USA Road Trip » motel

Day 27 West Yellowstone Montana to Salt Lake City Utah

admin — Thu, 21 Apr 2011 15:59:51 +0000

We stayed in West Yellowstone, just outside of the park. The town is almost completely closed. Even the hotel we stayed in with a few other guests was being renovated around us.

It was very cold in the morning -8C, with a thick layer of ice on the windscreen of the car that we had to scrape off.

what happens when its -8C

cars across the road that look like they have been buried all winter

We headed south through Idaho, through lots of frozen landscape.

filling at a service station, lots o mud, and slush and piles of snow

Eventually we made it to Salt Lake City. We stayed close to the centre of the city.

Day 22 Colby Kansas to Denver Colorado

admin — Fri, 15 Apr 2011 03:02:42 +0000

It was a cold morning in Colby Kansas, about 1 C.

And it only got colder.

We left Colby in rain, that gradually changed to sleet, and then when we crossed the Colorado border, snow. It was difficult driving along the interstate through snow and slush, having semi-trailers pass throwing up loads of water and slush over the windscreen, making it almost impossible to see. An SUV following us slid off the road onto the median strip.

Evenutally we drove through the snow areas to get to completely snow-free areas. We are staying a great hotel we got cheap on hotel.com, in the southern part of Denver.

parked having a break from driving in the snow, colorado

Day 21 Blue Springs Missouri to Colby Kansas

admin — Fri, 15 Apr 2011 02:33:38 +0000

The long journey over the midwestern prairie. We drove through Kansas City, which is in Missouri not Kansas.

We avoided the toll road to Topeka, travelling on a state road. Once we left Topeka it got very rural with not much around. Onece we past Salina it got very flat. Our choices of places to stay were getting more limited as we got into western kansas, as the towns are much further apart.

Eventually arrived at Colby in the evening. Colby has a population 5000 people and is nearly 1000 metres above sea level.

Windgenerator in Kansas

Day 17 Jacksonville Florida to Atlanta Georgia

Judy — Sun, 10 Apr 2011 03:17:31 +0000

Very looong driving day due to roadworks and a lot of traffic on the I-75. So we took a couple of detours off the main road and saw a bit of Georgia that we wouldn’t have seen from the freeway.

We ate real southern food tonight at Mary Mac’s Tea Rooms in Atlanta, founded 1945. Great food, huge serves and we finally got to try some cornbread and grits! Greg had Roast Turkey with cornbread stuffing and cranberry sauce and a Root Beer, I had Roast Pork (sorry Tom, there was no crackling) with cornbread stuffing and gravy, and washed it down with a Mint Julep.

I remember reading historical novels where Southern ladies drank mint juleps and always wondered what they tasted like. Turns out it’s just bourbon with ice and a large sprig of mint. Those Southern ladies were probably all pissed by 5pm!

Dinner at Mary Macs Tea Rooms

Mary Macs Tea Rooms

Day 16 Orlando Florida to Jacksonville Florida

Judy — Sat, 09 Apr 2011 01:39:57 +0000

So we’ve reached the turnaround point of our trip, and now we’re heading back across the country to LA. We drove to the east coast and stopped to dip our toes in the Atlantic Ocean, so that we can say that we really did go right from the West Coast to the East Coast. The water felt quite warm, and there are plenty of people on the beaches over here on the East Coast. Gorgeous weather too.

We made our way up the coast, stopping at St Augustine, the oldest continuously occupied European-established city in the US. It was founded by a Spanish explorer in 1565. We wandered round the Castillo de San Marcos fort and the old streets in the centre of the town, where we saw the original city gate, the oldest wooden school in the US and a few other old things that have been around since before Australia was discovered. If you’re interested, here’s the Wikipedia article

We’re staying in Jacksonville tonight, then heading north to Georgia tomorrow.

Space Shuttle launch pad and vehicle assembly building across the water from Titusville Florida

How the americans handle beach traffic. Hundreds of cars, thousands of people over many kilometres of beach, all controlled and orderly. Smyrna Beach Florida

Feet in the Atlantic Ocean

Day 15 Orlando Florida

admin — Fri, 08 Apr 2011 00:17:03 +0000

Harry Potter at Universal Studios

Hogwarts Castle

Drinking Butter Beer at the 3 Broomsticks

The ride that Judy did

Day 14 Grayton Beach State Park Florida to Orlando Florida

Judy — Thu, 07 Apr 2011 03:18:29 +0000

We spent most of the day driving from the campground we stayed at last night to Orlando Florida. Much of it was spent on the I-10, then we headed south towards Orlando. As we got closer to Orlando, we had to avoid the tollroads as most of them don’t accept cash payments at a tollbooth – you have to have an e-ticket-thingy, or phone to organise a credit card payment. It ws easier to just keep away from tollroads.

And the main reason we’re in Orlando, Florida? To go and see The Wizarding World of Harry Potter, which is part of Universal’s Islands of Adventure theme park. Watch this space tomorrow!

One of the many excellent rest areas along the USA interstates. The Florida ones have been even better

Day 13 New Orleans Louisiana to Grayton Beach State Park Florida

admin — Wed, 06 Apr 2011 01:41:38 +0000

Unlucky day 13. We left New Orleans at a good time, to make Grayton Beach early in the afternoon. However at Mobile Alabama, we holed a tyre (or tire in the USA), fortunately right outside a tire shop. However they did not have a replacement, although they tried to fix the old one, but could not. They spent some time helping us, and charged us nothing. We then went to another one, but also no luck. However they sent us to a third, which did have a replacement.

The whole episode took about 3 hours, and we didn’t arrive at Grayton Beach until 7pm at night (losing another hour crossing into the eastern time zone in Florida. We then found someone had already taken our booked campsite, but they moved on. We think they were just hoping no one would turn up.

Its a nice State Park. The americans do know how to setup camping areas. Its not exactly wilderness camping (Water, 50 amp power point for powering your 10 metre long RV), but it is nice.

campsite Grayton Beach on the Gulf of Mexico

Grayton Beach on the Gulf of Mexico Florida. Calm and the water was warm.

Day 10 Lafayette Louisiana to New Orleans Louisiana

Judy — Sun, 03 Apr 2011 15:21:29 +0000

In which:

Greg celebrates his birthday, we visit the Tabasco Sauce factory, we drive to New Orleans and spend the evening wandering around the French Quarter and Bourbon Street

Tabasco Country Store

the bridge over the mississippi river that we drove over on the I-10 into New Orleans

Day 3 Gallup New Mexico to Santa Rosa New Mexico

admin — Sun, 27 Mar 2011 03:31:44 +0000

We left Gallup driving through the interesting New Mexico landscape. It is very like the area around and north of Alice Springs in Australia. We passed several Indian Casinos on the I-40. The Casinos are built on Indian Reservations, because they are exempt from local and state planning restrictions.

We can travel at a fair speed along the I-40. The speed limit is 75 miles per hour (120km/hr), and plenty of cars (and semi-trailer trucks) pass us when we travel at the speed limit.

We headed into Albuquerque, and the Old Town area. We wandered around the old (and touristy) area. We had a Mexican lunch at La Hacienda.

Albuquerque

Albuquerque is a nice looking town of 550,000. They seem to embrace the desert enviroment with houses and buildings in subdued desert colours.

We left heading east, finishing up at Santa Rosa. We’ll be in Texas tomorrow.