Our sweet friend, Bethanie decided to get married, and although we had known she would do it for at least two years, she and her groom would not tie the knot before we moved away from Utah. Sooooo, we bought a camper and headed out from Alabama about twelve days (or so) ago. We also contrived to have Ryann and Tara be two of her flower girls. We decided to make a few stops on the way to and from Cache Valley, making a circular-ish route.
Day One: We started the day by ME not being ready, I had not packed for me or the girls AND I had to pack the coolers (which was planned). Needless to say, I was a bit flustered and Steve was a saint, being patient, encouraging me and assuring me that we had plenty of time. Ideally, we would have left at 9 a.m. but we did not really expect to be quite that early, but noon was later than we would have liked especially once we realized that the day was not going off without a hitch…actually we needed a Sway Control Bar for our trailer hitch to…well…control the swaying of the camper. So, we found a place online (on my smart phone no less, how did people travel without these before?) and went to get one, hoping they would install it for us. We ended up getting the most expensive one (because it had to be for the left side for some reason) and they were backed up and could not install it for us that day. Steve was sure (rightly so) that he could do it himself at the first stop. We found a rest stop and I made lunch in the van while he put on the sway bar thingy. We got going about 45 minutes later and made it to our first camp site at Wayne Fitzgerrell State Park in Whittington, Illinois. We made camp and ate tacos for dinner. The site was very nice and we all slept well once all the bugs that had tried to join us for the evening were smooshed.
Day Two: Breakfast was simple, cereal or yogurt and granola (the girls ALWAYS pick Cheerios over granola). We got going in decent time, only about a half hour later than we hoped. We planned to go to the Saint Louis Zoo and got there to find no parking near the zoo, especially for vehicles pulling campers. We found a place to park but it was too far for the little girls to walk, so we decided that Steve would drop me and the girls off at the entrance and then park and join us in a bit. While we waited for him, we examined the gift shop. He got to us very hot but determined to see the zoo. There were a lot of people there, but I think the girls really enjoyed themselves.
Saint Louis Zoo
Waiting for the hippos to swim by again.
We went to the gift store again until Daddy called that he was near with the van again, and we all got in for our drive to the campsite near Kansas City. Nice park, but no water hook-up again and dinner was very late. Needless to say, some of us were out of sorts. It was cool and fairly quiet, so we all slept well.
Day Three: We got going in good time and headed for Sterling CO. The wind was against us and we were forced to go much slower. By lunchtime, we knew that we would have another very late night if we kept going. We decided to use the smart phone again to find an R.V. park that was in western Nebraska. We found a KOA near North Platt, NE and had a very good experience there. We met the couple in the A-liner next to us and found that they were from a city not an hour from New Hope, they were so nice that Caitlyn adopted them. We had a good dinner and had the girls take showers and passed another night. We were able to leave in good time the next morning.
to be continued…
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