Cross-Country Roadtrip
Like I'd mentioned in my previous post, in order to get Zoey to New York from Seattle, we had to drive cross-country. It was an incredible experience. We'd complained in the past about how long the 4-5 hour drive from Seattle to Spokane WA was, twice a year for four years while I did my undergrad at Gonzaga. Preparing to move to New York, we knew we had at least 40 hours to go! Let that sink in for a minute.
Considering we had Zoey in the car, we knew we'd have to stop every couple of hours. But really, we'd have to stop for ourselves too. We'd planned to make the trip in 7 days, 6 nights, so we knew we had to get out and stretch every 3-4 hours on the road. We also wanted to fit in some fun too, so I checked out Roadtrippers to see what attractions would be close to our route. Here was our final itinerary:
Day 1: Leave Seattle WA, cross Washington, top of Idaho, and sleep in Missoula MT
Day 2: Leave Missoula MT, cross Montana, and sleep in Sheridan WY
Day 3: Leave Sheridan WY, cross Wyoming and South Dakota, and sleep in Sioux Falls SD
Day 4: Leave Sioux Falls SD, cross Minnesota, and sleep in Madison WI
Day 5: Leave Madison WI, cross Wisconsin, Illinois, and Indiana, and sleep in Columbus OH
Day 6: Leave Columbus OH, cross Ohio, top of West Virginia, and sleep in Harrisburg PA
Day 7: Leave Harrisburg PA, cross Pennsylvania, New Jersey, and arrive in New York
That's 14 states! We all knew we'd never have the opportunity to do this again, or more likely, wouldn't want to. So I bought a GoPro to record as much of the drive as possible, and added can't-miss places to visit on the way. Unfortunately, the first two days of the trip were raining, a LOT! Initially, I'd wanted to take an extra day to stop at Yellowstone Park. I'm glad we didn't, as it was beyond pouring the day we would've been there. But we did visit the following:
Saw A LOT of wind turbines!
Gonzaga (of course!)
Berkeley Acid Pit, Butte MT
We were expecting it to be red, but because of the recent downpours, it was murky. Make no mistake though, it still smelled terrible! But it was super interesting to learn about. And to learn that geese have no sense of smell, since nearly 350 snow geese landed in the pit to spend the night during their migration and died. After that, they installed sirens that will ring out if birds get too close to the water.
We'd also wanted to visit Our Lady of the Rockies in Butte, but because of the rain and how overcast it was, the tour had been cancelled.
Mount Rushmore, Rapid City SD
Mount Rushmore was an interesting stop for us. We had to detour nearly 2.5 hours to see it and were slightly disappointed when we got there. Sure, it was a must stop monument, but somehow I'd thought it'd be much bigger. The line to get in and the walk to the lookout point took so much more time than simply standing there to appreciate it. Not to mention that you can actually see it from outside the "park" they've built around it to charge you to go in. Anyway, we're glad we stopped by, but won't be going back, once's enough.
We'd also wanted to visit Devil's Tower, but it was in the opposite direction, and seeing both Devil's Tower and Mount Rushmore would've added nearly 4 hours to the day's drive. But we did kind of see it from the road, from VERY far away. Per my dad's description, it looked like a drinking glass upside down, in the middle of nowhere.
Zoey did so incredibly well with the whole drive, we were very surprised. Granted, if anyone got out of the car and walked away while she was still locked up, she made sounds no dogs are supposed to make. But all in all, she seemed to enjoy it even. Her favorite pastime at all the hotels were the beds and windows.
She'd get bored of being in her crate the entire time though, so every now and then, we'd let her out and she'd just sit on my lap in the back and chill. And then she figured out that sleeping on top of the towel that was covering our backpacks was waaaay comfier than anything else, so she'd somehow wedge herself in there and sleep for hours.......
This was a once-in-a-lifetime trip. It was absolutely beautiful out for the majority of the trip, and it went by surprisingly fast. We learned so much about so many of the cities we drove through. For example, I had no idea Wyoming was so beautiful! Driving through some of the small towns surrounded by acres and more acres of farms, we talked about the possibility of moving there one day. It's funny, since I was moving from Seattle (pop. 2mm) to New York (pop. 8.4mm), yet daydreaming of one day living in Gillette WY (pop. 30k). We also learned how to deal with seeing nothing but corn for hours and hours and hours. The US produces just way too much corn, it's crazy.
We'll see where I'll end up after graduate school, but I'm hoping that it won't be as long of a drive again. For now, I've got the memories and videos to remember this one by, without needing to do it over again anytime soon.
