Samantha's View from the Backseat

June 30, 2013
We woke up early and went to mass. The Mass was so short and one of my favorite Masses! After Mass, we went to the hotel for breakfast. They had PopTarts! :) I was SO happy. We ate a good breakfast, then Marta and I jumped in Meg and Jim's car. Within the first hour, I think everyone had fallen asleep. Even me (I was even the first!) We stopped twice on the way to South Bend for lunch and bathroom. For dinner we stopped at a Texas Roadhouse. Mmmm! Our caravans favorite. When we went out to the cars we saw lightning bugs. Tons of them. It was so cool! While we were driving to Notre Dame, Danny was telling us all about them. We got to Notre Dame and drove around since we were coming in the morning to see it when it was bright out. We then got to another beautiful hotel. I went to bed very tiered.
Best Food of the Day: Steak with Mash Potatoes, and Salad
Best Snack of the Day: Banana Chips
Best Sweet of the Day : Twizzlers  

June 29, 2013
When we woke up we broke down camp. Some of us were a little sleepy due to the train. When camp was finally down, we began to drive again. In the car we played trip trivia with Betsy through texting. We would text her a question like which child has never slept in the same room as Mom and Dad? She would text us back with the answer. However, she only had 5 guesses. We played this for about an hour. In the end, she got 40 points and won in Winner, SD! We got Sioux Falls at around 2 for lunch. Last trip we had lunch by the beautiful falls in Sioux Falls (Yes there are waterfalls in Sioux Falls!). However, when we got to the falls, there was a distinct smell of sewage. We don't know if the Sioux Falls had become Sewage Falls, or if the puddy-potties had not been cleaned, but whatever the case, the smell was NOT appetizing! So we drove to another park and ate our ham and grilled pineapple lunch. We then hopped on the road again. We drove to Omaha, NE. There we stayed in another wicked cool hotel. We had a full sized kitchen, bedroom, bathroom, and a living room. We spent the rest of the night talking and watching Despicable of Me.
Best Food of the Day: Grilled Ham and Pineapple
Best Snack of the Day: Chips
Best Sweet of the Day: Well I couldn't eat it, but everyone else had a Klondike Bar.

June 28, 2013
I have a criteria for hotels. When the hotel has something extra to the criteria, they become an adjective plus hotel. When a hotel has free breakfast, it is a great hotel. When the hotel has a fridge, it is an awesome hotel. (For those of you who don't know, Marta and I are ice ladies. We are in charge of making sure that the coolers have enough ice in them so that the food does not spoil. When there is no fridge, we have to fill bags with ice before we go to bed. Having a fridge makes the job easier!) And when a hotel has an indoor waterpark, it is an EPIC hotel! We woke up early and ate breakfast so we could be in the waterpark when it opened. It was SO much fun! There were 3 water slides that you had to walk up 70 stairs to get to, a lazy river, play structure with more slides, a play pool with basketball, and stepping stones, and a hot tub. It was awesome. I probably went on the water slide 100 times, which is about 7000 stairs! One of the slides had a funnel so you entered in one side, then spun around a lot, then exited at the bottom. It was so much fun. If you are ever in Rapid City go to the Fairfeild Marriott. After the waterpark, Marta and I got in Mama and Papa's rental car and we drove to Qdoba for some lunch. It was good. Then we drove to the Badlands. The Badlands are one of my favorite parks. As Betsy puts it, it is like the moon. It is gorgeous! We then set up camp in sleepy hallows where we had lots of train jokes and do you remember moments. We decided that the campsite we had last time was the best in everything, minus the vicinity to the train tracks. At around 1 AM I felt the ground shaking and heard the train. It is a painful noise that early in the morning!
Best Food of the Day: Hotdogs and my Burrito
Best Snack of the Day: Granola Bar
Best Sweet of the Day: S'mores

June 27, 2013
I was up early due to the chirping of the ground squirrels (we don't actually know what they are, but they were, as Molly said, an ugly cross of everything ugly!) We ate breakfast and packed up the truck. We drove to the famous Rosevelt Arch and took pictures. Then we waved good bye to Yellowstone and drove towards Rapid City, UT. We stopped in Custer which was cool (not lierally though! It was about 95!) then we drove on a 2 lane highway to Rapid City. There were no gas stations, bathrooms, or anything on this road. We later hopped on I-90. We watched our first movie in our car. We had made it all the way to South Dakota without watching a movie. When we got to the hotel, we noticed that they had a Waterpark in the hotel. It was awesome, just that it closed as we walked in. Jim had bought us all pizza and chicken nuggets for me. I went to sleep satisfied and excited for the next morning!
Best Food of the Day: Chicken Nuggets
Best Snack of the Day: Salsa Chips
Best Sweet of the Day: Wurthers Butterscotch

June 26, 2013

We woke up and began to pack the car. Dad had to work so we loaded the car then headed to the Old Faithful Lodge for breakfast. Then we hopped in the car to meet up with Meg and the rest of the crew went to the geysers. On the way we saw a Bison knock over a sign at Old Faithful. Then, after the geysers, we went to eat a picnic lunch. After lunch we went to drive up the mountains. They were SO pretty. We saw so much wildlife. We saw Bison and their babies, lots of elk, and deer. Sadly, no bears! We drove around and then went to Mammoth Hot Springs. After the hot springs we went to our cabin. There is a big shared backyard that we all were playing football with 2 other boys. Don’t want to brag, but I was better than them! Now we are setting down for dinner!

Best Food of the Day: Kielbasa Salad

Best Sweet of the Day: Fudge Cookies

Best Snack of the Day: Granola Bar

Rosies Singing "Happy Birthday to Dad" (Aspen)

Campfire Cake

I Was Pretending to be Friendly with the Red Team...

The Crew (Arches)

My Older Sister! (Utah)

Walking with my Friends (Aspen)

Most of the Family (Arches)

The Best Mom! (Canyonlands)

June 25, 3013

-          Woke up

-          Went fishing in the cold rain. Caught no fish

-          I drove a boat

-          Met up with Mama and Papa

-          Dad, Marta, Molly, Emmy, and Liam got “lost”

-          Saw a beautiful waterfall

-          Ate dinner at the Lake Hotel

-          Slept in the old part of the Yellowstone Lodge

June 24, 2013

I was exhausted last night. I woke up at 8 and went to Mama and Papa’s room for some breakfast. Then we packed the car to go to Old Faithful.  We went to the visitor’s center then we took a walk around all the geysers. Marta, Dad and I went on an off-road walk to see the geyser. Then we drove around and had dinner in the Old Faithful Lodge. We then drove to The Annex and slept in a pink room.

June 23, 2013

We woke up at the hotel and cleaned up. After the clean, we went downstairs for breakfast. I love hotels that have free breakfast. It is such a great way to start the day. After breakfast we packed up the cars and headed off. We dropped off Jim at the airport and my grandparent’s rental car as well. We drove 3 hours out to an Albertson’s grocery store somewhere in Idaho. Marta and I were helping my mom and my grandma get food and my mom told me and Marta to grab a few yogurts due to the space in the car. I, apparently, was not listening, so we got enough yogurts to feed the army! Thankfully, my dad is amazing and managed to fit all the yogurts plus the other food all in the car. After the grocery run, we drove to the Grand Tetons. It is such a pretty national park. We stopped in the park for a well needed birthday dinner of chicken, salad and a cherry graham cracker cheesecake deconstructed. My dad was grilling when Liam came up to us saying that he saw a bear. I, personally, did not REALLY believe him until a seasoned hiker said he saw a mom and 2 cubs.  We all gave Liam a high five and got back to our dinner. Molly and Liam wanted to go “bear hunting.” 2 minutes later Molly came screaming “BEAR!” I turn to were Molly came out of the woods and I see a brown bear eating. I probably screamed, definitely ran away, maybe even cried! But whatever I did, it was still amazing to see 2 live bears in their habitat. The bears stayed there for about 35 minutes.  It was so cool. We have been looking for bears for 2 years and we finally saw one in the Grand Tetons. Then, on our way out of the park we saw lots of temporary DO NOT PARK signs and lots of cones. Then, we saw lots of cars stopped and we saw 2 more bear cubs. Those cubs though did look like grizzly, but we don’t really know. We then made our way through the Grand Tetons to Yellowstone. We got to our lodge at 9:30 and it was still quiet bright outside. Then, in a hour, we went outside to see the super moon, which no offence, looked like a normal moon just like an inch bigger.

Best Food of the Day: Chicken

Best Sweet of the Day: York Peppermint Patty

Best Snack of the Day: Chips

June 22, 2013

After my 3 hour sleep I woke up to the sound of very loud birds. You never notice how loud birds are in the morning until you sleep in their habitat! We had to take down camp fast because the campsite was setting off their sprinklers at 10 AM and we did not want to get wet! Also, the amount of bugs in the camp was pretty gross. They were in my hair, nose, mouth, and everywhere in between! We headed out of the camp at 9:30. Marta and I hitched a ride in my grandparent’s car. We drove an hour out to Arches National Park. It is so cool. We drove through the park and stopped at Delicate Arch (aka the famous arch). After taking pictures we drove for 10 minutes to a picnic spot. We ate a very good lunch and hopped back in the car for a 4 hour drive to Salt Lake City. Marta and I rested then watched Star Trek on my grandparent’s IPad. The scenery in Utah changes so often. It went from Plautus to mountains. We stopped in a town for mass. The town was very heavily Hispanic. To demonstrate this, the confirmeies in the Church for the Spanish class was 121 kids. The English class was 11! We drove an hour out to Salt Lake City to a Springhill Suit. The hotel was very nice except for the fact that the toilet was clogged and it overflowed! Talk about a stinky mess! But the hotel felt bad so they sent up a bag of gummy life savers, trail mix, a bottle of water and a note. Then we ordered pizza, salad, and hot wings for dinner. As we ate dinner we watched the very sad Bruins game.  After the game we went to bed, but not before the toilet overflowed again!

Best Food of the Day:  Hot Wings

Best Sweet of the Day: Twizzlers

Best Snack of the Day: Peach

June 21, 2013

HEY! So, we are now in Utah! Sorry for not posting, but we had no wifi for a few nights. Where I left off, Colorado. We woke up in Snowmass and cleaned the house because we were leaving. I LOVE John and Shannon’s house. It is SO pretty and is in such a gorgeous part of the country. Only problem is the lack of oxygen. Oxygen is very important, and when you are 11,000 feet (or 72,000 feet!) above sea level, there is not much of it which makes breathing a little hard! We took pictures then left beautiful Snowmass. We did not eat breakfast at the house because it would make dirty dishes, so we drove an hour out to a cute little diner called Rosies. It was REALLY good! They also brought out a lemon tart for Dad and we all sang happy birthday. (It was his birthday in case you did not know!) We then hoped back in the car and drove to Walmart and the grocery store to buy an air mattress, cooler, and most importantly food!  Once our shopping was done, we drove to Utah. When we got to Utah we went to Canyonlands National Park. It is the Grand Canyon of Utah. It is wicked pretty! We left Canyonlands and drove an hour out to Green River, UT for some camping. At our campsite we met up with my grandparents. They flew into Salt Lake City, UT and drove 4 hours to have dinner with my dad on his birthday. For dinner my mom made an appetizer of triscits with cucumber, and for dinner pork tenderloin, and a tossed salad. Marta and I made an apple salsa. Meg made a chocolate cake in the camp fire. It was not too bad for campfire dinner. And the cake was AMAZING! It was perfect. We then said good bye to my grandparents (they got a hotel) and we all went into our tents. While most of us slept, some of us had some issues with late night partiers, dogs, and some trains. (yes, there was a train, but it was not as bad Wall, SD! See gobowgo.blogspot.com for details on THAT train!)I finally fell asleep at 4 AM.

Best (Homemade) Food of the Day:  Pork Tenderloin

Best (Store) Food of the Day:  Banana Nut Pancake

Best Snack of the Day:  Apple Salsa

Best Sweet of the Day: Meg’s Campfire Chocolate Cake!

June 20, 2013 (continued)

Today we woke up and ate breakfast. Then w drove into Snowmass village. We went shopping. I bought a green Snowmass shirt with snowflakes. Marta also went shopping for her family. We also skyped Marta's family on the mountain of Snowmass. It was so cool. Then we traveled back home. When we got home we cleaned out the truck and cleaned the house since we are leaving for Utah tomorrow. After dinner Marta, Molly, Dad and I went to the Snowmass concert. It was so cool. It was on the ski mountain. Snowmass ski mountain is very multipurpose mountain. You ski in winter, mountain bike in spring and summer, and it is used as a concert green. While at the concert we took a pod down to the lower villiage. There they had free ice cream. And this free ice cream is not cheap free ice cream. It is really good free ice cream. And trust me, nothing in Aspen is free. After the ice cream, we rode the pods 2 more times for fun and got back into the car to drive back home. On the way home we say elk, and deer. One of the deer, Marta's friend Bambi,  was literally 3 ft from the car. It was a very calm deer. He did not mind getting pictures taken. We got home and now we are doing last minute packing and cooling off, because tomorrow we are in the desert!

On the Lift

Our Bikes!

The Concert on Snowmass Mountain

Best Food of the Day: Dad's Wrap
Best Sweet of the Day: Popsicle (again! But this time it was lime!)
Best Snack of the Day: Granola Bar
June 20, 2013

Best comment of the day:
A man in a kilt: "Hey! A Ginger!"

June 19, 2013 (continued)

Today was a quiet day. We woke up and ate breakfast. Marta and I played The Scrambled States of America and Sort it Out. The we rallied Danny, Mary, and Emmy to play Monopoly. We are still playing! We ate lunch then went into Aspen Village to go shopping. We went into a cool authentic western store. It was so cool! After shopping we all took a nap. We ate dinner then went to the Snowmass Rodeo! It was SO much fun. I will try to post pictures and videos from the rodeo tomorrow!

Best Food of the Day: Mom's pork and potatoes
Best Sweet of the Day: Sour PatchPopsicles
Best Snack of the Day: Mangos! :)



June 19, 2013

I will try to post tonight. For now, just enjoy some pictures from our trip!

The entire group

Almost all the kids! 

Chicago Family!

Nebraska

Waterfall from Ditch Trail

June 18, 2013

I decided to organize my posts! This morning I woke up to the smells of pancakes. Mmmm! After breakfast we all piled into two cars and went off to hike in Maroon Bells. As we were driving we saw skiers jumping and doing flips into, basically, a large airbag. It was SO cool! We got to Maroon Bells and realize that the price to hours ratio was a little off so we went to another, I think, more beautiful hike. Marta, Bobby, Molly, Dad and I walked up to about 9,700 ft above sea level. And, as my dad said, we could see clouds forming around us. I felt like I was on top of the world we were so high! We also saw 2 ladies rock climbing. Now rock climbing on mountains is so much different that rock climbing on a rock wall. You are vertical and you are pulling all your weight and your gear up. It was so cool. We also saw some ice caves that had about 4 ft of solid ice in them. That was also really cool. We got back to the start and while Mom, Meg, and Lauren made lunch, all the kids plus Bobby went into the freezing river to take off our shoes and throw rocks. The water was absolutely FREEZING! We ate a good lunch of tacos and we drove back to the house. Bobby and Lauren left :( at around 4. We just came back from walking around Snowmass village and walking on the slopes of Snowmass. I cannot stop saying it, but Snowmass is gorgeous! We also saw a lot of wild like today. About 30 Elk, 8 deer, and 1 coyote. Now Marta and I are settling down to watch a movie.

Best Food of the Day: Tacos

Best Snack of the Day: Lime Chips

Best Sweet of the Day: Marta's chocolate peanut dipped banana

June 17, 2013

Yesterday it was SO nice to NOT pack and sit in the car for a long day. After breakfast we took a beautiful hike on Ditch Trail through Mt. Snowmass. It was absoluty BEAUTIFUL! Words and pictures cannot do justice to the beauty.

Aspen trees

The 10 day old puppies!



The trail was next to a dog sledding dog kennel. We went on over to see the dogs and the owner of all the dogs saw us and asked us if we wanted to see the puppies. Um, yeah! So we got to hold 10 day old and 3 day old puppies. They were so cute and so fluffy. I am surprised no one took one home. After saying goodbye to the dogs we went back to the house. My great aunt and uncle have a BEAUTIFUL home in Snowmass that they have so graciously allowed us to stay in.

Some of the great room

We ate lunch and rested. Molly and I played xbox then played hide and go seek with Mary. Hide and go seek is a very popular game at the moment. At 3 Molly, Marta, and I went on a bike ride. Going down mountains are fun, but going up is a different story. After the bike ride we went in the hot tub. We ate dinner then watched the Bruins game! After the Bruins game Marta wanted to watched Finding Nemo. So we watched Finding Nemo and finally went to bed at 10:30.

Best Food of the Day: Mom's Chili

Best Snack of the Day: Pita Bread

Best Sweet of the Day: Mango Cake

June 16, 2013

I woke this morning hot. Let’s just say sleeping in the middle is a little uncomfortable! We got dressed and went downstairs for a lovely breakfast! After breakfast we packed up the car and hit the road to go to mass. We got a little lost getting to Church, but we found it and went to a lovely mass. The Church was really cool. It was built 2 years ago and was basically in the middle of a field! After mass we played a little in the Church parking lot and got back on the road. We are still in Nebraska, but we will be in Colorado in an hour. Not to steal Molly’s stink of the day, but we passed a cow farm with, what I think, had about 1,000 cows. I could not breathe!

Once we got to Colorado, we went for a picnic lunch at a rest stop. It was 93 degrees. We ate our sandwiches then began to drive again. We hit this crazy wind storm and we saw lots of lightning. Then we got to Denver and we began to drive up the majestical Rocky Mountains! Finally, after many hours in the car, we made it to Aspen. We were welcomed by Bobby and Lauren who made us a delicious dinner! After dinner Mom, Dad, Marta, Molly, Emi, Liam, Bobby, Lauren and I went on a walk. Colorado is my favorite state in the USA. It is so pretty. If you have not been here, I strongly recommend coming out to this part of the country.

Best Food of the Day: Lauren’s pork and salad

Best Sweet of the Day: Blueberry Muffin

Best Snack of the Day: Strawberries

June 14/15, 2013

Before I begin telling you about the last 24 hours I want to say thanks to Betsy who joins us on our road trip adventures, but could not join us now because of the amount of snow that we had that is keeping school open until the bitter end of June. Betsy managed to not only settling our arguments, dealing with Greg but keeping all seven of us entertained and happy with her jokes, riddles, books and countless other tricks. Now, I sit next to Greg and no one has any clue how she dealt with him in a way that made the rest of the car comfortable, for he is loud, crazy, little boy. Thank you so much Betsy!

Where I left off. Iowa. Iowa and Nebraska are actually surprisingly gorgeous. Marta has told us that Nebraska, so far, is her favorite state. So we got to the hotel at 7 pm central time after a 10 hour drive. Mary, Molly, Marta and I played a game of hide and go seek in our hotel room (we get 2 hotel rooms, one for the boys and mom and dad, and one for the girls). We then went into Mom and Dad’s hotel room to have dinner. We ate a pasta salad, salad, homemade bread and salsa (Meg made the salsa from the produce on her farm share. It was amazing!)  And then, to top it off, cookies! We then went off to the pool. I am so happy that the pool was normal sized, not bathtub sized (we call small pools bathtubs because they are actually the size of a bathtub). After a few hours in the pool, we went back upstairs to shower up and go to bed. In our hotel room there was only one bed. And there are 4 girls. So Emi slept on an air mattress while Marta, Molly, and I squished on the bed. Though, I will say, I prefer one bed over a shower in the living room (see Boston to Cleveland post). 

Best Food of the Day: Tie between Mom’s pasta salad and Meg’s salsa!

Best Sweet of the Day: Meg’s banana muffins!

Best Snack of the Day: Mango Pineapple Smoothies!

June 14, 2013

As I said I am in the middle of Iowa and in the middle of my day. We have about 4 hours left at least. We woke up and got out of Chicago at 7. The Crawfords live almost diagonally across the street from Northwesten's athletic fields and department. And people who know my love of Northwestern's woman's lacrosse team might know how excited I was. I took pictures then we drove to meet up with the rest of our carevan who stayed at a hotel last night. I went into Meg and Jim's car and have been playing the ball game with Danny and coloring with Mary. It has been, so far a good day. I will post soon to tell you the rest of my day once we get to the hotel.

June 13, 2013

Ok! So I have no clue how to post on my side....

However, yesterday was really fun. We woke up at 5 (!) and did the last minute cleaning. Meg and the kids came over and we took pictures. Then we hit the road for a 10.5 hour long drive to Cleveland.  As my dad posted, the shower in the hotel was.... Unique! I was so glad I had a different room so I could shower without a worry of someone opening the curtain!

Now about the food I ate:

Favorite of the day: pepper french fries from B&B ( burgers and beer in Cleveland)

Best sweet of the day: Meg's blueberry muffin

Best snack: granola

Now, at this moment we are in Indiana (near Gary....) but I will try to post tonight or tomorrow!

Hey again! I am in Iowa now (my 37th state I have been to). So to begin where we left off. So we went through stinky Gary and then arrived in Chicago. We met up with one of my dad's friends and had lunch at Panara. We also took pictures at the Sears tower. Then we drove 30 minutes

west ward to the Crawfords (I believe they are my third cousins, but I have no clue!) they graciously opened up their home to us and let us sleep there. Then we went over to my other third cousins house and had a party there. We all met a year ago, and we had so much fun. I had stayed in contact with Brigit, and it was so great to see her and the rest of the clan and to hang out with them. We also had some fireworks happening! Uncle Jim (well technically my Great Uncle Jim) bought us all some Chicago memorabilia. But don't worry, there was no Blackhawk caps! It was so much fun. We finally went to bed at 11:00 pm central time, 12 am eastern time

Favorite food of the day: Panara chicken noodle soup

Best sweet: Fiona's Peach Cobbler

Best snack: Pop Tarts (!)

Hey! We are two day until we hit the road! We are beginning the packing and finishing all the cleaning. If you have any questions about anything like what our favourite song to listen in the car to what do we do in the car to where are we, please ask. I will try to post often (maybe not every night, but often!) to tell you where we are and to answer any of your questions. We are getting excited!