moving days part deux- no sleep till Brooklyn, er, Boston!

Wednesday:

after a good night sleep in a real bed, we left at 8:30 to go meet Uncle Emery, Aunt Sharon, and Kade & Natalie (Kody & Jill's kids) for breakfast at the Amana Colonies (if you know her, you'd get that this was totally aunt sharon's idea). apparently it was "right off the freeway"...or 20 miles or something. i have never seen so much food in my life- it was a breakfast feast...and i'm pretty sure the lady serving us was headed to the set of Little House on the Prairie after she was done working the morning shift at this restaurant. it was delicious, and fun to hang out with the fam a little more. aunt sharon gave me a really sweet gift- a prayer shawl made by some of the women in their church. she said that when i'm lonely, it should remind me that i'm loved. aww.... also, it's super soft, and we all know how much i dig things that are soft or shiny.

today was the day mom referred to as the old macdonald day- why? well, because she's super punny. yep, it was the 3I, 3I, O day (that is Iowa, Illinois, Indiana, and Ohio).

she was incredibly proud of herself for coming up with that one- picture her giggling at herself for about 5 minutes...and I think she was kinda pissed at me for screwing it up by making it to Pennsylvania and New York today. oh well, i'll let her enjoy her pun anyway. :) 

little known road trip fact- there are many kinds of rest areas. oh yes, some very close to each other, some very, very inconveniently far apart. some are just places to pull over- no bathroom (that's helpful!- well, maybe it is if you're Chris, who pulls over 5 times between Nampa, Idaho and Salem). well, did you know there are also "modern" rest areas. at first, i thought it was just referring to the kind that actually had bathrooms and vending machines...oh no, my friends, modern rest areas have wireless internet! who knew?! i didn't actually experience this one, but i was impressed, nonetheless.

there was a beautiful sunset behind us, somewhere in Ohio, i think. mom was freaking out that i was trying to take a picture of it while i was driving, so she decided she'd just pop her head out the moonroof to get a good shot...damn trucks! u get the idea- and maybe she was going for the artistic look of the reflection off the roof of the car. also, she almost lost the camera, due to the intense winds at 80 mph- and she thinks i'm unsafe!

for those of you counting how many places we were today, don't stop there...yep, we conquered 6 U.S. states today- mostly consisting of more corn and soybean fields (see pic above), but i wasn't satisfied with that. what the hell- let's go to Canada (or Canadia, if you're denessa)! it was 12:30 a.m.-ish when we hit Buffalo, NY. i figured we were too close to not visit Niagra Falls, especially since neither of us had been before.

by the time we found a place to park and go walk to the falls it was late- 1:12, or so (just a guess).  if you've ever wondered what Niagra Falls looks like at night (from the US side), you needn't wonder any more...

 i took a picture. just use your imagination a little, and i'm sure you can see the waterfall on the left, with Toronto on the right.

 if not, take my word for it- it was pretty, even in the dark. thanks to some more wisdom from grandma, who said the falls are much prettier on the canada side, we found our passports and decided to crash in Toronto (not Ottawa, as mom repeatedly referred to it) for the night. 

since it was late, and we planned on getting up early- and since it's us- we thought it would be a good idea to just sleep in the car...in the parking lot of a casino hotel.  just as we're getting ready to go to sleep (around 2 am), a guy pulls in right across from us. I told mom to stay down- I mean, how embarrassing to have some random guy we'll never see again see us sleeping in the car. haha- nope, he did the same thing. and just in case you don't believe me, i took a picture (i know you're shocked).  so we called it a night...in the car, in a hotel parking lot...

Thursday: 

so, apparently Niagra Falls is more magnificent in the daylight. mom dragged me out of bed (aka, the passengers seat) before starbucks was open...okay, it was 6:30, but apparently Canadian Starbucks don't open early.

 

we walked around for a while and took some (okay, a lot) of pictures of the falls, most of which look very similar. eventually, i found an open starbucks, which made me very happy.

 and then, i made a great discovery. i have yet to find evidence of its

 existence anywhere else (even google). my best guess is that the animal kingdom has some saying like, "what happens in Toronto, stays in Toronto." well, i guess they weren't expecting an observant tourist to catch a photo of the illegitimate product of their crazy night in Canada... ladies and gentlemen, the squnk!- its what happens when a skunk and a squirrel have too much to drink, and let things go too far. let this serve as a warning...

many hours, many miles...tired, but not deterred...after all, we're kinda hardcore, and almost there! :) we left toronto around 8:30 a.m., but thanks to the locals sending us on a wild goose chase down some street named Sodom (really!), it took almost an hour (and a few f-bombs- sorry, mom!) 

before we made it back U.S. soil. apparently, i was mistaken when i thought all of the states in the NE were small- New York is very big. Upstate NY is really pretty- it was the most green I'd seen since we left Oregon.  then, sometime in the early afternoon, i saw the most beautiful thing i'd seen in 3 days- a freeway sign that said -->New York/Boston! that meant we were close- very close... and that was all i needed to get me through the next few hours. it might not have been the best idea to wait to pee till we got there. i mean, i held it, but it was about 4 hours after i first thought i needed to go until i actually did- thanks, Boston, for being a parking nightmare! 

we finally made it, and nobody in our wagon died of dysentery or exhaustion, or snakebites...or anything else. before we did anything else, i took mom to see my apartment (or at least the outside of it). she pretended to be impressed, which was sweet. we had some dinner at a cool pub in Cambridge before we finally found a place to rest. i feel like i just found my Promised Land....or maybe it's just a Red Roof Inn in Saugus. either way, it had a bed, and that was all i wanted... and mom- she got to watch more Olympics. 

Road Trip Totals:

-Hours from door to door: 73 1/2

-Actual miles: just a little over 3200

-McDonald's Grilled Asian Chicken salads eaten (each): 3... i think

-Times mom yelled at me to stop taking pictures while I was driving: too many to count