Home

We finally made it home after driving straight through from Kansas City to New Philly. The trip was very uneventful and we were very tired and very ready to be home.

You cannot imagine how much one can miss things like chairs, televisions, couches and computers. You know what we missed the most though? Our toilet! Our clean, comfy, always-there-when-we-need-it, some-random-stranger-hasn't-used-it toilet.

Oh and we missed Karol ... haha. Unfortunately Karol was gone we we arrived home. She had flown out to San Diego to spend time with Marissa. Way back in the planning stages we were hoping this would time up perfectly with when we were in San Diego too. However, life got in the way of our best laid plans, and the timing just wouldn't match up. So she took her vacation and spent some quality girl time with Marissa (and I suppose some boy time with Ben too!)

Karol and I have been apart for nearly 4 weeks! When she flew back into Columbus, she started begging me to come see her at the Embassy Suites. I tried fending her off for as long as I could once I arrived, but she was strong and being alone for so long had only made her stronger. As soon as I walked in the door she assaulted me with kisses and hugs and pretty much hasn't let go since. Hey, hey, it's not like Nathan's going to let her smother him with love, somebody's got to take one for the team... not that I'm complaining!!

Now that we're home we've been settling back in, getting unpacked and preparing to go back to our daily routine. I start back to work next week. Nathan is already back into two a day soccer practices and doing quite well... if you don't count the sleep deprivation, sore feet, tight hamstrings, and very tender calves.

Thank You!!!!
Thank you to everyone who has come along with us on this journey. The whole trip was just that much more enjoyable knowing that we were able to share parts of it with our family and friends back home. We wanted to thank Jenni for her help with the blog. Thanks to Marissa and Ben, Paul and Marion, and Debbie for the hospitality! After days on the road, a friendly face and comfy home is so appreciated. Richard Jones wanted to send out thanks to Paul Schuster for the peacock ore.
Again thank you so much to all of our loved ones for the thoughts, prayers, care packages, comments, texts, and phone calls. We love you all.

Who knows what our next great adventure will be? Maybe a little bit of...

Overall this was such a great experience. We have this slideshow for all of the pictures we took during the trip. It's pretty long to watch and the pictures are not in  order. If you'd rather see the individual pictures just check out the tabs at the top of the page for pics from each leg.

(sorry I deleted two comments on accident when moving this slide show into a post!)

Kansas City

We left Paul and Marion's house and took off for Denver to check out some old stomping grounds of Dad's. I fell asleep in the back of the car, dreaming of my bed and home. Dad began to realize that he didn't really know much of the area anymore because it had blown up so much since he'd been there last. We went to see Red Sky Condominiums, Topaz at the Mall, and Riverfalls (old places Mom and Dad lived) and then drove down to see the house that I was born in, so to speak. Mom and Dad built this house in Elizabeth, and I spent my first years of life there. Dad was thinking how he'd always be torn between the two states he's lived in.


We ended up at Aunt Debbie's house in Westwood, KS after another long drive across I-70. We were able to finally take a look at all of the pictures we had taken since San Diego, and it was great to be in a comfy house. After loading all of our pictures, Debbie brought out some old pictures of Mom as a young lady. That was a hoot! We ate out at Johnny's Barbeque and were able to get in a swim at the Sylvester Powell Community Center near Debbie's house.


We'll be taking off for home soon and we can't wait to be there.

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Old Friends in Old Neighborhoods

We found our friends, Paul and Marion, and spent some time talking about old times and catching up with each others' lives.

Paul is sending this peacock rock home to Grandpa Jones. Miners used to look for this sort of rock because it's easier to see and once it's seen, the miners would know that they were close to finding some gold.

Rocky Mountain Bound

After a long night in the car in Green River, Utah, we set our sights upon the Rocky Mountains. Driving to Glenwood Springs, CO to take a swim in the spring-fed sulfur pools, we lounged around at the "Spa of the Rockies". Two pools, one 80-90 degrees and one 104 degrees, all spring fed, all year long. We got to go down water slides and swim laps and just enjoy the warm, relaxing waters. We at at Tequilas where I ate a spicy shrimp and mushroom dish. Well, I ate the spicy shrimp part, not so much the mushrooms.

From Glenwood Springs, we went on to Loveland Pass on continental divide. There were still a lot of snow patches in the higher elevations, so we partook in a small, yet futile, snowball fight. Being belted with snowballs in July is much, much nicer than in February. However, it was short lived due to a hail storm on the mountain. We both had a bit of a hard time catching our breath due to the altitudes. So much for being in shape! I thought people born in high elevations were naturally equipped to deal with this sort of thing. I demand a refund!

We attempted to go to Mt. Evans but the hail storm turned into a downpour, so we opted out. Next, we tried to go to an old favorite camping spot in Empire, but the 4 wheel drive was making some awful noises, so we didn't press our luck trying to make it up the mountain.

Then we visited Lookout Mountain which overlooks the Coors Brewery in Golden, and Denver in the distance. It was raining the whole time. After the lookout, we swung by mom's old house, which of course stirred up some of Dad's old memories of how they first met. We saw Sheridan Green Elementary school where Marissa went to school and just cruised around Mom's old neighborhood.

We're currently looking for some old neighbors of Mom and Dad's, but they aren't home right now. We're supposed to spend the night there, but we're not sure what will happen, as we showed up several days earlier than we thought... damn that gravitational force again.

Hoover Dam and Utah

This morning Dad took off to the pool for a while until it started to rain on him, thus cutting his swimming short and being the cause of me waking up early. We checked out of our room and headed over to hang out with some of Dad's favorite celebrities. No, it wasn't Celine Dion, Cher, Wayne Newton, or Prince we were off to see. More like The Old Man, Rick, Corey, and of course Chumlee over at Gold & Silver Pawn Shop. The Pawn Stars themselves weren't in as they were on vacation this week (of all weeks to go on vacation!), but we still got to look around at the tons of things they had and talked to some very informative guys about buying silver and gold. The place was a lot smaller than we expected, but really nice.

After leaving Vegas we took a quick jaunt over to the Hoover Dam. It was very impressive to look at, but before we were allowed to go near it, we had to have our whole car inspected including opening the coolers and such. Can't be too safe in this day and age of terrorists and whackos I suppose. Lucky for us we had no dirty underwear just hanging out in the car. Lucky for the inspectors actually! We got lots of pictures of it, but they're on the other camera, so they'll have to come later and you'll have to make due with this one:

Upon leaving the Hoover Dam, we drove through Utah. The plan was to go to Zion National Park while there, but we decided against it. The gravitational force known as "home" is really starting to tug at us and it gets stronger with each passing day. While in Utah, Dad thought of his old friend Kenny who had passed away and thought about how different things would be if he were still alive today, and how we'd be stopping by to visit him on this trip and having an excellent time. He was a bit saddened, but the happy memories were really good.

We ended up spending the night in a truck stop in Green River, Utah, sleeping in the car. No more ritzy 19th floor hotel rooms for us!

More Sin City

We walked the strip tonight and definately got our fill of VERY interesting people. We walked around to quite a few of the free shows in town, such as the water fountains at The Belagio, the fire show at The Mirage, and the battle between the pirates at Treasure Island. After that dad went to pay homage to the local casinos for a bit while I stuck around our awesome room and watched some movies. I tried to convince him I had a lucky streak going and I should go with but he wasn't going for it. I don't think I'd get by with my newly acquired driver's lisence either. Darn vertical IDs!