The long trek

The longest drive I've ever done solo was from Yakima to Portland. Yup, 3.5 hours. I've experienced longer drives than that, but by sharing driving (or not driving at all, in some cases). Reuben decided to take his car down to CO with us, so that meant that we had to drive from Yakima to Colorado separately. Yuck. One of the reasons that I got the phone that I did was because it had an mp3 player and a headphone jack that I could plug into my car. I had a million podcasts I've been wanting to listen to and was excited to finally get to them on the long drive. Of course, somewhere early on in the drive, my adaptor went berzerk. Nevermind about the podcasts! Luckily, I had NPR most of the way. As I was pulling out of the driveway in Yakima my dad handed me an audiobook of a Clive Cussler book, Blue Gold. Not particularly on my reading list, but it kept me half-way entertained for about 8 hours. Only half-way because audio books aren't really my cup of tea because I get distracted too easily if I don't have the words in front of me.



We decided to take three days to travel. The first day was pretty slow going, because Reuben's car started having car problems, and we ended up taking it to a mechanic and getting a leaky hose replaced in Baker City. We also stopped at an Oregon Trail Museum along the way. I just love gazing at the prairie land and wondering what it must have been like for the pioneers in covered wagons.



Little House on the Prairie, and the story of the Ingalls family going out West by covered wagon, was and still is one of my favorite books. I like to think that if I had lived during that time, I would have been one to go out west. Considering what normally happened when I played the Oregon Trail computer game in my childhood, however, I probably would have gotten bit by a rattlesnake or died of typhoid.




Our first night, we camped in Glenn's Ferry, a tiny town in Oregon. The only campground remotely in the vicinity happened to be an RV park, so we fell asleep to the humming of electricity pulsing through our neighbor's towering trailers.



The second day we camped in Wyoming. I can't say that I've ever been to WY before, but perhaps that isn't true because I vaguely remember seeing Old Faithful in Yellowstone. After a long day of Clive Cussler, car troubles and truck stops, our second night of camping was a-mazing. One of the most fantastic places I've ever camped. We drove into the Flaming Gorge Recreational Area and were told that we could camp anywhere we liked, so we followed one of the old windy roads down to the river. No RVs this time, no electricity, no city lights, only stars, water, prong-horn antelope, and bunnies. Camping at its best.










We had left Reuben's car in town, so we packed everything we needed for the night (which wasn't much) in my car. Only when we started getting hungry did I realize what I forgot: the food bag. Luckily we had some random foods in my car, and we improvised 'pad thai' with rice noodles, dried basil, and coconut butter. It was pretty disgusting.



I don't have much to report from the third day of driving, only more car problems. But we made it! We rewarded ourselves with an institution that we don't have the privilege of possessing in Washington: Cracker Barrel.

I survived! I probably will insist on never doing the drive again by myself. Reuben's car is being sold or staying here. We'll have to drive the car back up to WA this fall, but luckily my husband is much better company than a Clive Cussler audio book.