Day 1: The First Leg

From: Asheville, NC
To: Chicago, IL

We are officially homeless. We left town at 8am after some teary goodbyes from Tzena, Lauren, Randy, Sherry, Robert and Anna. Before we even started the car, Dakota had climbed into the front seat, as she seems to think that’s where she belongs.

Driving through the NC mountains on I-40 West is a beautiful drive. We passed the rock slide area from the 2009 slide. It was impressive.

Passing into Tennessee pretty much marks the end of the mountains. They quickly subsided into hills and then into straight roads, which rolled up and down a bit. TN turned out to be a very pretty drive. The leaves were beginning to change, the hills rolled gently and the road conditions were quite great. But, Tennessee was short lived. We shot into Knoxville, turned north and before we knew it crossed into Kentucky.

We eventually came to Lexington, KY, “horse capital of the world.” And I’d believe it. For miles around Lexington there was ranch after ranch after ranch. Fences spanned miles and trees were most often only seen to separate property lines.

Something interesting we noticed throughout KY was when building the road, instead of going over a small hill they cut through it. So, in the gently rolling hills which I would normally expect to drive up and down over, we drove straight between solid vertical rock walls which had been cut and blasted out to make room for the road. This is to be expected for large hills or mountains. We grew up driving through one in Asheville. But they did this for tiny knolls. The rock walls sometimes were only 5 or 6 feet high. It would’ve been simple to pave over the top of them creating a slight incline when driving. But no, Kentucky is stubborn. They prefer flat roads.

Crossing the Ohio River into Indiana was fun. The huge bridge with scores of cross beams was fascinating. We caught a quick glimpse of Louisville before moseying on northward.

It was a bland ride from there to Indianapolis where Gunter-Gunter and Nathan had a falling out forcing Heather to drive straight through downtown which was more than a little stressful. All and all, the back half of Indiana looked just like the first: boring.

The one fun part of Indiana was when we passed through a multi-mile stretch of wind farms. Huge 3-blade turbines cranking out renewable energy for the entire area. They looked really cool. They’re bigger than you think and created a cool visual effect when you saw a line of them together. We ain’t seen noth’n like ‘at ‘n ol’ NC. Go, wind turbines, go!

We were welcomed into the greater Chicago area and Illinois by a tollbooth. Two more tolls were required before we reached Adam and Nora’s small, quaint and cozy apartment. To get there we drove very near the second most dangerous neighborhood in the country. Good thing Heather was packin’ heat.

Adam and Nora took care of us with delicious home cooked Pad-Thai. It was so good that my taste buds became angry with my stomach for filling up. (Mmm…Nathan want more Pad-Thai…) We also played a game of Dominion to finish the evening and Nathan kicked butt.

Heather’s benadryl kicked in and she was out on the couch for the night. Dakota tried to wine her way past the huge buffalo chair (enormous bean bag) to snuggle with Adam and Nora (and the cats). Nathan stepped on glass slicing open his foot and had to clean blood from the floor. Lola was cute, and Adam was awoken by the lovely sound of Dakota hacking and yarking in the morning. A true Chicago experience if you ask me.