Jam-Packed

Today, was booked. First we walked to One World Everybody Eats, a restaurant where you pay what you choose, and if you can't pay a reasonable amount, you can work for a meal. Then from there, we walked to the Tabernacle for an organ recital with an unexpected mini light show in the background. With each new song, a new color appeared to match the music. After this, we walked around the visitors center at Temple Square. We were planning on taking a tour, except there were some pretty obnoxious people that were in our group, so we decided against it. The visitor's center, was focused on the life of Jesus Christ, but I probably shouldn't talk too much about it for the sake of our non-Christian readers. Then we went to a Super Target, which from the outside didn't look too different from the ones in St. Paul. But on the inside, it looked a lot like the old Target, but part of it looked up-to-date. And now we are stocked up with groceries for another week, before we go to Holden Village. Then we had our new dinner food in our hotel, cooked in the kitchen in our room. Then we topped the day off with a swim.

~mAra

Drive, drive drive

Gardeners working hard
Pooh and Lincoln


Today, we drove. And drove. And drove, and drove and drove. We made a few pit stops, which added to the time of getting to our hotel, which took 10 hours. Long long LONG! It was supposed to only be nine and a half, but it turned out, we had been following the wrong GPS directions the entire time, but luckily the hotel that it took us to, wasn't too far from our scheduled hotel. Then we made it just in time to see the Mormon Tabernacle Choir practice. You were allowed to come in and leave as you like, and it was very fun to watch. First they went over different chords, as a practice should go, and then they sang the entire song, start to finish, like a performance. It didn't cost us anything, but the parking lot cost $6.

Tonight and tomorrow, we are staying in Salt Lake City, but there will still be new events ahead!

Driver thoughts: we stopped at a rest stop along the way that had a giant head of Lincoln. Something about his influence in the development of the amazing Interstate 80 connecting New York and San Fransisco. The rest stop was at the highest elevation along the way. After leaving, the mileage bars hit 100 mpg twice (10 minutes of top mileage). This did not affect the overall average very much because after you coast down for a while, there's always an up to follow. At one point I saw about two dozen cattle walking east in a perfectly straight line. hmm? We also crossed the continental divide. This 10 hour drive was not one I would like to repeat. I was white knuckled much of the time because everyone is driving 75 mph and there were huge gusts of wind every few minutes that, if you weren't tightly gripping the steering wheel, would push you over into the next lane. I prefer the gently rolling hills of the mid-west, thank you very much. We have passed many Flying J's along the way and I thought today we would finally check one out. We filled the tank and our bellies in honor of all the J's we have been visiting (James, Jan, Joel, Julie, Jim and next - Jessica in Jackson!).

Mint Room Survival

Look at the two or three little circles in the hallway. Those are orbs. Otherwise known as LITTLE GHOST CHILDREN!!!! According to Tyler the Tour Guide.
Yes, we had to wear hair nets in the Tea Factory. (Some people wore beard-nets!)
Standing on a log in Bear Lake
Pooh at the top of the mountain
Driving through Estes Park, and taking a pit-stop with LOTS of chipmunks.

On Tuesday morning, we headed to Boulder. The drive took us about 3 1/2 hours. The GPS got us right to our friend Julie's house. After getting settled in, we headed off to the Celestial Seasonings factory tour. We learned more about tea than we had expected and enjoyed a lovely tour of their facilities, even with the hairnets. The company was started in the late '60's by some hippie types making herbal teas from the herbs they found growing in the mountains. The highlight of the tour was entering into a normally closed room that was filled with bags of spearmint and peppermint leaves. The smell was overpowering and my eyes were watering, I couldn't wait to be let out. Mara loved it. After purchasing some packs of our favorite tea flavors, we headed into Boulder and walked around the Pearl Street Mall, where no cars are allowed. There are lots of cool shops and many street entertainers. We had some yummy pizza at a place with their own microbrewery. The mint was finally behind me. After dinner, we passed by a little place called Jax, where Hosea Rosenberg, the recent winner of Top Chef worked.

On Wednesday, Julie drove us up into the mountains. We started with a stop by some falls at the Alluvial Fan. Mara led us on quite a rock climbing adventure along side of the falls. Then we drove to the Alpine visitors center along the Old Fall River Road, a one-way, unpaved road. Lots of twists and turns. The center was at about 11,000 feet and we enjoyed the views and a picnic lunch. It was quite windy and chilly there. The temperature was in the mid 50's, about 40 degrees cooler than in Boulder. From there, we headed down the mountain to the Stanley Hotel in Estes. This is the hotel that inspired Stephen King's book The Shining. We took "the ghost tour" and learned all about the amazing Stanley brothers, how King was inspired by a late season visit to the hotel and how it is legitimately haunted (or so they say). Some of the people on the tour felt the presence of spirits more than others. After that, we headed back in to the park and took a hike to Alberta Falls and ended at Bear Lake. It was a great day filled with hiking and horror. We ended the day with some tasty bison burgers grilled by Julie's husband Jim.

On to Salt Lake City.

Kansas City, Here we come!

The big easel and Pooh
Mara climbing on the vents, probably breaking the rules.
Um... Is it a bunch of peas...?
One of Deborah Butterfield's horses, actually made out of sticks and mud
The giant shuttlecocks

We woke up in Independence, and called our friend (cousin) Jan again. She invited us over for lunch, and said we could stay the night if we wanted to. So we canceled our second night at our hotel, packed up our suitcases, and drove over to her house. When her husband Jim came home, we had lunch, and went to the Nelson Art Gallery. And there. Were. The. Shuttlecocks. And they were HUGE! Claus Oldenburg had designed them, along with a giant light switch, a giant crumpled saxophone, and a few in St. Paul such as a giant bag of french fries, a giant outlet with a giant cord and the ever so giant Spoon and Cherry. The Shuttlecocks were one of the coolest things I've ever seen. You were allowed to touch them, or at least I thought you were, because everyone did and they were in a field, but there was no graffiti. Which was very nice. We saw a bunch of more art, which you can see in the photos. Then we ended the day with a game of Phase 10 which got much harder when Jim and his son Joel started playing. So today we said goodbye to our friends and set off on our drive. We stopped at the Dwight D. Eisenhower Library, Museum and Childhood Home. We saw a short movie about him, then bought a pin and saw a sculpture. Then we drove again. For a LONG time. For the entire time we drove for nine hours, including being held up by three trains in the same town. Finally, after driving for a long time, we stopped at the worlds largest easel with a van Gogh painting on it, of sunflowers, for the sunflower state (Kansas). It was huge! And there was a nice red-brick pathway to it. Then, we left the painting at 7:00 and arrived at our hotel at 6:30. (How did it happen? Did we time travel? Did we drive backwards? Did we lie about it? Comment and guess!) Now we are in Burlington, Colorado, and tomorrow we're heading to Boulder. Keep watching!

Comment Replies

Hey, guys, Mara here! Thanks a bunch for sending so many comments! Here are our replies!

Julie- We are arriving tomorrow afternoon, perhaps mid, perhaps late. We'll call you.

David(Pigpig)- Yes, that was Mama that wrote about our 4th of July adventures. And I knew it was you when I read David. I don't know any other Davids other than your dad.

Great-K8, Me-Rox, and Pebbles!(Great-K8/Artemis Fowl Freak)- I bought a rock, but it was a coincidence that I did. I didn't buy it for you, but I didn't want to say that in the comment because I thought it would sound rude. It didn't occur to me that you still wanted rocks. I bought it because it looks cool and it has some cool luck thing that clears my aura or something. And it's black and white!!!

Betsy- Miss Sara says that she was looking for the sign that said "Sara W. was born here" but we could not find it. :( She only lived there for nine months, so she is still, cheesey, through and through. The fire works were nice, until a group of teenagers parked right in front of our view.

Lucy- Tee hee, nice blog! Technically, we have only been a few places so far, but we went to many last year. Next stop, Boulder Colorado!

Keep leaving comments! It's nice to see that people are following our progress!

Independence Day in Independence, Mo, how apropos

Boys Town
Boys Town Ripley's believe it or not's big ball of stamps
Mara makes a friend. What a friendly duck to come over to someone like that.
Sara with lots and lots of geese. And lots and lots of poop.
The house that Sara was born in

Happy 4th! We have just returned from fireworks at the Mormon Visitor's Center in Independence. We found a nice place to park and enjoyed a lovely view from our car. We began the day in Omaha and the first stop was the house I lived in when I was born. It looked like the pictures that I remember, but they have added on quite a bit. Lovely neighborhood. Then, we walked around the Heartland of America Park. It was very pretty with lots of friendly geese and ducks. We also walked around the Old Market area which seemed like a fun destination, but most of the cool stores were closed for the holiday. We did wander into a couple and managed to find some small souvenirs. From there we went to Boy's Town to see Father Flanaghan and the largest ball made entirely of stamps. Apparently the boys needed something to occupy their time, so why not make a big ball? Next, it was back on the road for the 3 hour drive to Kansas City. We are staying near Harry Truman's home, but it doesn't look like we'll have time to visit. Tomorrow we plan to see the KC sites including the famous shuttlecocks.... (Note from Mara: "shuttlecocks" are birdies in badmitten.)

Year II

Hey everybody! We're back! Today we drove for six and a half hours, and are now in our nice Holiday Inn, waiting for our dinner to be served to our hotel. (Like we have been for about 45 minutes.) Today we are in Omaha, Nebraska. These are the places that we are planning to visit starting tomorrow: Kansas City MO, Bolder CO, Salt Lake City UT, Jackson Hole WY, Boise ID, Portland OR, Seattle WA, Then we're going to spend a week at a camp called Holden Village (where we can not use computers so no blogging), Then Bozeman MO, Bismark ND, and then we will head back to St. Paul MN on the 29th. So keep reading and please leave comments!