stuffed inside somewhere. Tomorrow morning we're planning to hike around at McConnell Springs, where the first settlers of Lexington camped. Lexington is named after the Lexington in Connecticut, supposedly in honor of the Revolutionary War battle fought there! Hopefully I will learn more fun facts tomorrow.

I apologize that this entry is so long. I can only imagine that they will get longer as I spend more and more hours alone in my car! Tonight the clocks "fall back" and that is extra good news when one is on an adventure because that means more adventuring time! Cheers!

Day 1 mileage: 222. Total mileage: 222.

3 days to go!

So the days are flying by, my plans are finalizing, and suddenly I am leaving in 3 days! At the same time as I feel like I have endless things to do, I also feel like I hardly know where to begin (and that most of the things on my to-do list are probably unnecessary).

Instead, I just busy myself with nailing down little details of my schedule and rehashing it in my head. So I will share it here, too! If you live in one of these places, and I have not asked you if I can visit, let me know, and I'd love to swing on by!

I'll be leaving Athens this Saturday, hopefully by 11 am.

Sat. 11/6 Athens-Lexington, KY
Sun. 11/7 Lexington-Jefferson City, MO
Mon. 11/8 Jefferson City-Salina, KS
Tue. 11/9 Salina-Colorado Springs, CO
Wed. 11/10 Colorado Springs-Denver
Thu. 11/11 Denver-Green River, WY
Fri. 11/12 Green River-Boise, ID
Sat. 11/13 Boise
Sun. 11/14 Boise-Eugene

Boise is my home-free zone, where I can hang out as long as need be, really, while knowing that I'm a day's drive away from Eugene. It's a nice cushion in case I get delayed along the way, but from what I've seen of the forecast it should be smooth sailing - er, driving. Whatever.

That's really all the updates for now! Just trying not to lose my head these last few days in Athens!