Cross-Country Summer 2022

  July 28 - Shabbona State Park, IL We had a peaceful morning around the campsite and left around 10:45am. The drive to Shabbona wasn't going to be as long as the last couple drives, so we felt relief. Ev and Til got right back to playing with their friends (and each other) all morning until we left - we actually hooked up the camper and pretended we were leaving to mess with those sweet children of ours. This drive was similar to yesterday's drive in that it was entirely on the highway, straight-fast driving. We packed lunches and didn't need to stop many times at all. We all have such excited energy to get back home, and after today, we will be more than 2/3 of the way there! We saw the windmills across Iowa and Illinois again and started seeing similar sights (this time, from the other direction) as we backtracked for the first time on our journey. We arrived at Shabbona State Park and were immediately struck by its calm, natural beautiful, sitting on Shabbona Lake

  July 27 - Mahoney State Recreation Area, NE We woke up and got on the road by 6:05am after waking up to a 5:30am alarm. I was up at 5am and walked to a Moraine Park overlook to watch the sunrise over the meadow. The valley was thick with fog, making the meadow look like a slow-moving lake. As the sun rose, I watched the fog slowly melt away, exposing the hidden meadow moment by moment. It was absolutely stunning and mystifying. I was so happy to have that morning time to myself before everyone else woke up. We groggily got the kids in the car and Ev fell asleep almost right away - and we drove for about two hours before anyone got hungry and needed food. Cassandra attended a virtual work-meeting at 8:30am, and by 10:30 she took the helm after we gassed in eastern Colorado. We stopped for lunch at Lee's Family Restaurant in western Nebraska. It was a classic Americana diner (with movable a salad bar!). This was a cozy, comfortable restaurant, and we chatted with the waitress

  July 26 - Rocky Mountain National Park, CO It was my birthday today. Everyone was so nice to me today, from the moment I woke until when I laid down to sleep. Cassandra worked to make sure it was a great day, and the kids greeted me with the most coziest "Happy birthday" when I popped my head in the camper to check on them in the morning. I felt so much care and love and all day long. Cassandra and I decided Tilda deserved to go on a pony ride at least once on this trip (Ev had that ride in the Tetons, too).   We decided that I would take Tilda for the pony ride while Cassandra made breakfast. I thought it would be a wrangler-led ride, but they gave me to pony to guide along the trail on a loop that took us about 45 minutes or so. Tilda chose a cute, chubby black pony named Poptart. It was a beautiful trail along the Fall River near the northern entrance to the park.  Tilda was so excited and she had so much fun. It was a perfect way to start my birthday.   Cassandra

  July 25 - Rocky Mountain National Park, CO Cassandra had a day planned in Boulder with her coworker Anna, who lives in Denver. She had been back and forth the last couple days about leaving us to our own wits and driving on her own for an hour and back, but she ultimately went out and had a great time. In my mind, it's always nice to have a little solo time, and getting to explore independently is fun and exhilarating. She came back to the Rockies pretty quickly after finishing up working with Anna, and I partly wish she spent more time in Boulder - I hear it's a pretty cool place. Ev, Til, and I rode our bikes to the shuttle station at our campground (on the Green, Moraine Park Route) and rode the shuttle to a couple hiking spots. The shuttle system in Rocky Mountain National Park is pretty impressive and enabled us great exploration of the park throughout the eastern region without requiring a car! We had a changeover at Park & Ride (the bus-line central hub), and t

  July 24 - Rocky Mountain National Park, CO Ev and Til spent the morning riding their bikes with new friends they made from Ft. Collins, CO. They were really sweet kids, and their mother came by to hang out with Cassandra and I as we packed up camp - they were on a circum-Colorado camping trip. Every day, I am again reminded about the gracious power of human relationships. Children synching campground lifestyles; adults sharing goodwill and common-interest. We received positive energy, inspiration, and affirmation on our way to our last big stop.   It was a pretty easy breakdown (we've gotten good at this by now…), although evening was a bit damp. The last two nights, Cassandra and I tried to sleep with the rainfly off, but both nights were interrupted by flash downpours and we had to scramble to throw the fly on - so we didn't have terribly-sound sleep.   We cannot wait to find ourselves in 40-degree evenings in the Rockies! We hit the road around 10:30am and planned to

  July 23 - Dinosaur National Park, UT Cassandra and I got into an argument early in the morning, and it put a damper on the first activity of the day - it was a frustrating misunderstanding that we worked through (because we love!). Cassandra took the lead on planning our activities for the day, and we went on a hike through the desert to see rock formations and cool views of Split Mountain. We got on the trail by around 11am, and it was already pretty hot. We got lucky with some good cloud cover for much of the hike, so it wasn't too rough weatherwise, but it was absolutely exhausting to all of us by the end of it. The sights were every bit worth it... After the hike, we drove out to an expansive petroglyph site that contained over 1000 year-old petroglyphs! It is always fun seeing a reminder of people's historic, ancient presence in the world (in a place we can drive to in our car…). What did those people think about when the lived here? Were these desert lands full of won

  July 22 - Dinosaur National Park, UT We had a calm morning - we didn't need to leave our campsite very early because the drive to Dinosaur National Park was only about four hours. We ate a leisurely breakfast and slowly cleaned up camp. Cassandra and I walked out to the Salt Lake this morning. It is amazing how hard it is to judge distance - it was so much further away than it seemed from our campsite. The kids eventually found us... Even though I find this place to beautiful and fascinating, I am happy to move on as it has been tough out here: hot and draining. We should visit this place outside of the middle of the summer when the weather is more reasonable. Our drive across northing Utah was simple and visually stunning. We didn't need to stop and made it via the highway to Dinosaur National Monument around 3pm. We stopped at the Visitor Center and immediately explored the dinosaur fossils. The dinosaur quarry is absolutely amazing - a huge exposed rock-slab that revea