Day 28, 29, 30....: Raleigh, NC

Well, we made it!  We got home Thursday afternoon and it felt good!  The trip was amazing but what is it Dorothy says (maybe I'd remember better if they had let us in to the Oz museum!:) "There's no place like home!".  Unpacking and getting organized after being gone for a month is a chore--and we're not done yet!  Yesterday the 4 weeks of riding and sleeping on the RV and walking around all those different cities finally caught up with me (and my back) and I had trouble just getting around.  I tried ice, heat, stretching--nothing really helped.  It is still pretty bad but I am hoping as the day goes on, maybe it will get a little better! 
Thanks to everyone for following my blog as we have traveled.  It was comforting being so far from home and knowing that some of you were coming along for the ride!  I feel blessed to have been able to take this trip and to have such wonderful families and friends. 
If there was somewhere we traveled to that you would like me to post some more pictures of (should be easier now that we're at home!) or more information about, please just make a comment below or send me an e-mail and I'll post it. 
Missed you all!!

Day 27: Bowling Green, Kentucky

Today we drove from St. Louis to Bowling Green to visit the Lost River Cave, a river that runs underground through caverns and dubbed by Ripley's the shortest, deepest river in the world.  After the boat ride through the caverns we visited their butterfly habitat which the kids loved!  Since we are trying to make it home tomorrow, we decided to drive a little more tonight so we are in Crossville, TN, seven and a half hours from home!  This trip has been amazing but it sure will be nice to sleep in our own beds and shower in our big showers with unlimited hot water!  I can't wait to get all our pictures back from the trip--I know some of them are incredible! 
Here's a few pics from the last couple days....

Today getting ready to go on the boat ride

Inside the cave

This bar used to be part of an underground night-club outside the cave's mouth

Carson with a butterfly

At Grant's farm, feeding the goats

The St. Louis Arch

Riding in our "space pod" tram to the top of the arch

Day 26: Saint Louis

Can it get any hotter? Seems like every time we take a vacation, there's a heat wave! Still miss that CA weather! Today we visited Grant's Farm, named after the Ulysses S. Grant family but the land was bought by the family that owns Anheiser-Busch. It is free to get in the park which is home to elephants, camels, exotic, birds, llamas, goats, and the famous Clydesdale horses. There is a tram ride through the wildlife preserve where we also saw buffalo, zebra, ostriches, longhorn cattle and many deer (with babies!). When you get off the tram you can see the other animals, take in a show, ride the carousel, have lunch or, our personal favorite, bottle-feeding the goats. We each got 2 bottles and went to town! Those goats loved it! They would stand up on you to get to those bottles! Now, of course, Lily wants a pet goat. One of them was very fond of Kevin and kept following him around, licking his leg. (Kev kind of liked it:) I got some cute pics that I'll post when I have some internet. We didn't stay a long time because it was just too darn hot!
Afterwards, we did what I like best, went shopping! We needed to do a little back to school shopping and Mommy shopping so we went to Saint Louis Mills, which had everything--stores, outlets (got the boys some Levis for back to school for $9.98!), arcades, restaurants, a playground, an ice skating rink, a bowling alley, putt-putt, an arcade, go-carts and a movie theater! It was all-in-one family entertainment! We spent the rest of the day there and got back to the RV pretty late. We would have liked to see more of the downtown area but it was just too hot to spend the day outside.
Today we're on the road again, heading to Bowling Green, Kentucky where they have the state's only underground boat ride into the caverns. Sounds cool! We're going to drive a little more after we visit the caverns and are planning to be home tomorrow night! It's been four weeks on the road and we didn't try to kill each other! That's a blessing in itself!!

Day 25: Saint Louis

Last night we had a little mishap while doing laundry-it was raining some and so Kevin was running back from the laundry room and twisted his ankle and it was ugly! It was so swollen--it looked terrible and he was in real pain! I thought I might have to take him to the ER...or worse--drive the RV today! He put ice on it and we wrapped it in some medical tape and it looks a lot better today. It is pretty bruised but the swelling is way down.
We drove to Saint Louis today. You can see that huge arch from miles away! After we got set up at our RV park, we went to the arch and rode up in it! I didn't even know you could ride up in it until my Dad told me. The tram you ride in looks like a little space pod.(I'd show you pics if we had WiFi here) Then at the top, you can get out and look out these small windows to the world below-pretty cool! Then we rode the tram back down and came back to the RV for the night.
I think we're going to stay here tomorrow and do some sight-seeing before we hit the road early on Wednesday. I'll update photos when we have some wireless service!

Day 24: Outside of Kansas City

Today we put the pedal to the medal and drove close to 8 hours.  It wasn't bad though--we watched "I Love Lucy" episodes, did a little summer school work and read some.  Then as we got in to Kansas, we started seeing billboards for the "Oz Museum".  Well, "The Wizard of Oz" was one of my all-time favorite movies as a child and that love has been passed down to Lily so we decided we would try to fit it in.  But when we were about 10 minutes away, I started thinking about it being Sunday.  It would be very upsetting to get there and it be closed.  I pulled up the website on my blackberry and they were open...but closed at 5:00 and it was 4:45!  I called to see if they closed promptly at 5:00 and they said they had already stopped selling tickets for the museum for the day but the gift shop was open. :(   We were almost there anyway so we decided to go ahead, but young Lily was not a happy camper.  She and I walked in to check it out.  As they had said, we were not going to be able to tour the museum but I tried to make the most out of it as we browsed the gift shop and offered to let her pick out a tee-shirt. (they had a cute one that said "Toto ate my homework") but she was still down in the dumps.  She ended up picking out a bookmark, we took a couple pictures (not of her because she was not in the mood!) and left.  It took her a while to get over it.  She wanted to go tomorrow but we drove another hour after we left there and I told her Daddy was not going to go for that!  Anyway, we ended up in Lawrence, KS for the night and plan to drive to St. Lois tomorrow which I am looking forward to.  It sure is hot again!  That CA weather was so nice and cool--I miss it already!!

Day 23: Vail, CO

Vail is beautiful!  I know Colorado is known for the skiing and winter sports but the summer is beautiful too!  We took a gondola ride to the top of a mountain (used for ski lifts in the winter) and had lunch at an outdoor patio grill overlooking the mountains.  The kids climbed the climbing wall and jumped on the bungee trampoline and Lily road the ponies.  Afterwards we rode back down on the gondola and looked around in the little village.  It was so cool!  It had shops, restaurants, and condos that I'm sure were very expensive!  It was a nice break from the driving we've been doing the last couple of days!  The scenery while driving is just incredible. 

After our afternoon in Vail, we continued driving for a few more hours and stopped in a small town called Limon, CO.  Tomorrow will probably be another heavy driving day as we need to be back in NC next week.  We'll be driving in to Kansas tomorrow. 

At the bottom of the gondola in Vail

On the Gondola ride

And after we left Vail, we saw this beautiful rainbow on the way to Limon

Day 22: Somewhere in Colorado

We decided to drive quite a few hours today too after stopping by Wal-Mart to pick up the third season of I Love Lucy to keep the kids entertained. (They've already watched every episode of the first two seasons at least twice). We got to Colorado this afternoon and it is so beautiful-mountains everywhere and the Colorado river (which runs behind our campground tonight). We stopped between Grand Junction and Denver for the night and hopefully will get to see some of Aspen and Denver tomorrow.
That's all for now!

Day 21: Salt Lake City, Utah

Wow--I cannot believe we have been gone for 3 weeks!  It seems like so long ago that we were in Nashville and Memphis!  Today we drove to Salt Lake City.  We just got here this evening because this morning we had laundry to catch up on and Kevin needed to change the oil in the RV so we didn't get on the road until after lunch.  Unfortunately, we can't take our sweet time getting back like we did getting to CA.  The kids start camp on the 31st so I need to be home a couple days before to pack for them and wash the clothes before I can pack!  We are driving to Colorado tomorrow--hopefully Aspen--which is supposed to be beautiful! 
Here's a few pics from yesterday!

We stopped on the side of the road to admire this scenic area of NV.

An old railroad track runs through the mountains

Day 20: Reno/Winnemucca NV

Today was mostly a driving day. We left San Fran this morning trying to get some miles behind us but we did make a quick afternoon spot in Reno to check it out. It's pretty much like a little Vegas but much less crowded! We had lunch there, browsed in some souvenir shops and let the kids play some carnival games at the Circus Circus midway. I was on a roll again and everybody won a prize. :). I told the kids I think I'm better at the carnival games than Daddy! (hey, I have to be able to beat him at something!!).
We have seen some beautiful scenery on the drive from CA into Nevada. There are so many amazing parts of this country! If we had not taken this trip, we would have not gotten to appreciate God's beautiful handiwork. We are truly thankful to have this opportunity and are trying not to take it for granted!
After Reno, we drove a couple more hours to the small town of Winnemucca, NV. We'll be leaving here today after I catch up on some laundry and Kevin changes the oil in the RV and possibly stop tonight in Salt Lake City, Utah. Thanks for following!!

Day 19: San Francisco

Today was a busy but wonderful day!  We started out this morning by driving in to Chinatown.  It was mainly shops (which I'm not one to shy away from!) and restaurants.  We did a little souvenir shopping and had Chinese (naturally) for lunch.  Carson and Lily both had to have a Chinese outfit and wore them the rest of the day, even though Carson's were actually pajamas!
After lunch, we drove down to the wharf area to try to catch a tour of Alcatraz but they were sold out...until August!  Kevin was disappointed-he really wanted to see The Rock because he loved the movie of the same name but we just had to admire it from afar.  Since we couldn't get a spot on the boat to Alcatraz, we checked out other "touristy" spots like Pier 39 where they have shopping, dining and you can see some local seas lions napping--or at least they were today. Then we walked down to Ghiradelli Square where you can get chocolate, chocolate and more chocolate--oh, and ice cream sundaes too--which we indulged in two of!  Afterwards, we drove over the famous Golden Gate Bridge to the Muir Forest where we saw some of the most amazing redwood trees!  These trees were huge!  It was very cool.
Tomorrow, we'll start our drive back towards home.  We'll still have stops along the way but we have to get started back to keep our schedule.

Day 18: San Francisco

Today we departed beautiful Malibu. It was a sad good-bye but we'll always have the memories! We spent most of the day driving today and reached San Francisco this afternoon around 5:30. It is such a cool place. There are houses everywhere along the cliffs. After we got set up at the RV park, we drove down to the wharf area. It was a very interesting area! There were a lot of street performers, restaurants and shops. We went to In and Out Burger, which is the one place Big Daddy said we HAD to go! :). We really enjoyed our burgers and fries and then we did a little souvenir shopping. There was a cool restaurant and bakery that made loaves of bread in the shapes of animals like crabs, alligators, turtles and teddy bears so we had to stop in and pick up some loaves.
We are looking forward to some more sight-seeing tomorrow!

Day 17: Malibu

Malibu is one of the most beautiful places I have ever seen!  It runs along the PCH and our campground overlooks the ocean and backs up to the mountains.  The houses here are incredible.  No po' folk live in Malibu!!  Our neighbors at the RV park saw Tony Danza and Tori Spelling at the farmer's market today.  (I think Leonardo trumps Tony & Tori!).
We went to a patio seafood restaurant that overlooks the beach and it was great!  The view was amazing, the food was good and the cool 70's weather is perfect.  I don't know if I want to leave tomorrow!  This was not even a planned stop on our trip but Kevin and I are both so glad we stopped!
After lunch we drove to one of the beaches with rocks and cliffs all around.  It is so different than our beaches and the water is so cold!  The kids did get in a little bit but they got cold quick.
We've come back to the RV park and I think we're going to grill out here tonight and maybe take a drive down to the pier.  Here are some photos of today including some of the gorgeous scenery!!

At lunch

This is the view from the RV park--can't beat it!!

Day 16: Malibu

Ok--Could not wait to post this one--I just met Leonardo DiCaprio having frozen yogurt in Malibu!  Here's the pic: (thanks to the kids for asking him to take a picture with me!)

We were just sitting outside a frozen yogurt place in Malibu and he walked in to get yogurt!  He's one of my favorite actors so the kids went in and asked him if he would take a picture with me and he did!  It will be hard to top this!!!

Here's some photos from the last couple days....

Lily and I on the steps of the Kodak Theater in LA.

Kevin and I with the Hollywood sign in the background

Simon Cowell's house

The house where Michael Jackson died

Grohman's Chinese theater

Carson on the Santa Monica Pier with the feathered friends

getting a kiss!

Disneyland

Zack fighting Darth Maul at the Jedi Academy

And now Carson fighting him...

The view from our Malibu campground!

And in case you missed it the first time....here's Leonardo and I again....:)

But bigger!!