Desert Heaven in Phoenix, AZ

The drive from Tucson to Phoenix was a piece of cake and took us just over two hours. The desert landscape was similar to what we’d seen coming into Tucson, with saguaro cacti scattered amidst dry sand. What was interesting though was how many tumbleweeds we saw that day. It was a particularly windy day (we seem to pick all the windy days to do our driving…it makes it more exciting that way) and because we were driving through dry, flat land, tumbleweeds had nothing to stop them from swirling around the highway. I’d seen tumbleweeds crossing roads before, in cartoons and silly movies, and kind of always thought that the size of these things was exaggerated for comedic effect. BUT NO. These massive tumbleweeds, the size of wine barrels, would fly right across traffic, with no obvious trajectory pattern aside from the direction of the wind gust.

Tucson and the Saguaro National Park

Wednesday morning we woke up at the gas station on the side of Interstate 10. It was a bright and sunny morning in the New Mexican desert and we had plans to drive west into Arizona to our next destination, Tucson. The weather forecast for southern Arizona called for snow later in the day, and I had trouble believing it. Snow…in the desert…on such a nice sunny day? We’d run into similar craziness last time we’d come through Flagstaff, AZ when we experienced a gorgeous sunny day followed by a morning snow blizzard, only to end in another sunny and warm afternoon. Well, we set out on the road hoping to be parked at our campground, snug and safe, by the time this “snow” rolled in.

Becoming Austinites

I can't believe we've already been in Austin for over two weeks! We've fallen into a routine here, made up of running, mountain biking, soccer playing, hiking, and city exploring. We've had amazing, GLORIOUS weather as well, holding steady in the mid 70s and lots and lots of sunshine. (70 degrees in January...EPIC!) It's hard to complain when everything comes together so well and works outs. In other words, life and Austin have been good to us.

Houston, TX

Houston is the fourth largest city in the US, right after New York, LA and Chicago. Last time we'd visited Texas we were just hours away in Austin and didn't make the drive to see the sprawling cosmopolitan city, so this time we decided to head there first. We had high hopes for Houston and were super excited for it to be our very first destination on this leg of our trip. Unfortunately, bad weather, bad RV park choice and LOTS and LOTS of traffic added quite a negative tone to our Houston experience.

Inspiration For The New Year

So how is everyone doing on following through with their New Year's resolutions? Me? Not so good. I didn't really go into the year with specific resolutions, but I did have some general life goals in mind. So far: eating healthy, Check! sticking to a regular running schedule, Fail....Well, in case you've been looking for some motivation on getting in shape this year, look no further than this epic blog.

Biking Around

This week I picked the coldest day yet to bike to the local library. The average temperature hovered around 30 degrees all day. I wore a face mask to protect my face from the wind and probably looked like a goofball biking around downtown, but at least my cheeks were spared! The bike ride wasn't long, just 9 miles from my parents house, but by the time I arrived there my toes and fingers were nearly frozen solid.

Asheville, NC via the Blue Ridge Pkwy

Saturday morning we joined the Blue Ridge Parkway just before the border with North Carolina. The Blue Ridge Parkway is a 469 mile long two lane stretch of scenic highway that runs along the Blue Ridge Mountains, a major chain of the Appalachian Mountains. The north end of the highway actually picks up where the Skyline Drive drops off. The road ends when it runs into the Smoky Mountains National Park, just west of Asheville. We’d done some reading on the Blue Ridge Pkwy and found out that the most scenic portion was right after crossing the North Carolina border, heading south. Since this road is narrow and quite hilly, we decided to skip the first 200 or so miles of it and jump on for the prettiest parts.

Washington DC

We spent an awesome 6 days in Washington DC. While in the city we got to visit with three friends from back home (all three have made DC their new home), visit the nation’s Capital and the National Mall, and got the chance to meet back up with a new friend we’d made earlier on this trip. After Philadelphia we had originally planned to visit Baltimore for a couple of days and then make our way to DC just in time for our birthday. Then the apocalyptic storm of the century Sandy rolled in and we decided to scrap Baltimore and move further inland to wait it out. We drove to State College, in the middle of Pennsylvania, and spent three uneventful nights there. When the coast was clear (pun intended!), we drove directly into DC, having decided to save Baltimore for another time.

Niagara Falls, NY

After Detroit we were headed for the Niagara Falls. We had two options on how to get there: through Canada or by going south of Lake Erie on the American side. Since we still had the issue of having too much liquor on hand to cross the border (as well as our pneumatic pellet gun), we decided not to risk it and went the American route. We crossed into Ohio, our 20th state on this trip, under pouring rain.

Madison, The Capitol Of The Cheese State

After Minneapolis we crossed into our 16^th state, Wisconsin. We had planned to spend one night in Madison, the state capitol, but were so pleasantly surprised by the city that we ended up staying three nights. Madison is one of only two cities in North America that is located on an isthmus (the other is Seattle). Do you know what an isthmus is? I didn't either, so here goes: an isthmus is a narrow strip of land connecting two larger land areas, usually with water on either side. The city of Madison is banked on one side with Lake Monona and Lake Mendota on the other.

Minneapolis, MN

We spent Labor Day weekend in the city of Minneapolis. Minnesota was our 15^th state to visit on this trip, and I’m happy to say that the scenery did indeed improve as soon as we crossed the border from South Dakota. We took the scenic back country road way into Minneapolis instead of the interstate and in doing so I think we caught the cuter side of the side. We passed some really picturesque farmlands with vibrant red barns. About 100 miles outside of the city the roadside views turned from farmlands to forest, and if I didn't know better, I would have said we were driving through Arkansas.

The Wild, Wild West in Wyoming

To continue our trek east we headed north from our parking spot on Grassy Lake road, back through Yellowstone Park. When planning our drive we’d looked at the topographical map of the area on Google Maps and decided that if we headed north out of the park and back into Montana to get to I-90, that that would be the flattest way out. But, at the last moment, we rethought our plans and decided to instead venture directly east through Wyoming with hopes that the mountain passes wouldn't be that bad. I’m really glad we made the choice because we saw some really gorgeous parts of Wyoming that we would have missed otherwise.

Whistler Mountain

On Wednesday we made a day trip outside of Vancouver to visit the home of the 2010 winter Olympics, Whistler Mountain. That morning started off rainy and cloudy and we were afraid that our plans for a hike in the Garibaldi Provincial Park, just outside of Whistler, were ruined.

We Went To Canada! Cool, Eh?

So, late Sunday afternoon we decided to check the customs rules for entering Canada. The funny thing was that we were heading into Canada the following day. Come to find out, our BB gun was probably not allowed, neither was our somewhat large stash of liquor we'd been dragging around for the last 10 years (no seriously..I don't know why we don't just throw this stuff away, or just have a party, we could be the cool kids on the block!), and fresh potatoes and certain other fruits and vegetables were questionable. And because we still couldn't bring ourselves to trash the liquor, and didn't want to part with the gun, we decided to ask the nice folks at the RV park to hold it for us, packaged up in a nice box of course. Surprisingly, they agreed. With the perishables we just made a huge pot of mashed taters and stir fried a random mix of the veggies. Phew! One crisis averted.

West of Portland: The Oregon Coast Part 1

After spending a month in Portland, we tore ourselves away and drove to the coast. Our first stop was in Tillamook, famous for the Tillamook cheese factory.We found easy street parking for the night, and in the morning decided to bike a portion of the Three Capes Scenic Route. I say a portion because the total ride is over 30 miles long, and very hilly, and after running 8 miles the day before and Sky playing 2 hours of soccer, we only had 23 miles of hills in us (on mountain bikes no less!).

Down Days in Vancouver, WA

We have been here in Vancouver Washington (just outside of Portland) for just over two weeks now. Living somewhere stationary has been a very nice change, and it has lived up to what we were hoping it would be. Portland being the very cool city that it is has certainly helped, but Vancouver has really turned out to be very nice as well.

Why Portland Rocks

On our trip we have come across two cities that we had no expectations for, and but where we came away very pleasantly surprised: Austin and now Portland. Portland has smitten us with its waterfronts, bridges, expansive downtown and multitude of walkable city districts. We have been here just over a week, and have put only a small dent in the long list of things we want to explore in this city.

Oregon, Our 9th State!

Tuesday morning we packed up, and drove our last portion of highway 101 in California. We turned off on highway 199 at mile marker 794. What a long state California is! An hour later we crossed the border into our ninth state, Oregon!

Welcome to Oregon!

Crescent City and the Jedediah Smith Redwoods

We had found street parking in Arcata, right by campus, and it was convenient to walking to downtown for the festival, but unfortunately, it was only good until Monday morning at 6am. Since we're not the best at waking up at such early hours (at least not anymore...), we chose to leave town on Sunday, after we hiked around the awesome city park.

Marin County- A Perfect Blend of California

So we've spent the last week in Marin County, in an RV park in Larkspur. Larkspur is a small town that is on the water, and is known for its Larkspur Landing, where the commuters can catch the ferry to San Francisco.

The Larkspur Landing