Days 13 - 16

It's been a while again, probably because we weren't doing much driving and that's when the posts get written.  So, we have days 13 through 16 to catch up on.

Day 12 ended very late with us checking into a cheap motel as soon as we could after leaving Colorado.  It was almost 11pm when we finally got into the room.  We decided that we weren't going to set our alarms since the kids would need to catch up on sleep.  Unfortunately, no one had told the cleaning lady that.  So, at 6:50 in the morning I heard someone trying to get into our room.  I woke Cliff up, who went to investigate.  He couldn't see much through the peephole, and the person wasn't listening to our request to "Go AWAY", so he opened the door to find that it was the cleaning lady for the hotel just trying to do her job.  Unfortunately, me and Cliff were already awake so we decided to start getting ready and were on the road before 9AM - a first for us!

Day 13 was spent driving through Kansas.  The road was very flat and very straight.  It was also very boring, though I did notice from the billboards on the side of the road that the cost of dentures got cheaper the closer you got to Kansas City. The first sign I saw said they were $459 for a whole set! After a few hundred miles I saw another sign that said they were $199 a set.  (After we left Kansas, on day 16, I saw a sign that said $99 a set - I hope Kansas folks do their research!)

Yeah, that was about as exciting as our trip got.  There were multiple potty breaks and stops to fix the bag covering the chair on the roof.  Other than that, it was pretty uneventful.

We finally got to my sister's house at around 5PM.  Hah!  Those of you who knew me growing up are now confused!  I have 3 biological half-sisters - they were the reason for the stop in Kansas City. Surprise!  Their names are Melissa, Toshia, & Heather.  We stayed with Melissa (Thanks, Melissa!)Somewhere in Kansas we had gone over another time-zone, which added an hour to the day, so we had really only been driving for about 7 hours including all the stops.

Melissa, Me, Toshia

I didn't get to see one of my half-sisters (Heather) while I was in Kansas City, but at least I got to know the 2 I did see a little bit better.  It's weird having these people you're related to, but know nothing about. 

Days 14 & 15 were spent in Kansas City, spending more time with my sisters.  On day 14 we went bowling with all of the kids (our 2, and 1 from each of my sisters that were there - all boys) and then went to a late lunch at a Chinese Buffet where I marveled at how my nephews could eat such a variety of foods (and so much of it! I hope the poeple who tell me that my kids will eventually eat me out of house and home are right!).

Day 15 was pretty boring.  We had a bunch of errands we had to take care of, so that's what most of the day was.  However, we were able to try some authentic Kansas City BBQ that everybody at home has raved about.  We all went to a place called Jack Stack's.  Either they were off their game that night, or we're just not BBQ people.  Don't get me wrong, the food was good, but we couldn't understand why it had been so hyped up.  After dinner we all went back to Melissa's house where the kids played while the grownups talked until after midnight!

For day 16 we had set our alarms for 9AM.  If we hadn't, we probably could've slept until noon after such a late night.  The kids were not happy when we woke them up only to tell them it was to get in the car for more driving, thankfully day 16's driving was only for 4 and half hours. 

Before leaving Kansas City we had to find a Post Office to mail another box to England so I don't think we actually got on the Interstate until after 11AM.  We had gone through our clothes again and decided we could do without a lot of it so we could make space in the trunk of the car.  Funny, even though we seem to be getting rid of a lot of the stuff we originally had in the trunk, it doesn't seem to be making a bit of difference!

Before leaving Kansas City we also wanted to find a bumper sticker for Kansas since we were going to be crossing the boarder very soon.  Unfortunately, we were not successful - ugh!  I'm really beginning to regret suggesting this bumper sticker business.

We made it to our hotel in St. Louis by 4PM.  Once we got in our room, we decided to veg out for bit and then went to dinner at the Hard Rock Cafe right behind our hotel.  After dinner we walked a little over a mile and a half to see the St. Louis Arch (aka - The Gateway to the West).  It was nice to get out and walk for a bit, even if it was still over 90 degrees and so much more humid than we're used to.  By the time we got back to our hotel we were all dripping with sweat - I'm sure we were quite a sight for the doorman. 

While we were at the Arch, we were able to get a bumper sticker for it.  Unfortunately, they did not have any for just Missouri on it, so when we left the hotel on day 17 we tried looking - no dice!  We're now in Illinois, and are without bumper stickers for Kansas, Missouri, and Illinois.  I'm not hopeful that we'll find any more, but we'll keep looking.  Here's what the car looks like now, with the newly added California and New Mexico stickers that we had sent to Toshia from some place we found online.

That's all for now!

- Mayzie