Trek Across a Country: Day 1

Up At 6:15am. We hit the snooze button after a crazy pre-trip day full of day packing, cleaning, spa daying, driving, car washing, eating, and tough goodbyes. Rough night of sleep as well. The anxiety of getting on the road bothered us both. After running through the apartment for what felt like hours we finished packing up with my life inside of our Toyota Camry sedan, aptly named blueberry for her hue. Blue is so heavy the tire well in back went lower than normal, all I could think of was gas budget going out the window and fear of what can happen with just the wrong bump. Nonetheless we hit the road at 7am.

We made it to Fair Haven around by 8:30 we made it to Fair Haven, Vermont right next to Whitehall, NY. My last picture below in Vermont for at least the foreseeable future. Bittersweet indeed.

I made a starling discovery after we used the restroom at the Vermont Welcome Center (see below).

 Turns out I drove nearly 50 miles with the masking tape (used for packing) on our car. How this happened, I think our pre-caffinated brains just didn't register this. So after a good laugh, we kept on into our journey.

State number two:

So after we entered we noticed the two license plates (yellow and white), does anyone know why there are different colors? Is one for upstate NY and the other for NYC? Any who billboards are everywhere, the small lazy towns are big and they are older albeit forgotten looking. Interesting was how the roads went from bad to good and vice versa with the varied income levels. You can tell this by the conditions of the houses. And then highway, pure highway.  I began to tire but we were making such good time. We hit a rest stop in Senaca, NY and sat in the new green grass to eat our sandwiches made the night before. I love the spell of fresh grass, no more winter!

AAA had us rested for the night in Buffalo, NY but we decided to continue onward to cut an hour off of tomorrows 8 hour drive to Chicago.  After another 2 hours we hit gold. State number 3:

We got here by weaving through tracker trailers in afternoon traffic surrounded by miles and miles of barren land. Within the last half hour we spotted a frozen Lake Erie in the distance. I tired and failed to contain my excitement. My husband was afraid something else  had happened given the pitch of my voice. We neared the end of leg one in North East, PA, home of Lake Erie Wine Country, known as the largest grape-growing region east of the Rockies. Too bad we are in the off season. 

 So we have arrived, checked in and looked around this older town. It didn't seem that friendly after we took a stroll in the local grocery store for stocking up on road provision. The local dive bar/restaurant offered bland American fare but was a welcome plate after the long journey. After food time to get our energy up for a big day two ahead. All smiles from here.

-a-