We left for our family vacation shortly after the boys come home from school on the last day. We had the good old suburban loaded down and just had to get some gas and get on our way. It was shortly after 3 pm when we left Hooper.
Kevin and I thought we were doing so well. We thought we’d make it to Mesquite that night and get into Riverside before lunch on Saturday. The plan was set and we were on target.
We didn’t account for life. And things like the weather. We got to Bountiful and started crawling down the freeway. The rain was coming down so violently we couldn’t see the road at all. Then, even when it let up a bit, we couldn’t see the lines on the road to tell if we were close to the right lane!
That slowed us down a bit, but we picked back up and were cruising along nicely. Until just after Downtown Salt Lake. Then back to the crawl. Or just plain stopped. Traffic. Lots and lots of traffic.
At 6 pm we pulled off in Riverton and found a park to eat dinner – that cleverly pre-packed dinner that I packed thinking we’d be picnicking in the middle of nowhere by the time dinnertime came. Nope. In 3 hours, we had traveled what normally takes a little less than 1. To say I was disgruntled would be an understatement.
But the park was fun. The boys climbed a rock wall and crossed the monkey bars. Kevin and I gave the monkey bars a try as well. Feeling better, we started on our way again, this time avoiding the interstate and taking Redwood Road until we could see that the freeway had cleared up.
Our travels went well and we were making good time again until about Beaver. That’s when we found the rain again. And when we found that our windshield wiper was about to fly off! Thank goodness for truck stops that sell parts at 10 o’clock at night! We decided to try for Cedar City and spend the night there.
The problem with this new plan was that there were no vacancies in Cedar City. In addition to it being Memorial Day weekend, CEU had just had graduation so the hotels were packed. On to St. George.
The new plan was to find a room in St. George or else sleep in a rest stop for a few hours. The boys already looked like this …
Except for Bobby. He was wide awake. Completely and totally wide awake.
Our luck didn’t seem to be changing in St. George as we met “no vacancy” after “no vacancy.” Finally, one nice deskman called around and found us the last empty room at the last hotel before reaching Arizona. It only had two double beds and a chair, but we took it. At 1 am, we took it. And Bobby was still awake.
We only slept about 6 hours and then started on our way again. Travel was going great … the boys were occupied, the suburban was functioning, the weather was nice, and there wasn’t even any traffic in Vegas. We were SOOO close.
A few miles before hitting Cajun Pass, we began to crawl. We crawled up the pass, over the pass, and back down the other side. No other option. No round-about way to go. Just bumper to bumper.
We finally reached Grandpa Brent and Grandma Jeanne’s house about 4 pm … 26 hours after we had left our home. The best laid plans …
There were a few “laugh out loud” moments in all this slow-never-going-to-get-there traveling.
The first came in Payson, Utah. We always like to point out the LDS temples to the boys as we drive along and we had forewarned them that the new Payson temple was coming up. Rusty likes this game and had his eyes on alert. We came up to a power plant of sorts and Rusty knowledgeably let us know, “That’s Satan’s temple!”
Then, no matter how many times we corrected or pronounced it slowly, Tommy insisted on saying Nevada, “New-in-Vada.” Every time.
“Good-bye, Arizona … Hello, New-in-vada!”
“Is that Las Vegas, New-in-vada?”
“Are we still in New-in-vada?”
“Good-bye, New-in-vada … Hello, California!”
Now that we were out of New-in-vada, we started looking for our California landmarks, including the big ole thermometer in Baker. It was actually working this time and the boys could see the temperature clearly from the car (it does ranges so 100* was lit, but 110* wasn’t). When Tommy noticed it was working this time, he said, “I guess they put big batteries in the big thermometer!”
It took forever to get there, but we were definitely READY to start our vacation!