We pulled into the house last night about 7 p.m. almost exactly twelve hours after we pulled out of the campground in Colorado Springs. By 8 p.m. everything was in the house and out of the motor home. By 10 p.m. we were both sound asleep in our own beds.

Statistical information

In total we drove 4,790 miles over 23 days and were in fourteen states. Gasoline prices declined the further east we drove, going back up as we came through Colorado, Wyoming, and Idaho on our way home. However, even there prices had declined while we were gone. We bought gasoline in the same two Wyoming gas stations going out and coming back:

I’m pretty sure that much of the rest of the country enjoyed similar decreases in price.

I thought it was also interesting to look at gasoline prices during the entire trip. We bought gas 24 times for the motor home. The price varied from the highest price on October 6th of $3.519 to the lowest price on October 25th of $2.199, a spread of $1.32 per gallon. I thought that perhaps the differences in state taxes might explain some of that spread, but that was not the case. The highest and lowest prices were at the same fill-up, even net of state taxes. I put together in a chart all of the prices paid during the trip and highlighted the highest in red and the lowest in green, along with the state taxes and the prices net of state taxes:

This kind of statistical information is always interesting to me. I’m sure that I could run all kinds of statistics on this information, but that suffices for now!

iPhone: The New Guide Book

Usually when we travel we take with us guide books for the various states (or countries) where we’ll travel. This time we used a new method which worked out very well: the iPhone. Except for some spots in Wyoming and Nebraska, we had connection with the iPhone almost continually. As we’d drive through places the passenger would do a Google Search or a Wikipedia Search on the place and read the information to the driver. While we didn’t really have the ability to compare what we found online to what might have been in a guidebook, I’m certain that the Internet information was as good if not better. Further we were able to find information on the Internet on places that would probably never have been written about in a guidebook. For instance, Opal, WY has an entry in Wikipedia. There is nothing interesting about this place and this morning I checked our Wyoming guide books and neither of them had anything about Opal, WY. I think it’s likely we’ve purchased our last guidebook.

We’ll be home for the foreseeable future. We had a great trip and a lot of fun. We accomplished the goals we had set for the trip. We got home glad that we had gone but happy to be back home.

After a long day of driving we arrived at the Garden of the Gods campground in Colorado Springs about 6:30 p.m. last night. We were mighty glad to be here! The drive through northwest Oklahoma, western Kansas, and eastern Colorado was exceptionally boring. Our stop in Dodge City was a big disappointment. In fact, the picture with this post was the highlight of the drive.

We met our good friends Duane and Bobby for dinner at a favorite Japanese restaurant in Colorado Springs. We enjoyed good food and good conversation after which we retired back to our motor home and crashed for the night. Unfortunately, the body clock has not made the change and at 5:50 a.m. MDT I was awake. Maybe I’ll take a short nap this afternoon while Nina visits one of her friends. Meanwhile, we’re off to Church!

We got to the campground in West Memphis in the dark and in the rain. This morning the rain had stopped, but it was very foggy. As I walked outside I saw this very strange looking vehicle parked in one of the camp sites. I took a picture and sent it out on Twitter. A few minutes later I learned from a response that it was a UNICAT. I expect it is a Very Expensive (Much More Than A Hummer) Vehicle.

We got on the road about 8:30 a.m. headed west on I-40. We drove through Little Rock and then on to Oklahoma. We stopped at a campground in Oklahoma City about 6:30 p.m. CDT. This campground has pretty good wifi (that service was down at the campground in West Memphis). Tomorrow we’ll drive to Colorado Springs.

On the way we’ve been stopping at all the Welcome Centers. Nina has been collection pamphlets, the two- or three-panel kinds of pamphlets that have a nice picture on them. These pamphlets can be folded into boxes and have a kind of kaleidoscope effect. It takes four pamphlets to make the lid and four more to make the bottom. The collection process has been fun as it gets us out of the vehicle and walking around.

The second picture is the other side of the UNICAT. This vehicle definitely looked like it could go anywhere!

The pictures of the wedding have been posted by the photographer online. They’re password protected, so let me know if you’d like the URL and the password to access the pictures.

Meanwhile, it’s time to go to bed as we’ve got a long drive again tomorrow.

We left Marsha’s house in Ninety-Six, South Carolina about 8:30 am EDT. We pulled into our campground in West Memphis (just across the Mississippi River in Arkansas from Memphis) twelve hours later in the dark and the driving rain. I did a quick connect of water and electricity and we’re set for the night. The door is closed and locked. We’re not going anywhere until morning. It’s now 9 pm CDT, which our bodies consider to be an hour later. I’m going to split the difference and go to bed in another half-hour.

We went through Atlanta on I-85 and then turned west on I-20 to Birmingham, Alabama. Then we went northwest on US-78 to Memphis and across the river. We stopped at the Welcome Centers so Nina could pick up pamphlets to use for origami boxes and for lunch plus a couple of gas stops.

The further west the cloudier the sky got. About an hour outside of Memphis the skies opened and it got dark. Not very fun driving at night in the rain in traffic and unfamiliar territory. Jill ( our Garmin GPS) did a great job of navigating so we didn’t have to read a map in addition.

Tomorrow we’ll end up at Roman Nose State Park a bit northwest of Oklahoma City. We’ve decided to go through Pueblo on Saturday and into Colorado Springs for Sunday. We’ll do a little visiting, go to Church, and continue home (probably on Monday sometime). We’ll be home on Tuesday and this adventure will be finished.

Meanwhile, it’s still raining. Supposed to end overnight. That would be nice as the southeast really needs the rain rather than here. Goodnight, world!

So says Nina’s sister Marsha as she sat across from Nina and they set up a chat room to include their sister Pamela in Ohio. They’re busy chatting … and laughing more than they are chatting. I’m just shaking my head and agreeing with Marsha’s pronouncement.

Marsha had a list of computer things she wanted me to do while I was here. Most are now completed … as we’re leaving in the morning to wend our way back to Pocatello. Nina suggested we set up AIM on Marsha’s new laptop and the two of them spent quite a while sitting across from each other at the dining room table and instant messaging each other. This evening I talked their sister Pam through the process of setting up AIM on her computer in Ohio. Right now the three of them are in an AOL group chat typing messages to each other and laughing. I’m very happy that they’re having a good time.

One of the tasks was to make Marsha’s desktop computer work faster. It is painfully slow. I discovered that it had a paltry 256mb of memory installed while the computer, in a completely idle state, was demanding 380mb of memory. Of course it would be painfully slow. Tomorrow after we leave a new set of memory will be delivered giving her 1gb of memory and the computer should suddenly be wonderfully fast again. However, I need to sometime break up the three-way-chat/laugh session so I can show Marsha how to install the memory. But, it’s too early to break up their love fest.

We’ve had a good visit here. Billy has taken us out on their pontoon boat and I’ve had a great tour of the lake. I’ve been playing with computers most of the time I’ve been here. Nina and Marsha have been able to do a lot of talking and a lot of origami folding. We visited Marsha’s new studio in downtown Greenwood where she hopes to be able to display and sell some of her artistic creations. It’s been a nice visit.

From across the table:

I keep getting a….

Oh, I know what I’m doing. I keep hitting the enter key instead of the shift key.

The chatfest continues! I’m sure they know what they’re doing … Of course they do….

Both Nina and I arrived at her sister-in-law’s place in Ninety-Six, South Carolina on Sunday afternoon. She rode with her sister from Dalton, Georgia while I drove the motor home towing the car. Since they had to stop for a sit-down lunch (I got McDonalds takeout) and had to go to the grocery store, I got here about a half hour earlier than them. It was a nice drive because the Sunday traffic around Atlanta was pretty light.

This morning Nina told me that she “finally felt like she was on vacation.” With the wedding over and the time schedules met, we can now do a little relaxing. Marsha’s house is on a large reservoir and it is very quiet here at night … far different than the campground in Ringgold, Georgia! It was right next to I-75, which is one of the Interstates that traverses the entire United States from the top of Michigan to the bottom of Florida. Every truck in the world is on that road driving past the campground. The road noise was almost unbearable.

About 4:30 this afternoon, we went for a boat ride on the lake. Billy and Marsha have a 22′ pontoon boat and we headed out from the dock around a nearby island where we were immediately stopped by the lake police doing a safety check. Registration, driver’s license, extinguisher, life preservers …. oops, supposed to be one life preserver on board for every occupant. There were three life preservers. Four passengers. Busted.

However, because we were close to the dock and close to the shore and if we immediately returned and got the fourth preserver, they would give Billy a warning rather than a ticket and a fine. We turned around, went back to the dock, and got the life preserver. The lake was now safe.

The lake was smooth as glass. No wind and very few other boats (other than the lake police!). By the time we got back to the dock the sun had set and it was getting rather chilly. We’ve had a delightful day in South Carolina.

I asked again why the town is called “Ninety-Six”. It’s because it’s 96 miles from somewhere. The locals aren’t exactly sure from where, though. During the Revolutionary War a fort was built here and called “Ninety-Six”. The town took the same name. That means we’re 96 miles away from something. That’s far enough be be a quite, peaceful place and we’re glad to be here for a few days.

Daryl and Laura did the deed last Saturday (October 18, 2008) in a beautiful, traditional wedding ceremony. The service was held at the First United Methodist Church in Dalton, Georgia. It started promptly at 4 p.m. and lasted a bit under 25 minutes. Laura was stunning in her wedding dress and Daryl looked quite handsome in his tuxedo. Everything proceeded without a problem and they are now husband and wife.

The events of the weekend started on Wednesday evening. We arrived at the campground north of Dalton in the early afternoon and did some sightseeing at the Chickamauga National Military Park, the scene of the Confederacy’s last victory in the Civil War (and the turning point where the North won the war). We then took the twins with us to dinner with Daryl, Laura, her parents, Nina, and me. Nina has previously met Laura’s mother when they were in Philadelphia for the bridal shower. I thoroughly enjoyed getting to know Robert (goes by Bob) and Dorothy (goes by Dot) at dinner. She’s the department head for the humanities at a college in Chattanooga. He’s a retired professor from a college in Dalton. They’re both well known and respected in the town. He’s been working on the genealogy for his family and has been recently published on the first of a two-part series on his grandfather’s experiences in World War One. Then evening ended much too quickly. Then, just as I was settling into sleep, Nina’s cell phone rang. It was her two sisters standing outside the camper door. They had both arrived a day early and wanted to surprise her. They succeeded!

Friday afternoon was the wedding rehearsal. Further, Jim and LeeAnn arrived from Missouri, Dawnmarie and Kirk arrived from Pennsylvania, Heather and Ty arrived from Salt Lake (via England), and Jared and Arlene arrived from Seattle. Our contingent for the wedding was complete. Nina says that we had 32 people from our family present for the wedding.

The rehearsal went very well. I think the lady at the church responsible for weddings was quite pleased with our promptness, soberness (often a problem, both she and the minister told us), and attention to detail. After that we retired to the rehearsal dinner. Nina had been working on and arranging this dinner for a couple of months. It was to include not only the bridal party, but all family members on both sides of the family who had come from out of town. In total 63 people were there from 14 states. It was truly a family gathering. Nina had arranged for the Spiced Apple restaurant to provide the dinner. We had the restaurant to ourselves and the buffet they provided was delicious. We had a delightful time.

Friday Nina and her sisters did some playing and we met at the wedding hotel (the La Quinta in Dalton) in time to go to the church at 2:30 p.m. for pictures. The pictures went well and at 3:55 pm (right on schedule), Daryl escorted Nina and me to our seats. Promptly at 4 the organist started playing the march and Laura’s father escorted her down the aisle to numerous oohs and aahs from the congregation. They’ve lived in Dalton for close to 30 years and there were a lot of friends and neighbors at the wedding.

After more pictures we went to the reception in downtown Dalton. The reception included a buffet-style sit-down dinner, cake cutting, bouquet toss, and a garter toss (which our son Jared deftly snagged in a NFL style catch). There was a City of Dalton celebration happening as well (some kind of a Liberty Tree commemoration), so about 8 p.m. the sky lit up with fireworks. What a delightful (free) show! The videographer was able to get a lot of video with the sky lighting up with fireworks behind the bride and groom. More reasons to buy the video!

Congratulations, Laura and Daryl!

Two days after we left, the Internet access to my house went down about 1:50 am. The next day I was able to get a Qwest tech into the house to find that the Qwest modem had died. He was able to install a new device, but couldn’t program it. So, everything was still inaccessible.

I sent out a status about the problem on Twitter, but had no idea what to do next as someone fairly computer literate would need to be in front of the computer inside my house and I wasn’t sure who I could ask.

Yesterday as I was driving to South Carolina, a fellow I know who is an excellent systems admin at Idaho State University asked me on Twitter if I needed some help as he noticed the blog was still down. I called him and he said he’d have time that evening (Sunday) to go over to the house. I emailed him the info and he got it running. Hurrah!! I will be home somewhere about the 28th or 29th and everything otherwise would have had to wait until then.

A huge thanks to Ben (and his able assistant daughter)!!!