A Lotta Terra Cotta

During last night's session of video games, we played nothing but disc golf on the PS3. Katie and I couldn't help but want to play the real thing and in the morning we looked up a nearby course and proposed the idea to our hosts. Much to our delight, they were more than up for a round. After a great breakfast of waffles and sausage, we left the base and headed to nearby Kileen for some real life discing. The course was short and it was immediately obvious that the skills from the game the night before did not translate into real life. Once we were through with the round we backed up our separate cars and parted ways. Next stop on our list was Houston and we spent the majority of the day driving through rural Texas to get there. My cousin's boyfriend Kyle offered to house us for a night and once we reached town we met up with him for drinks then dinner. For dinner, Kyle was forced by my cousin to take us to Papacitas to enjoy some of the best steak fajitas around. We were all glad that she did and proceeded to eat until we were about to burst before heading back to Kyle's place for the night.

In the morning we headed straight for Forbidden Gardens. Visiting this place was one of the

main reasons that Katie and I headed to Texas in the first place. Long ago, while still living in Chicago, I had found this place on Roadside America and have wanted to visit ever since. After Steve persuaded us to travel to Arkansas I just couldn't help checking in on Forbidden Gardens and found to my dismay that it was being

torn down, soon to close its doors forever! Let me start from the beginning. Forbidden Gardens was basically started by one man who after visiting China and experiencing its many wonders wanted to bring a piece of it back to America. So, in the small suburb of Katy Texas he created a 1/3 scale exact replica of the Terra Cotta Army and a 1/20

scale replica of the Forbidden Palace, along with numerous other small displays and exhibits

about ancient Chinese culture. After 15 years of business they will soon become a victim of highway expansion and close their doors forever a mere 2 weeks after our visit. When I saw this back in Arkansas, I knew we had to make it to Texas. When we got to Forbidden Gardens that morning I was

immediately surprised by the number of people visiting. I figured since it was going out of business, that implied that not many people came to visit, but that was certainly not the case. We spent a few hours walking

around the grounds in awe of the time and detail that went into making this amazing recreation. Before we left, Katie bought some fish food at the gift shop and on the way out she fed the giant Koi fish that inhabit the lake outside, a highlight of her day. After Forbidden Gardens we made our way over to another under appreciated Houston landmark, the Beer Can House. Unfortunately for us, the Beer Can House is only open for tours on the weekends so we were forced to enjoy this work of art from the sidelines. We

left the Beer Can House and decided it was time we had a cold one for ourselves. We went back downtown to Flying Saucer where we had met Kyle the night before and had some snacks while we waited for Katie's friend Laura to get off work. After a while we headed to her place where we would be shacking up for the night. Laura wanted to treat us to dinner and we headed down to the Kemah Boardwalk to enjoy an excellent seafood meal at a place called Landry's. The food was amazing and if possible, even better than our meal the night before. The restaurant was right on the water but because of the intense fog we had virtually no visibility at all. Dinner being complete, we walked around the boardwalk once, enjoying the cold wind and fog, before heading back to Laura's where we watched Dead Poets Society before falling asleep for the last time in Texas.

Diamonds in the Rough

Now that we felt that we had successfully toured both Tennessee and Kentucky, it was time for us to decide what to do next. Our ultimate plan has always been to make it down to the Florida sun, but seeing as our current plan is to be in Jacksonville by February the 16th, we have some time to kill. Again, fate seemed to make our decision for us and just as we were beginning to plan our trip further south I received a phone call from my buddy Steve. Twice now we have stayed with Steve on our trip, both times out in California in different cities. Now, he told us, he was working in Pine Bluff Arkansas, just south of Little Rock. He called to see if we would be interested in coming by and keeping him company for a night. We decided, why not, and headed west again on Thursday morning instead of south. Memphis is really the only thing in between

Nashville and Little Rock and though it did have a minor draw for us (Graceland, Sun Records, and some Southern BBQ) we decided to pass up the city entirely and headed south to visit the Battle of Shiloh National Park. We spent the whole afternoon here doing the 12.7 mile long auto tour as well as taking numerous small hikes to read about the battle. The rest of the day was spent driving on back roads until we reached Pine Bluff just after 7 p.m. Here, Steve treated us to an excellent dinner at a Hibachi restaurant. I had never been to a Hibachi place before and was fascinated the whole time by the cook lighting everything on fire with oil, spinning his cooking utensils around at blinding speeds, and trying to flip broccoli into each of our open mouths. The meal itself was just as good as the show if not better and by the end we all were so stuffed that it hurt to get up and exit the building. After saying "thank you" to the entire staff, we picked up some beers and spent the night in Steve's hotel room hanging out together once more.

Friday morning we headed west into Arkansas after seeing Steve off to work and enjoying our complimentary breakfast at the hotel. We were still making our way west because aside from seeing Steve there was one other thing that Arkansas had to offer, diamonds! Crater of Diamonds State Park is the United States only diamond mine and the world's 8th largest diamond reserve. The best part about this place is they let you dig for diamonds here yourself AND let you keep whatever you find! Katie and I had read about this place in our travel book long before we were anywhere near Arkansas and now a trip to the state would no be complete until we had gone. Before we started digging for diamonds we stopped off at Bill Clinton's high school town, Hot Springs Arkansas, to visit the Hot Springs National Park. This national park is a strong contender for the title of most boring national park that we have visited; granted we didn't explore the back country or any of the camping areas. The national park, as it appears to most of its visitors, is a row of old bath houses situated on the main street through town. Known in the past for their healing qualities, the water of the hot springs has been diverted over time to fill these illustrious bath houses. At the beginning of the century, people came from all over the world to bathe in the healing waters of the springs. Earlier, when we heard of the national park, Katie and I envisioned the various hot springs that we had visited along this trip and hoped to take a dip ourselves in one of these. We even almost grabbed our swim suits from the car as we headed into the park. But as we found out, the bath houses have been long closed down due mainly to the advances in modern medicine, thus rendering them obsolete. Unable to experience the water for ourselves, we took a tour of one of the old bath houses and left the city unsatisfied. Though slightly downcast our spirits began to rise as we got closer and closer to the diamond mine. Once at Crater of Diamonds State Park we got right to work. We rented a shovel, bucket, and sifter, then headed out into the field to find our fortune. There are many methods for finding diamonds but Katie and I chose to dig with our hands mostly. They also have running water on sight allowing for sleuthing or you could simply walk along the rows of upturned dirt hoping that erosion had laid bare a shinny morsel. We stayed at the park until close, bringing our findings to be identified by the staff. As you may have guessed, we did not strike it rich, nor did we find any diamonds. We did collect lots of interesting rocks, coming away with a small sack full of quartz, calcite, and jasper. From the diamond mine we headed south toward Texas, hoping that it would treat us better than our last visit. We stopped in the border town of Texarkana for dinner then spent the first night of our trip in the comforting belly of CJ.

Our first night in the van felt like coming home after a long vacation. Though we have been on the road for over a week, it hasn't seemed like proper road tripping with all of the fine accommodations that we have had staying with our friends. The weather was pleasant throughout the night and we both had a great night sleep, refreshed to take on the day. We decided to give Texas another shot for a number of reasons. First and foremost was to visit

Katie's friend Margie who lives with her husband and child on Fort Hood Military Base. Also, we felt that the state deserved a second chance. Being so big we figured there must be something good within its bounds, and with a hopeful attitude we headed to the Dallas Fort Worth area to spend the morning. In Dallas we drove by Dealy Plaza where JFK was shot but

were unable to tour the book depository because we were visiting hours before the museum opened. Next we made our way over to Fort Worth to visit the famous Water Gardens Park. I had been here before once with my dad when I was younger and was excited to relive a bit of my past. The park has 3 fountain areas, a quite pool, an active pool, and an aeration pool. The coolest one by far is the active pool where you can climb down to the center of the fountain and experience the

rushing water all around you while leaping from platform to platform, hoping not to fall in. I remember being quite a bit more terrified of falling into the water as a child and could see that a similar fear had taken hold in the minds of other children who were visiting the park with us. After leaving the chaotic atmosphere of the active pool we were entranced by the subtlety of the quite pool. Here the water cascades down an even greater distance but leaks slowly down the walls without making a sound. The neat part here was you could put your hand on the wall, diverting the flow of water as you wished. After playing in the park for about 40 minutes we hopped in the car and headed a few miles down the road to the Fort Worth Stockyards. Here we arrived just in time to watch the noon cattle drive then we proceeded to browse the many shops. After a while we made our way over to Billy Bob's to enjoy a beer at the countries

largest bar. We walked around for about 30 minutes looking from room to room at all the attractions and doing our best to avoid the main dance floor where a group of seniors were line dancing. After Billy Bob's we got began our southward journey to Fort Hood. When we arrived at the military base we were shocked to see how many people were visiting that weekend along with us.

We had to stop off at the visitor center in order to register for a guest pass and we were met with a full waiting room that would put any DMV line to shame. We took a number and proceeded to wait around for 45 minutes before we got our chance to submit our request for entry. Once we got the all clear we went to Margie's house where we hung out for a bit playing with the baby as well as the dogs. Before the sun set Margie and Aaron took us for a tour of the base. We went by the spot of the recent shooting that took place on the base, visited a full scale model city of an Iraqi town used for training, and stopped by a museum like grouping of old tanks and planes. We spent the night at their house playing video games and eating pizza.

On the Bourbon Trail

We started out the morning again with eyes bigger than our heads. After having a taste of that great Kentucky Bourbon we wanted more. Today we planned to visit the remaining 5 distilleries on the Kentucky Bourbon Trail thus securing us a free t-shirt. Since all the tours but one are free and involve a tasting, we were pretty sure we would have a day full of fun. Our plans were somewhat dampened when we woke in the morning and peered out the window to see about 2 inches of snow on the ground and more still coming down. Now to us northerners this doesn't sound like much, but to the these country folk it seemed like the world was coming to an end. After brushing off the car and getting on our way we quickly realized that no one was driving above 25 mph. A quick turn of the dial and our radio informed us that all the schools were closed in the area and there was accidents on almost every highway. We couldn't believe it. The roads weren't great but there was no reason to be creeping along and definitely no reason to close the schools. After we got on the main highway traffic picked up and we made great time over to Lexington to start off our tours. We rode down some back roads arriving at Woodford Reserve in time to make the mornings first tour. The estate was plowed and the walkways salted but when we reached to open the door it wouldn't budge. We walked around for a bit, trying to find another entrance, then decided to call the place

to ask them what we were doing wrong. Before the phone could even ring we were transfered to an automated message saying that they would be closed for the day due to inclimate weather. Appalled we decided to call other distilleries in the area to see if any were open. We snagged a picture of the place for memories then left heading to our next destination, Wild Turkey.

Now, since we couldn't complete the entire tour and thus unable to get a free t-shirt, the appeal of the doing the entire trail diminished. Katie still wanted to visit Wild Turkey in order to pick up some of their honey liquor that we had tried at Scott and Sarah's a few nights before. We were the only ones at the place for the 10 a.m. tour and thus got a very personal and intimate tour with our guide. Sadly for us, Wild Turkey is in the midst of expanding their operation by twice its size resulting in their distillery not being part of the tour. We spent a half hour in the cold store house while our guide schooled us on the finer points of the aging process. After our tasting and an hour and a half had gone by, our guide recommended we head down to Four Roses Distillery and take their tour, which he said was great. At Four Roses we were again the only ones there and got a nice personal tour around the grounds. While talking with our guide about the weather and expressing our disappointment about Woodford Reserve being closed, he shared with us an interesting bit of information. Now, in order to get the t-shirt for the Bourbon Trail you have to obtain a stamp from each distillery on you passport. This is why we felt our chances were over for completing the trail once we found out Woodford was closed; no stamp, no t-shirt. Our guide shared with us that stamps are not completely necessary. He told us that even if you send in a picture of the distillery, they will count it as a stamp since some places close early or aren't always open. We thought back and the only picture that we had taken the whole day was the one at the Woodford Estate! Taking this as some sort of omen we were again invigorated and felt like we could complete the entire trail. The day before at Maker's Mark, a fellow tourist told us that Jim Beam was not conducting tours currently but would give you a stamp for just showing up. This meant that the only other place we had to visit was Heaven Hill Distillery. Our guide at Wild Turkey had mentioned that Heaven Hill might be closed due to the weather. After a few short phone calls and getting vague messages we were pretty sure that they were closed, which indeed they were. We quickly took a couple pictures to prove our case,

then went to Jim Beam to receive a stamp thus completing the

Bourbon Trail. South on 65 toward Nashville is Lincoln's Birthplace. Katie, not sharing in my love of history, finds these sights boring and a waste of time. However, with the extra time we saved from not being able to do 3 of the 5 tours we had planned for the day, she had no room to object. We headed off the highway and visited Lincoln's birthplace, a small log cabin encased in a huge pillared stone structure atop 56 steps representing each year of the president's life. After watching an informational video about Abe's life in Kentucky, we headed back down to Nashville to stay again with Scott and Sarah. After dinner we cracked open my beer for the first time and I was pleased to see that no one had to spit it out on the first sip. Overall it was pretty good. The Robust Coffee Porter has an extremely strong coffee taste with chocolate on the front and a bitter chocolatey finish. Not too shabby for my first stab at brewing beer.

Kentucky Revisited

Today we stuck around Nashville hoping to visit with one of my

friends who we had not been able to meet up with yet. To waste time during the day we headed to Lynchburg Tennessee to visit our first distillery; Jack Daniels. We spent the morning both on the tour

and shopping in downtown Lynchburg before making our way back toward Nashville. The tour was very interesting and informative. Our tour guide sounded like he had auditioned for the role of Boomhauer from King of the Hill but was rejected for being too unintelligible. We learned a lot about whisky that day and would have the process repeated over and over to us in the days to come. Lynchburg is in a dry county which means even though you can make whiskey there, you are not allowed to try it. After the tour, instead of the traditional

tasting that accompanies a tour, we were served lemonade and

coffee. Since the Jack Daniels tour took less time than we had originally planned we were able to make a stop at the Stones River Battlefield on the way home. This was a civil war battleground and reportedly one of the bloodiest engagements of the war. We had enough time to do the complete audio tour and visit all the battle sites before it closed for the evening. Unable to get ahold of my friend, we spent the night with Scott and Sarah again, enjoying homemade fajitas and playing Wii late into the night.

Tuesday we got an early start on the day because we again had some ambitious plans. On our way down from Louisville to Nashville we passed by Mammoth Cave National Park. I had been there once before with my grandparents when I was young and felt that a trip to Kentucky would not be complete without a stop. This, plus our complete avoidance of the Kentucky Bourbon Trail, convinced us that Kentucky deserved another shot. We arrived at Mammoth Cave to get on the first tour of the New Entrance Cave Tour. This tour was unique because it took you past some of the only stalactite and stalagmite structures in all of Mammoth Cave,

not to mention the Frozen Niagara. The tour was great and we got to see lots of cave life that we had never seen before in our other cave explorations; cave crickets, spiders, and snails. After Mammoth we headed north with intentions of visiting Maker's Mark Distillery. We called Mary again and she agreed to meet us there for the 3 p.m. tour. The tour was short but sweet and even gave us the opportunity to dip our hands in the fermenting mash. Like all good tours it ended in the gift shop where you get the chance to dip you own bottle of Maker's Mark in it's wax coating. If you don't want to do a bottle, you can have the staff dip almost anything you buy in the gift shop for you. Mary chose to buy a coffee mug and we watched as the sales clerk dipped it and the wax gradually flowed down its sides creating a perfect formation. Afterwards we went back to Mary's house to wait out the rush hour traffic before heading downtown for dinner. This time my wish was granted and we got to eat at the Bluegrass Brewing Company in the heart of downtown Louisville. After a great dinner and a couple rounds of beer we headed back to Mary's for an early night, again hoping to make the most of the following day.

Nashville 1, Louisville 0

Saturday morning dawned and we were up early again, ready to make the most of our day. Our schedule for the day was to visit some stops along the Kentucky Bourbon Trail, namely Maker's Mark Distillery. We had to get started early since we had plans to be in Nashville by the evening. Somehow, in the confusion of planning the night before, I got roped in to accompanying the girls to the Zappo's Shoe Outlet store before heading over to Maker's Mark. I agreed to this plan, because it allowed me to spend some time in the passenger seat as well as save some money on gas. Little did I know that this decision would cost me so much more. We arrived at Zappo's around 10 a.m. with the intention of shopping for an hour then heading down the road to the distilleries. In my sage-like wisdom, I brought a book to read in the car, therefore not risking exposure to the madness inside. I waited for about an hour while the temperature in the car slowly decreased to match the frigid weather outside. It was a happy feeling when I began to glimpse Katie and Mary appearing through the fogged windows; I anxious for the heat to start blasting. To my dismay, when Mary tried to turn on the car nothing happened. The lights had been left on during the hour of shopping and now we needed a jump to get the car going. With no jumper cables, we got out and started to ask all of the people around us if anyone had jumper cables and was willing to give us a jump. No one was biting and we were forced to resort to calling the towing company. After waiting for a half hour we called the company again to find out that there was some confusion with the insurance company and they never got the call. To make a long story short, it took the company over 3 hours of repeated phone calls to finally show up and jump the car. By this time, our dreams of going to Maker's Mark were over. We headed back to Mary's, were glad to see that CJ was still running strong, then made our way towards Nashville. At Sarah and Scott's house, they greeted us with homemade pizza's and some local beer. Later on in the night we went down to the main strip and explored the Saturday night bar scene in Nashville complete with cowboy hats and boots on each person, and live music at every bar it. Needless to say it was a good time.

Sunday morning Sarah and Scott took us on a tour Nashville.

We started the day at the Parthenon, thats right, the Parthenon. Nashville has a complete, full scale replica of the Parthenon in Athens Greece, just blocks away from their house. Who knew??? Sadly it wasn't open so we could not see the recreation of the giant golden statue of Athena which is reportedly inside, but we still got to walk around its exterior and experience the size and beauty of the monument in its complete glory. My favorite part was the pediments on either end of the Parthenon, fully recreated and telling stories of the struggle between Athena and Poseidon for the rule of the city of Athens as well as the birth of Athena, the victor of the struggle. Next on our list was a stop at Vanderbelt University (where both Sarah and Scott work) to stop by

their research lab and show us around. Afterwards we went by a coffee shop called Ugly Mugs which Katie had high expectations for. Loving awkward and ugly things, Katie expected this place to live up to its name and have nothing but horribly ugly mugs for everyone to drink from; this was not the case. The mugs were definitely old but most were pretty normal and

since the novelty was gone, we got our coffee to go and headed to the Nashville Zoo. Sarah and Scott had adopted an elephant, Rosie, at the zoo and as a result they got a couple of free passes. They of course have a yearly pass to the zoo so they were more than happy to give us the free passes for the day. The zoo was awesome. They had a lot of African animals and since it was the middle of winter many of them were kept inside

away from our view. The ones that

weren't however were up and moving trying to keep warm in the snow. They had Bengal Tigers, Cougars, and Lynx's all of which were up and roaming the cages instead of displaying the usual lethargic laying around that you associate with zoos. After the zoo closed and we were forced to leave, we headed to the suburb of Smyrna to have dinner with another of Katie's friends from college. That night the AFC and NFC championship games were on and we spent around 3 hours talking, enjoying southern bbq, and watching the games, before heading back to the city for the night.

Back On the Road

After our holiday sojourn in the midwest Katie and I were ready to get back on the road. We spent our holidays with family and friends, enjoying suburban life in the Chicago and Detroit

areas. While at home, I took the knowledge I learned from our many stops on the road and brewed my first batch of beer with the help of one

of my friends. We brewed a robust coffee porter, coincidentally one of Katie's favorite beers, and can only hope that it will live up to her standards. Katie also got to try her hand at ice fishing for the very first time. My friend Al took us out on Long Lake for a whole day on the ice but we only managed to reel in one fish. Admittedly, Al and I have had worse days on the water

together so there was really nothing to complain

about. We had a lot of fun out there and now Katie can say that she has been ice fishing. Also, I'm sure I'd never hear the end of it if I didn't mention this last bit of our time spent at home; Katie got her engagement ring. A combination of her great great grandmothers wedding ring and a diamond which belonged to my mom, we had taken in the ring to be fitted

with the diamond and re-shanked to fit Katie's hand better. We picked the ring up a few days before we left and she has not stopped playing with it for weeks :) When the time came to finally leave again, it was hard to say goodbye to the comforts of home but great to be on the move once more. Our return to the road was as unceremonious as

possible. After an early morning wake-up call, some mad scrambling to re-pack the van, and a hard goodbye to family and friends, we were forced to endure the remainder of the day driving through Ohio. Our plan was to head

south; basically becoming snowbirds, hoping to find someplace to

wait out the winter without snow. Florida being our ultimate destination, we decided to take our time as usual, visiting friends and places we've never been to along the way. Ohio however, is well trodden territory, and there isn't much down there that would strike our fancy anyway. We drove for hours until we reached Louisville where we planned to stay our first night with Katie's friend from college, Mary. We spent the early evening talking and catching up before heading into the city for some dinner. Naturally I wanted to get started right away with continuing our brewery tour which, aside from a couple Michigan breweries, had been put on hiatus for far too long. But tonight was a girls night. My vote was overruled and we ended up at a restaurant which Mary highly recommended, Hammerheads. This place was great and more than met our expectations for the night. It was nestled in a small basement of a house right off of a main street downtown. Apparently it had been recently opened by a gourmet chef who decided to branch out on his own, basically the food was amazing. Also the atmosphere was very laid back while the crowd that it attracted was definitely upper class. There was no host and the tables were seated on a first come first serve, every man for themselves, basis. This resulted in many of the uptight guests leaving before even getting a table and us being seated rather quickly. This place also earned points in my book for having both Bell's and Founders' beer on tap. The food was great and after our meals we decided to give up our seats and let the next group fight over them. We spent the rest of the night lounging around Mary's apartment making plans for the following day.

Stats From Part 1

Miles Driven: 33,830

Miles Hiked: 290

Postcards Sent: 343

National Parks Visited: 33

Dollars Saved Using National Parks Pass: $303

Animals Seen: Black, Grizzly, and Brown Bears, Deer, Pronghorn, Elk, Moose, Wolves, Coyotes, Caribou, Dall Sheep, Big Horn Sheep, Mountain Goats, Beluga Whales, Humpback Whales, California and Stellar Sea Lions, Sea Otters, Starfish, Ptarmigan, Jellyfish, Puffins, Harbor Seals, Wild Salmon, Bison, Bald Eagles, Elephant Seals, Prairie Dogs, Badgers, Armadillo, Gray Fox, Porcupine, Banana Slugs, Tarantula, Wild Turkey, Land Snail

Casualties: 1 Deer, 1 Cat, 1 Bird (possible)

Breweries Visited: 77

Couches Surfed: 14 different places; 18 separate times

Campsites Used: 7 different sites

Hotel Nights Purchased: 2 (aside from time spent with Russ)

Slept in Van: The rest of the time :)

Traveling the County in a Beat-up Van... Priceless

Bringing It All Back Home

Now that the cold front had come through, the weather was unbearably cold. Our entire day in Missouri, we left the car less than 5 times, and even then we could barely stand it. We spent the entire day driving through the state hoping to make our way to Springfield, IL to stay with Katie's Aunt and Uncle. Of our few stops the highlights

were Mr. C's Route Post, home of the Route 66 "Route" Beer, and Katie's favorite, the Worlds Largest Gift Store. At Mr. C's we talked with the owner a bit who again brought up the weather as a topic and told us another storm was coming tonight. Luckily for us the roads weren't horrible. The storm the night before had very strong winds and apparently had kept the roads relatively clear. Still there was ice that lingered and it made the driving slower than we would have hoped. Starting at the eastern end of Oklahoma and continuing through all of Missouri Route 66 leaves the flatlands of the Great Plains and rises into the Ozarks. Beautiful, yes, and a welcome change from the flat tundra, but not so good for fast driving. In the bitter cold I also discovered an

unfortunate side effect of our run in with the deer. Having dented the car right before the door hinge, the deer created a virtual wind tunnel, which now funnels cold air, through the speakers, directly at my feet. Normally I would just blast the heat to counter the cold air coming in but conveniently the heat does not work very well on my side. Oh well, I like the cold anyway. We drove all day and reached St. Louis just about 5 p.m. Had weather been better, and time allowed, we would have spent more time in the city, but as it was we had another storm to beat. Almost exactly a year to the day, Katie and I had driven Route 66 from Chicago to St. Louis. This was actually the inspiration for us to take Route 66 back this time, seeing as we had so much fun on this stretch the first time. However, now it was dark and the snow was beginning to fall, we decided to bypass the Route from St. Louis to Springfield hoping to get ahead of the storm. Even with our bypass, we weren't quick enough. We hit the storm head on and were forced to drive 35 mph the whole way, white knuckled and tense. We made it safely to Katie's relative where we were greeted with open arms, a hot meal, and a warm bed. In the morning we

explored Springfield for a while before getting back on Route 66 and making our way to Chicago. We visited Lincoln's home in then made a stop at the Cozy Drive In for lunch. The Cozy Drive In is not only the birthplace of the corn dog, aptly named the Cozy Dog in these parts, but it is also owned and operated by the Waldmire family. Bob Waldmire is a Route 66 legend and we have been following his name and footsteps

during our entire Route 66 adventure. He was a traveling artist who lived out of his van and spent the last 20 years of his life driving up and down the road talking with local business owners and making a living selling his art. The Cozy Dogs were great and we spent a long time looking through all of the paintings and memorabilia that litters the walls. The rest of the day was spent driving Route 66. We didn't make

any stops because we had already done everything before. There were a few places we would have liked to spend more time at had the weather been nicer, but as it was we were all about driving.

We pulled into Chicago just after dark and were welcomed home by the beautiful skyline and shining lights of the city. Over the next week we spent our time in the city visiting old friends and staying with Katie's family. After spending the holidays running around between families and New Years apart, Katie came back to Michigan where we have stayed for a few weeks now helping Russ with things around the house, rifling though all of mom's stuff, and going out to dinner with all of the friends and family we haven't seen in 6 months. With the first part of our trip complete and the holidays over the lure of leaving again grows ever stronger. The road is calling us home and we hear there is no snow in Florida. It seems like its time for us to get back to someplace that we ain't never been.