In Which I Am Alive

So, we did it.  We drove from DC to Denver, crossing nine states, in two days.  To simplify things, we camped in Illinois, sleeping a few hours, and then getting up and chugging back along.  On Sunday, the day after we arrived in Denver, I had a flight back, so we spent the day poking around nearby Boulder.  Here's what Denver and back in 3 days looks like:

Our most important cargo.  She held up well, despite being bored out of her mind 99% of the trip.

We hit Wheeling, WV around lunch time on the first day, and having sampled some of the wares while at the conference, I encouraged Casey to stop so we could get crepes at Later Alligator.  We both had savory crepes, and Casey also had a cup of unbelievably fantastic cheddar and beer soup.  I am not a soup person, but this stuff was incredible.

Here is Indianapolis, taken with Casey's iPhone.

Watching the sun set on the first day.  This was, um, Illinois, probably.

Saturday morning was gray and dreary.  The sun didn't really peek through until around nine, so it felt like we drove through the night, even though we'd slept.

Kansas City from Casey's iPhone.  Wish I could have snapped the Royal's stadium, but I missed it.  It's impressive.

After KC, Kansas was pretty uninteresting.  It was a tie beween Kansas and Ohio for Least Interesting State to See from Interstate 70.

Kansas did have wind farms, though.  I'd never seen one before, but was driving, so Casey snapped these.  I love the little old windmill in the foreground--such a contrast!

Those black dots are cows.  For scale.  They are HUGE!

The point at which I understood why they call it "Big Sky Country."  The clouds go on, and on, and on.

We made it to Denver!  Sadly, there are no photos until we made it to this bookshop that night.  I think I had largely ceased to be human at that point.  The Tattered Cover is HUGE, by the way, and carried new and used books.  I grabbed a couple to read on the plane.

Casey and Lani on a pretty chilly summit in Boulder.

And there we all are.  There was a rescue climber training thing setting up to our right, which is what Lani was so interested in.

There you have it!  To Denver and back, and still alive.  Casey made his way the rest of the way to Jackson Hole the next day, where he was promptly caught in a blizzard.  Fortunately Lani loves the snow, so she's pretty happy.