19 States in 11 Days!

After Ashley's graduation, we spent the weekend with my parents in Washington and enjoyed the sights of our nation's capital. My favorite was the Jefferson Memorial. Anyone that goes to Washington should definitely go there and read the quotes in that place. They are amazing. We had a great weekend, but had to get back to our house in time to pack up. We had two full days to finish packing up before our house sold. Thanks to some help from the ward, we were able to get our POD packed up and the house cleaned in time for the closing on the house. The day finally came to sell the house and everything went through pretty smoothly. We said goodbye and left with a car packed tight to go on an adventure across the country.

The trip did not start right away, however, because we still had some loose ends to tie up. We sold our Sonata to a friend in the ward and visited some friends at the Colony to say goodbye. By that time, it was late and we were definitely not going to be starting a cross-country road trip. The Zobells, our friends who were out of town in London, let us stay the night in their home so that we could rest up for our journey.

***NOTE: Our camera was not working very well during the road trip, and died around the time we were in Nauvoo. That is the reason there are so few pictures of us along the way and none toward the end. We did, however, have a video camera with us the entire trip and took some great videos along the way so if anyone is interested, we will show you about an hour of great action from all over the country.

DAY 1: The next morning we woke up late and started our trip. Our first stop was Gettysburg. It was amazing. We spent all afternoon there and loved it! It was amazing to see. We had a great time and even had our last Rita's while we were there. After Gettysburg, we traveled through the Shenandoah Valley of Virginia and along the Blue Ridge Mountains. It was beautiful. We made it all the way to Charlotte, North Carolina late that night, where we would stay with my cousin Danny and his wife Andrea and Connor, their son.





DAY 2: We stayed with them in Charlotte for the whole Memorial Day weekend. We had a great time. Our first day there, we went to downtown Charlotte for "Speed Street." Basically it was a night when they shut down the city in preparation for the big NASCAR race. We got a lot of free stuff and ate some food. Thanks to them undercooking my chicken and Andrea, I was able to get a lot of my food for free.



DAY 3: The next day we went to Connor's flag football game (he played awesome and had a sweet catch) and then drove up to Asheville to see the famous Vanderbilt estate. We got there all the way there and discovered that it was an insane $55 per person to go see. We decided to settle on the free video in the lobby and drove around the Blue Ridge mountains for a while. We went down to the French Broad River and Danny and Connor caught a couple little fish with some caterpillars that Ashley spotted along the river bank. We drove down the famous Blue Ridge Parkway until Andrea got sick from the road. We drove down to a place called Chimney rock and ate dinner at a fun restaurant overlooking Lake Lure (famous Lake from the movie Dirty Dancing).





DAY 4: It was Sunday and we went to Church in Charlotte. It was great to have a day of rest to get us ready to leave again the next day. We relaxed that day and played games that evening. Connor and I were on a team and we won.

DAY 5: Monday morning (memorial day) and we hit the road early. We decided to not head toward the beach and avoided the holiday traffic. We drove down through Columbus, South Carolina. We wanted to find a southern plantation to stop at and we found one on our GPS that wasn't too far off the road. We took a little tour of the plantation and really enjoyed it. After the plantation, we crossed the Savannah river and ate lunch at a little diner in Augusta called the Mellow Mushroom. After lunch, we tried to drive over to the Augusta National golf course where the Master's golf tournament is played. We thought there might be some kind of visitor's center or something. We pulled in and got yelled at by the security guard. So we hit the road again and drove toward Atlanta first, then Alabama. We stopped near Atlanta at a place called Stone Mountain. It as a huge and beautiful park surrounding a large rock mountain. We walked up to the "Mountain Rushmore of the South" and got a picture in front of it. The Stone carving shows the three heroes of the Confederacy: Jefferson Davis, Robert E. Lee, and Stonewall Jackson. After our quick stop at Stone Mountain, we left toward Alabama. We were surprised by how beautiful the northern part of Alabama was. We first tried to stop for dinner near Talladega. We searched for a barbeque place by our GPS and drove through some back country in the middle of a massive thunderstorm. The restaurant ended up being closed, so we settled for some Sonic. We then went into the city of Birmingham and visited Vulcan Park, which overlooks the city. Vulcan Park is named for the second largest statue in the United States and the largest cast-iron statue in the world. The statue is of Vulcan, the Roman God of fire and metal work. The statue overlooks the city from the mountains and it was great. We went to the top of the statue and it was very scary at the top. After visiting with Vulcan, we continued on our drive. The rains started again, which ruined our plan of camping that night. We opted instead for a hotel in Jasper, Alabama in the middle of about 100 Bingo parlors. It was a great day.











DAY 6: Another long day. This was the day when we took a right turn on our journey and went back north. We got up early and drove through the corner of Mississippi and into Memphis. We started by driving by Elvis' house in Graceland. We didn't take the tour because it was expensive and we aren't exactly Elvis fanatics, but we could see it a little from the road and that was enough. After that, we drove into the downtown area for some lunch on the famous Beale Street. We ate lunch at the famous Blues City Cafe. I had some Tamales and we shared some Ribs. I am no Ribs expert, but those we by far the best Ribs I have ever had. After eating, we drove down to check out the Civil Rights Museum that has been built at the place where Martin Luther King Jr. was assassinated. It was closed, but Ashley had an interesting experience with a homeless guy wanting money from us. We said no and we left town. We crossed the Mississippi into Arkansas and drove a long, boring drive through Northern Arkansas and Southern Missouri. Our next stop was in St. Louis at the Gateway Arch. We went to the top and it was one of the coolest places I have ever been in my life. We loved it. We finished the day with driving up the Mississippi to Nauvoo.







DAY 7: We stayed two nights with my grandparents who are serving a Temple Mission in the Nauvoo Temple. This was our Nauvoo day. We spent the morning traveling around town with my Grandparents and stopping in a bunch of the little homes and visitor's centers. My grandparents had to report to the temple around noon and Ashley and I went back to these little homes to hear the testimonies of all the Senior missionaries. The strength and faith of the Saints that lived there was so amazing. We felt the spirit so strong in all those little homes and shops. We went to the temple in the afternoon and were able to go through a session with my grandparents officiating. It was a great experience and we even got to take a tour of the temple afterwards. We had a Nauvoo buffet afterwards and then went to watch the performing missionaries put on a show on the Mississippi River. It was a lot of fun.





DAY 8: This was our Church History day. It began with a trip to Carthage Jail with my grandparents. This was an unforgettable experience to see where the Joseph and Hyrum were killed. After that emotional and very spiritual morning, we left and traveled across northern Missouri to visit more church sites. We ended up visiting Adam-ondi-Ahman, Liberty Jail, and Independence. It was a great day and very spiritual. We even got to see the competing churches at the Temple site in Independence and the Seashell-like temple of the reorganized church. We found a hotel that night just south of Kansas City.

DAY 9: Lots of traveling. We drove through a corner of Kansas and went through Oklahoma and into Texas. We stopped in Arlington to take in a Rangers game. The Ballpark in Arlington was very nice and it was a beautiful night for a game. There was even a fireworks display after the game that was awesome. Unfortunately, we stayed a little too long at the game and decided to not take the journey down to Doug and Jen's house in Houston. We instead began to travel west and stayed the night in a Best Western in somewhere in the middle of Texas. We even lucked out and were given a really nice suite at discount price.

DAY 10: West Texas. That is about all I can say. Other than a fantastic game of Roadside Euker, it was pretty boring. We made it, though. We got to Albequerque early enough to stop for a nice visit with Ashley's cousin Kristie and her husband Scott (and their two cute kids). They were nice enough to let us stay with them on our final night there. We ate some homemade Cafe Rio and played some games with them. Lots of fun.

DAY 11: We woke up and went to Sacrament the next day with Ashley's cousin. After that, we hit the road for the final home stretch. Being the Sabbath, we didn't really stop anywhere and just enjoyed the Arizona desert in all its glory. We arrived at my parents house in the early afternoon. The entire day was weird because we knew our fun trip was actually ending. It was a trip to remember (which is why I went into so much detail here). 19 states in 11 days. It was amazing.

It has been a crazy month and we are still waiting for life to get settled. Right now, we are living with my parents in Glendale and enjoying our little break before life gets going again. We are both applying for jobs and waiting for our Arizona licenses to come in. Ashley will not be able to work for a few more weeks and school doesn't start until August for me. We are enjoying the nice weather we are having down here and can't believe that we actually live in Arizona now!