Day five: June 12, 2026 Rochester, Minnesota

It was delightful not to have to get up super early and head down the road. We were already in town for this family wedding festivities. We slept in a bit and then had a nice breakfast time with Patti’s mom.

Then, we got a load of laundry going, Dick downloaded photos and worked on the blog, while Patti went out to a friend's, Randy, parent’s garage sale. He was conducting the sale, and it was so good to spend some time with him.  Patti had known this family since she was 14 years old. It was great to visit with both of his parents and she even picked up a few cool items to add to our load when we’re driving across the country. 

We had an early lunch and then the additional family members began to arrive. It was so nice to see everybody. Family had gathered from California and Texas. And, we were able to have enough time to go on a lovely walk in Quarry Hill Park, the 2000 acre Park across from the house that we all grew up in. We stopped to sit on the bench that honors "Mr. C," Patti's father Harold Christensen. He was an elementary school Physical Education teacher. The kids could remember "Mr.C." better than "Mr. Christensen." Nephew Drew appreciated being able to show his wife Toni around the area because she’d never been to Rochester, even Minnesota, before.   They all had wonderful memories of being that this woods as young people, and we all enjoy a good walk whenever we can do it.  Even better when it includes a large part of the family.

The afternoon flew by with lots of chatting and photos and catching up. The Dallas family had arrived late last night, and Paula’s kids flew in from California yesterday. So nice to be together.

At 6 o’clock we gathered for the rehearsal dinner with over 50 out-of-town guests gathering together at the hotel where many people were staying. For many of us, this was the first we got to meet Sofie, the Bride.  She is delightful. The food was great, and it was lots of fun just visiting and meeting people and catching up. These cousins rarely get a chance to see each other, and it was very fun seeing how much fun they had together. There were also a number of new partners who were there, amazing watching these young people grow up to such fine competent adults.  The whole day was filled with grabbing meaningful conversations with so many family members.  

Patti took her duties as an aunt photographer, and took over 250 pictures yesterday.  It is fun to be able to share some of them with the wedding couple on a wedding photo website.  

Eventually, it was time for Dick and Patti to head back to Patti’s mom’s. Tomorrow is gonna be a busy day with the wedding.  Hooray for family 

Day four: June 11: Emperia, Kansas to Rochester, Minnesota

Today’s drive consisted of zipping along through Kansas, Iowa and finally to Minnesota. We know that the majority of Patti’s close family members will be gathering tonight and tomorrow to celebrate our nephew Matt’s wedding to Sofie.

So mostly, we just watched the miles go by and enjoyed the changes of scenery. When Patti is just too tired, we have a good set up. She can crawl in the back and curl up and actually stretch out for some decent sleeping. Dick does more of the driving, but we have a deal that whenever he is getting too tired, Patti takes over. He prefers to just kick the seat back and sleep for a little bit.

The whole day was racing towards being in Rochester, Minnesota at Mr. Pizza for a 5:30 family gathering. It is amazing how well GPS does with estimating how long it’s going to take to drive so far. Our theory of keeping the speed down around 70 miles per hour has been paying off. Our miles per gallon is just shy of 40 miles per gallon, which is terrific.

As we were driving the 500 miles north from Kansas, both of relished being back in green. We have been in mostly brown in California for nearly 30 years but have a deep connection with the green of our earlier years. In Missouri and Iowa, we drove through a couple of bad stretches where it either was storming and raining hard or quite a storm had gone through earlier. In Iowa, we stopped at a roadside rest where there were huge branches were down and talked with one of the workers there who was starting to clean up. She said a big storm had gone through just an hour earlier. In the local communities, there had been some buildings that had been taken out, with estimated straight line winds of 80 miles an hour. We saw lots of standing water from the deluge of rain. As we drove around Des Moines, we drove slowly for nearly an hour through a very heavy storm. Further north in Iowa Patti took over driving for a while and was relieved for it to be a sunny afternoon.

And at last we were in Minnesota and stopped to unload our car at Patti’s Mom, Joan’s house . We then drove to meet the family at Mr. Pizza. So nice to see the folks who were already in Rochester. We know more people are flying in or driving in on Friday or late Thursday night. It’s such a blessing when family can gather together. There was lots of chatting and catching up of what everyone is doing and tons of fun photos. That really captures the fun. We made it and we’re ready for a fun celebration.

After getting back to Patti’s mom’s, we went on a lovely walk over at the park with the dog. Nice being out in the green green wooded area. We miss Green in California. What a lovely walk.

Both of us went to bed at 9:30. Driving 2000 miles in four days had caught up with us, but we had now arrived. 

Day 3: June 10, 2026 Tumucari New Mexico to Emporia Kansas

We listened for more rumbling storms during the night. It seems that they mostly have gone through the area, but we don’t get that many summer storms in Southern California so it was nice to have some good rain coming down. By morning the sky was a bright blue and sunny

Another 500 mile day and 8 hours of driving. We quickly turned off Interstate 40 and headed northeast primarily on two-lane highways. A couple of hours through northwest New Mexico, then an hour in the northern tip of Texas, briefly passing on to the panhandle of Oklahoma, before entering Kansas. We were struck by both how flat this part of the Great Plains were and how much greener it was once east of the Rockies. Kansas look lush, frequently with standing water from recent rains. Dick always watches the farms. Central Pivot Irrigation has turned much of this land into very productive farm land but depleting the huge aquifer under much of the western plains. The corn, such a high water demand crop, was shorter than he expected. Very little seem to be headed for “knee-high by the Fourth of July“ both of us had learned when we were growing up. The winter wheat was being harvested. A rail line paralleled the road for much of the time in Kansas. Every few miles there was a large grain elevator, holding grain until shipped out by rail. In spite of some people being against green generation of electricity, we saw many windmills appearing to march across the landscape.

During the morning, we were able to enjoy finishing our book about the small Canadian town who opened their hearts and their homes too strangers from around the world after 9/11. That was a really great book. And there is also a play, “Come From Away” which we will see in September. Of course we had to listen to the Original Cast Recording of "Oklahoma" during our relatively short time in the state.

We know we’re driving by some places that would be fun to stop and explore, but this time we are people on a mission. We’ve got to get to Minnesota tomorrow. So we keep moving forward, over 2000 miles in four days.

We arrived, checked into our hotel and then grabbed a quick meal at Wendy’s. We settled in for an evening watching some basketball and surfing the Internet. Tomorrow another long day's drive and then time for Patti’s family to begin gathering in Minnesota for the wedding on Saturday.

One of the interesting things in this hotel was in addition to a Gideon Bible there is also a copy of the Bahamas Gita, an ancient Hindu scripture. Not necessarily what I was thinking I would find in the middle of Kansas.. But,  we do know a lot of the hotels are owned or managed by people of Indian descent. Just a little cultural diversity.

We had seen a couple of warnings about potential tornadoes as we’re driving along. No tornadoes yet, but once we returned from dinner, the creepy sky is the kind that Dick only saw once before a major tornado in Ohio. We just checked and we are in a tornado watch area, which means there is the kind of atmospheric conditions where tornadoes could form.

While we were watching the game the Direct TV suddenly went off the air.  When we looked outside we could see it was raining very hard. Then our phones alerted us to our being in the middle of a Tornado Warning. That meant a tornado was located near us, probably seen on radar. We prepared to shelter in the bathroom but it never became necessary. The storm passed. We were thankful.  Oh, the adventures of travel!!

Day 2: June 9, 2026 Flagstaff Arizona to Albuquerque New Mexico and then to Tucumcari New Mexico

We both woke up very early today and decided rather than waiting until 7:00 for breakfast we, could get ready and eat at 6:15, hitting the road at 7:15.

Patti insisted that we stopped at a restaurant a block away from our hotel for the first of the photos of this trip of Patti with very large objects. This time a large red Adirondack chair. These are so much fun and Dick is such a good sport in terms of stopping and taking the photos. For some unknown reason, he doesn’t like getting his picture taken with these giant objects. Who can understand that?

The morning up in the mountains was crisp in the upper 50’s. We were about to leave the Ponderosa Pine forest. Soon after leaving Flagstaff, we headed down off the high plateau, and the temperature started getting hotter again. We had a lovely morning, soaking in the changes in the environment and landscape. Some of it looked very volcanic and lunar, some had trees, some was just flat grasslands. We made a brief stop at Petrified Forest National Park. We had been there several times before so we just stopped for a photo. We needed to get through eastern Arizona and crossing the border into New Mexico.

The plan was to arrive in Albuquerque for a 1 PM lunch with dear friends, Tomi and Hank. Patti and Tomi were roommates in seminary in 1982-83. Having dear friends for so many years is so precious. Both Tomi and Hank have had series health challenges, so it is especially great to have some time together. We ate at a Cracker Barrel restaurant and had the chance to catch up and just be together.

All too soon, we had to drive down the road needing to get another 3 hours down the road tonight. Immediately to the East we climbed through the southern end of the Rocky Mountains.  Here they are lower and it took only about 30 minutes to reach the other side.  In front of us was the Great Plains with another couple of days to cross it. This year it is not a leisurely drive across the country, because we have to get to Minnesota for the family wedding and gatherings.

We chased some dark clouds and large raindrops across the Eastern part of the state.  It never rained very hard, but it really freshened up the air. later in the evening, we enjoyed listening to the thunder outside. And enjoyed a lovely rainbow in the sky. 

One of the things that we sometimes do when we’re on this long trips is listen to an audiobook. Today we listen to one that was really well done. "The day the world came to town: 911 in Gander, Newfoundland.” this is a fascinating story of a very small town in Newfoundland that ended up being the place where 38 large jet planes and over 6600 people had to make immediate landings when all of the US airspace was closed following the 911 attacks. It is very well told story of how this small town took in thousands of strangers and treated them with such care. Will finish it tomorrow. Sometimes it is excellent to have a long time that you can really get into a book that is well written and well read.

We made a picnic dinner on the bed while we watched some Women’s Basketball tonight. We have lots of food in the car and it was just fine to have a nice indoor picnic.

So we’re moving our way across the country. Two more days until Minnesota.