Travel Log
We made it in to Seattle on Monday, and have been apartment-hunting since then while crashing with wanderinggeek. More on that to come. In the meantime, a quickie travelogue of the past week's adventures:
Tuesday, May 19th: Loading Day
Movers come, load stuff into van, we see many of you at Bacon Night. Spend the night camping in an empty apartment with sleeping bags and rollable air mattresses. Iffy sleep, but unclear if this is due to stress, ethanol overconsumption, or too much bacon.
Wednesday, May 20th: Pittsburgh to Milwaukee
We decided to front-load the driving and make the first day the longest; this also allowed us to reach friends for the first night. Took us a bit of a while to get going, as we had to play a bit of Tetris to correctly pack the car, plus stop with our landlord to drop off keys.
Wednesday was also the most tolls we paid, as we ran sections of turnpike in PA, OH, IN, and IL. Of these, IL is the most annoying. Rather than the "take a ticket, go, and pay when you're done" method, they have toll plazas every 10-20 miles. Paying cash? Slow from 75mph to a stop, dodge traffic back into the "cash" lane, pay, and re-merge. Luckily, they also have a system to pay tolls online if you, er, "accidentally" went through an EZ-Pass lane.
This being the first day of driving, we were also kind of worried about the cats, and stopped every two hours or so to let them out of the carriers and offer them water. They ignored the water and mostly wouldn't come out of carriers unless forcibly dumped out. At which point Jubles would run back inside, and Snicket would attempt to hide under the car. Or, in one case, to climb a tree (adorable, but mildly worrying from a "catch the cat" perspective).
We tried lake perch for the first time, somewhere in Indiana. Not bad, although the place that served it to us needs to put some seasoning in their breading. I'd have it again if I was anywhere near a perch-bearing lake.
Evening was with metallian, mrsmetallian, and rebeccavich, and as usual was a mixture of comparing jobs, talking about old Dartmouth and alpha_theta happenings, and enjoying a quiet drink. We remain totally jealous of their nice house in which they can throw kick-ass parties, and someday will hopefully be able to afford something similar.
Thursday, May 21st: Milwaukee to Minnesota
Originally, "Milwaukee to South Dakota". But, we kind of slept in. And then hung out with the Metallians. And then went to the Milwaukee Public Market to buy cheese and pastries and coffee. (Note to locals: cinnamon rolls from bakery there are off-the-hook delicious.) Net result, we didn't even start moving till 10:30 AM, which kind of makes it hard to cover mileage.
The other thing that makes it hard to cover mileage: Minnesota has some truly excellent roadside crap, as does Wisconsin. I would love to come back and check out the tourist traps of the Dells sometime. As it was, we had to make time for the SPAM Museum and the Jolly Green Giant. The latter doesn't take much time, but the former is worth a good 45min-60min of fun.
Hence, we stopped for the night in Luverne, MN, just over the border from SD. Here, we enjoyed three lovely things about the Midwest: (1) plenty of cheap independent motels, (2) cheese, and (3) readily available beer. Had an excellent evening watching crappy action flicks, nibbling on cheese curds, and sipping Leinenkugel's Summer Shandy. (Cats had an excellent evening hiding under the bed.)
Friday, May 22nd: South Dakota-rama
Most days, we cleared at least two states. Friday's goal was to try to get through one, by whatever means necessary. The problem is, South Dakota's I-90 corridor is FULL of cool stuff. With an early morning start, we managed to visit the Corn Palace, Minuteman Missile Facility (visitor center only, as the control center tour was booked full), Badlands (car only, due to cats and desert/rattlesnakes not mixing well), Wall Drug, and Mount Rushmore.
All that, AND we managed to fit in a nice buffalo steak/prime rib dinner just over the border in Wyoming. Very tasty, but my conclusion is that buffalo is best as a burger. It's very flavorful as a steak, but the lean-ness seems to make it a little chewy. It was nevertheless a quality meat-fest, and we slept very soundly once we finally managed to find a motel in middle-of-nowhere Wyoming.
Saturday, May 23rd: Sundance, WY to Butte, MT
A bit of clever planning put Friday night's hotel right at the exit for a visit to Devil's Tower. It consisted of driving up, snapping photos, and heading onward, but it's still a pretty cool piece of geology. It also put us near a gas station that turned out to sell pasties, which I thought were not found west of Minnesota. A very happy discovery, although I can hardly say my waistline needed it.
Saturday was also where I discovered the joy of US highways (i.e., the primary paved roads other than the interstate) in the deep West. They're straight, they have almost no traffic, and they only have cops inside towns. In short, they are excellent places to speed-test your turbo engine if it's been feeling bored for the past few years. I kept it around 90 most of the time in order to maintain enough distance not to hit stray deer/cows/etc. (we'd had a very close call on I-90 on Friday with an antelope), but it's nice to know that my car *can* do 125 if it feels like it.
Once we got back from those roads to the interstate, it was pretty much a straight cruise through Wyoming and Montana. They've foregone giant roadside fiberglass things in favor of casinos. LOTS of casinos. The only place I've seen with more slot machines is Las Vegas. We did discover a prairie dog colony at a rest stop (very cute) and experience huckleberries (very tasty), but mostly, we drove through mountains and casinos.
Our motel outside Butte offered an interesting twist on "in-room movies". They've got two DVD players. Anyone can call to the front desk and ask for a movie to be put in. First-come, first-served. "Kung Fu Panda" goes excellent with beer and with fried pork cutlet sandwiches. (Fried pork cutlet sandwiches are OK, but do not compete against a proper torta milanesa.)
Sunday, May 24th: Butte, MT to Nowhere (Naples), ID
My initial alpha_theta call for crash space produced an interesting outcome: I got an offer to stay with someone's mom. A little odd and potentially uncomfortable, yes, but free crash space is free crash space, so we said "yes". Turned out to require about three or four hours of travel off the interstate just to reach their place. That produced more trepidation, which was almost entirely unfounded. We hopped off I-90 at Missoula, MT and endured about half an hour of terrible road construction. After that, it was more of those absolutely lovely almost-no-speed-limit US highways. The scenery along MT-200/ID-200, meanwhile, is to die for. Huge mountains, forests, river valleys, and fluffy clouds. Jennifer described it as "like driving into a picture". Plus, very nice curves for fun speeding. I'm pretty sure it's the most enjoyable driving I've ever done. Also a very fortuitous route in that it leads past the National Bison Range, home to the only buffalo we saw on our entire drive west.
Our hosts in Idaho were absolutely lovely people, and I hope I see them again soon. Basically, they were well-aged hippie artists. Great little house full of paintings and various metaphysical books, tasty wild salmon for dinner, and a porch full of lilac bushes and hummingbirds. It was deeply refreshing, which we needed before we headed back to "civilization" after three days of barely having cell phone service.
Monday, May 25th: Idaho to Seattle
Pretty simple, really. Go back, find I-90, keep driving it until you run out of I-90. Exit highway or fall into ocean. It was my first chance to see the whole state of Washington, which was more diverse than expected -- I didn't realize it had big swatches of grassland in addition to the forests. It is very cool, though, when Mt Rainier finally heaves into view and you realize just how much of a Really Big Mountain it is. (Found out that it's scheduled to blow Any Minute Now, in a geological sense. Could be next week, could be next millennium.)
Surprisingly, this was also our first experience all trip with Traffic. Boy, was there Traffic. About two hours worth going through the mountains, with no determinable cause. Started around mile marker 120, dissipated around 65, but was brutal in between.
By the time we finally got the cats into their designated boarding facility, made our way back up to the city, saw one apartment that was only showable in the evening (swing-shift manager), and found our lodgings for the night, we were near-dead. Thankfully, this is a land of cheap grocery store wine and sushi, which provided an excellent welcome-home.
Some general notes I've learned from this:
Tuesday, May 19th: Loading Day
Movers come, load stuff into van, we see many of you at Bacon Night. Spend the night camping in an empty apartment with sleeping bags and rollable air mattresses. Iffy sleep, but unclear if this is due to stress, ethanol overconsumption, or too much bacon.
Wednesday, May 20th: Pittsburgh to Milwaukee
We decided to front-load the driving and make the first day the longest; this also allowed us to reach friends for the first night. Took us a bit of a while to get going, as we had to play a bit of Tetris to correctly pack the car, plus stop with our landlord to drop off keys.
Wednesday was also the most tolls we paid, as we ran sections of turnpike in PA, OH, IN, and IL. Of these, IL is the most annoying. Rather than the "take a ticket, go, and pay when you're done" method, they have toll plazas every 10-20 miles. Paying cash? Slow from 75mph to a stop, dodge traffic back into the "cash" lane, pay, and re-merge. Luckily, they also have a system to pay tolls online if you, er, "accidentally" went through an EZ-Pass lane.
This being the first day of driving, we were also kind of worried about the cats, and stopped every two hours or so to let them out of the carriers and offer them water. They ignored the water and mostly wouldn't come out of carriers unless forcibly dumped out. At which point Jubles would run back inside, and Snicket would attempt to hide under the car. Or, in one case, to climb a tree (adorable, but mildly worrying from a "catch the cat" perspective).
We tried lake perch for the first time, somewhere in Indiana. Not bad, although the place that served it to us needs to put some seasoning in their breading. I'd have it again if I was anywhere near a perch-bearing lake.
Evening was with metallian, mrsmetallian, and rebeccavich, and as usual was a mixture of comparing jobs, talking about old Dartmouth and alpha_theta happenings, and enjoying a quiet drink. We remain totally jealous of their nice house in which they can throw kick-ass parties, and someday will hopefully be able to afford something similar.
Thursday, May 21st: Milwaukee to Minnesota
Originally, "Milwaukee to South Dakota". But, we kind of slept in. And then hung out with the Metallians. And then went to the Milwaukee Public Market to buy cheese and pastries and coffee. (Note to locals: cinnamon rolls from bakery there are off-the-hook delicious.) Net result, we didn't even start moving till 10:30 AM, which kind of makes it hard to cover mileage.
The other thing that makes it hard to cover mileage: Minnesota has some truly excellent roadside crap, as does Wisconsin. I would love to come back and check out the tourist traps of the Dells sometime. As it was, we had to make time for the SPAM Museum and the Jolly Green Giant. The latter doesn't take much time, but the former is worth a good 45min-60min of fun.
Hence, we stopped for the night in Luverne, MN, just over the border from SD. Here, we enjoyed three lovely things about the Midwest: (1) plenty of cheap independent motels, (2) cheese, and (3) readily available beer. Had an excellent evening watching crappy action flicks, nibbling on cheese curds, and sipping Leinenkugel's Summer Shandy. (Cats had an excellent evening hiding under the bed.)
Friday, May 22nd: South Dakota-rama
Most days, we cleared at least two states. Friday's goal was to try to get through one, by whatever means necessary. The problem is, South Dakota's I-90 corridor is FULL of cool stuff. With an early morning start, we managed to visit the Corn Palace, Minuteman Missile Facility (visitor center only, as the control center tour was booked full), Badlands (car only, due to cats and desert/rattlesnakes not mixing well), Wall Drug, and Mount Rushmore.
All that, AND we managed to fit in a nice buffalo steak/prime rib dinner just over the border in Wyoming. Very tasty, but my conclusion is that buffalo is best as a burger. It's very flavorful as a steak, but the lean-ness seems to make it a little chewy. It was nevertheless a quality meat-fest, and we slept very soundly once we finally managed to find a motel in middle-of-nowhere Wyoming.
Saturday, May 23rd: Sundance, WY to Butte, MT
A bit of clever planning put Friday night's hotel right at the exit for a visit to Devil's Tower. It consisted of driving up, snapping photos, and heading onward, but it's still a pretty cool piece of geology. It also put us near a gas station that turned out to sell pasties, which I thought were not found west of Minnesota. A very happy discovery, although I can hardly say my waistline needed it.
Saturday was also where I discovered the joy of US highways (i.e., the primary paved roads other than the interstate) in the deep West. They're straight, they have almost no traffic, and they only have cops inside towns. In short, they are excellent places to speed-test your turbo engine if it's been feeling bored for the past few years. I kept it around 90 most of the time in order to maintain enough distance not to hit stray deer/cows/etc. (we'd had a very close call on I-90 on Friday with an antelope), but it's nice to know that my car *can* do 125 if it feels like it.
Once we got back from those roads to the interstate, it was pretty much a straight cruise through Wyoming and Montana. They've foregone giant roadside fiberglass things in favor of casinos. LOTS of casinos. The only place I've seen with more slot machines is Las Vegas. We did discover a prairie dog colony at a rest stop (very cute) and experience huckleberries (very tasty), but mostly, we drove through mountains and casinos.
Our motel outside Butte offered an interesting twist on "in-room movies". They've got two DVD players. Anyone can call to the front desk and ask for a movie to be put in. First-come, first-served. "Kung Fu Panda" goes excellent with beer and with fried pork cutlet sandwiches. (Fried pork cutlet sandwiches are OK, but do not compete against a proper torta milanesa.)
Sunday, May 24th: Butte, MT to Nowhere (Naples), ID
My initial alpha_theta call for crash space produced an interesting outcome: I got an offer to stay with someone's mom. A little odd and potentially uncomfortable, yes, but free crash space is free crash space, so we said "yes". Turned out to require about three or four hours of travel off the interstate just to reach their place. That produced more trepidation, which was almost entirely unfounded. We hopped off I-90 at Missoula, MT and endured about half an hour of terrible road construction. After that, it was more of those absolutely lovely almost-no-speed-limit US highways. The scenery along MT-200/ID-200, meanwhile, is to die for. Huge mountains, forests, river valleys, and fluffy clouds. Jennifer described it as "like driving into a picture". Plus, very nice curves for fun speeding. I'm pretty sure it's the most enjoyable driving I've ever done. Also a very fortuitous route in that it leads past the National Bison Range, home to the only buffalo we saw on our entire drive west.
Our hosts in Idaho were absolutely lovely people, and I hope I see them again soon. Basically, they were well-aged hippie artists. Great little house full of paintings and various metaphysical books, tasty wild salmon for dinner, and a porch full of lilac bushes and hummingbirds. It was deeply refreshing, which we needed before we headed back to "civilization" after three days of barely having cell phone service.
Monday, May 25th: Idaho to Seattle
Pretty simple, really. Go back, find I-90, keep driving it until you run out of I-90. Exit highway or fall into ocean. It was my first chance to see the whole state of Washington, which was more diverse than expected -- I didn't realize it had big swatches of grassland in addition to the forests. It is very cool, though, when Mt Rainier finally heaves into view and you realize just how much of a Really Big Mountain it is. (Found out that it's scheduled to blow Any Minute Now, in a geological sense. Could be next week, could be next millennium.)
Surprisingly, this was also our first experience all trip with Traffic. Boy, was there Traffic. About two hours worth going through the mountains, with no determinable cause. Started around mile marker 120, dissipated around 65, but was brutal in between.
By the time we finally got the cats into their designated boarding facility, made our way back up to the city, saw one apartment that was only showable in the evening (swing-shift manager), and found our lodgings for the night, we were near-dead. Thankfully, this is a land of cheap grocery store wine and sushi, which provided an excellent welcome-home.
Some general notes I've learned from this:
- Driving with cats is remarkably non-stressful, and would happily do again. Much easier than dogs.
- Driving in the West is much more fun than the East. Straighter roads, higher speed limits, better views, fewer troopers.
- RoadFood has different tastes than I do. Few of the meals they steered us to were bad, but they just weren't up to the level of flavor I expect from a truly high-quality burger/taco/etc. stand. I don't think I'd bother with them a second time.
- This is definitely a lot more fun than doing it via U-Haul. The mover is not cheap, but the stress being saved and the semi-vacation we had along the way was well worth it.
- Portable GPS units, particularly when combined with a smartphone, are quite possibly the best road trip tool ever.