*Yawn* I woke up around 7 AM. We all woke up at about the same time, so we got dressed at about half past. Doing so made great time, and we were outside quarter to 8. We went to see what the “car fairy” (basically our parents placing gifts in our seats to help pass time in the car) got us. Summer Brain Quest books. What a surprise (I’m being very sarcastic here).
We left our hotel at about 8:00 AM. This drive would be shorter by a couple hours. We drove around Lincoln for a bit, stopping at a donut place and taking pictures of the capital building. Sooner or later we started our drive to Estates Park, CO.
Yes, of course, another rest stop for lunch. This is pretty convenient, though. Afterward, we got snacks from the—oh wait, I’m ahead of myself here. The vending machine was out of order. So what? We got stuff at the next rest stop, whose vending machine was out of order also. What is the chance of that!? We got stuff at a gas station instead.
The iPad display has been mounted. (Woohoo!!!) Finally we can watch movies together. Nothing else is in here like that. Our Pilot had a TV, but we didn’t need this display too much. We watched all of Ghostbusters and then got out iPads.
We made a few sightseeing stops along the way, like Chimney Rock and Scotts Bluff. Pretty amazing being able to view practically everywhere nearby. By the time we were going back on the road from Scotts Bluff, Braden’s and Zoe’s iPads were dying. We dug our the chargers and went on with the drive.
We stopped at McDonalds for dinner, now in the mountain time zone. This will aid us with an extra hour of driving. All is well, so the trip is good so far. Lots of relaxing.
All this time the weather has been great, but when we stopped at the Wyoming welcome center / rest stop the ear-popping began. We were about 6300 ft in elevation. I got a refill on water and popped my ears, so I was fine. Now a few more hours and we will have reached our destination.
We wound around great mountains and some streams as we neared the hotel. There wasn’t phone data at all, so it was our brains we relied on for navigation. Finally we arrived in Estes Park and pulled into our hotel. It was technically a 2-floor motel, but at 9 in the night, no one really cares. We hit the sack and prepared for tomorrow.
