July 10, 2013 Day One

July 10, 2013  Day one of the trip

Today started with Patti having her final completion of her oral panels to become a Yah!!!!  Celebrations all of way around.

Patti  celebrating with her friend Kamran

spiritual practitioner.  The day was a bit nerve wracking, but ultimately a great final affirmation of all of the work the past several years has brought.  She was able to speak well, answer the questions, pray a couple of coherent prayers, and it is now complete! 

While this was happening, Dick was completing the final packing of the car.  When Patti arrived home, shortly after noon, there were some last minute finishing up tasks that cropped up (par for the course) and we hit the road at about 2:30.

Getting "out of Dodge" is always quite a task...but once we are FINALLY on the road, it feels great. Before we were too far down the road, we began our search for state license plates, this time upgraded with a printed out sheet showing the states in order.

We immediately began to see the changes of scenery as we drove away form the coast.  Once we got unto the high desert, we saw Joshua trees and very bare looking mountains.

We drove 380 mile to get to Mesquite NV, nearly on the Arizona border.  We stopped for our favorite Vegas buffet and then were back on the road for another hour to stay in Mesquite where we had a reservation for a fairly inexpensive, but quite charming hotel room.  The trip has begun!  Yahoo!

This year's agenda will take us through the national parks in southern Utah, over to the Black Hills and Badlands of SD, time in MN with family and friends, over to Wisconsin to Patti's sister's cabin, Duluth and Minneapolis, then back through ND, to Montana and Wyoming, and then going down through Utah and NV again.  All in all, around 7000 miles and five weeks.

The weeks and months of planning, the searching the web, and creating the Excel spread sheets of the itinerary, the buying guidebooks and making and changing hotel and campground reservations....all are now behind us.

Hold onto your hats, Patti and Dick's grand adventures are back in business.

An added feature to this trip's blogs will be some of our favorite quotations about traveling.  We hope you enjoy reading what some interesting and well traveled folks what said about travel....

“Anticipation. In love and travel, getting there is half the fun. The lustful impatience, the passionate daydreams, the nerve-wracking waiting... lovers and travelers are all alike when they find themselves on the brink of a new adventure.”
― Vivian Swift, Le Road Trip: A Traveler's Journal of Love and France