VACATION 2012

SOUTH DAKOTA ~ WYOMING ~ COLORADO ~ NEBRASKA. . . or bust!

So here it is, two? three maybe years since the last time we took an actual vacation, a good ole' Road Trip! Yep, a pack your bags, grab a cooler, make sandwiches and cut them corner to corner in little triangles road trip! This one wasn't thought about really, it just sort of. . .happened. And what started as just South Dakota, began to seemingly sprout roots and grow into quite the trip!  One evening I received a call from an old friend of mine, a friend I haven't seen since. . . .MIDDLE SCHOOL! Or as we called it back then, Jr. High. He called because through his brother, who is also an old friend of mine, were all fortunate to, again through Facebook, reconnect. Soon he became a friend of Mikes and it's now as if the two of them have known each other for their entire lives. Crazy! We've not seen each other for at least 34 years!!!!
He mentioned to me that he and his family were going to be in South Dakota  http://www.nps.gov/moru/index.htm   for their vacation, then he said, "why don't you and Mike meet us there?" With that, a vacation was born!

Wyoming came into play because of my childhood BFF. She lives in Illinois with her husband and grown children and their families, but her extended family, mom, dad, brothers and sister and THEIR families all live in Wyoming. Considering the fact that for all these years I have remained in touch with her mother, and more currently (Facebook) with her younger sister I thought since we are so close to the border, and it's only 6 hours to "Mom R's" house we should stop there as well.
When we were kids, Friday and/or Saturday nights would be spent spending the night at one anothers homes. Mine was, well, lets just say I was the youngest child of my parents, living in Colorado while all my siblings lived with their families in Minnesota or, in my brothers case, in the mountains somewhere. At the time I was young and really didn't know where he was, nor did my parents. He was in fact just west of Fort Collins.  http://www.fcgov.com/ Rist canyon to be exact. (that's another story of it's own right now with the wild fire going on...) But hers, well her family consisted of four children, two boys, two girls and when I was there and the boys had their friends there it was quite the busy, crazy, loud place to be! Filled with FUN!
I spoke with her sister and mother, "Mom R" about coming through, one thing lead to another and my childhood BFF is making the journey from Illinois, her sister and brothers are making it from south and mid Wyoming to Mom and Dad R's. in Thermopolis. http://thermopolis.com/  I haven't seen the family since I was 18. My BFF, just saw her a few years ago when Mike and I ventured to Springfield.  http://springfield.il.us/

So then I started looking at the map. My hometown where I grew up is only 6 hours from Thermopolis, and one of my oldest and dearest friends still lives there as well as several other friends from school. So that's how Loveland Colorado  http://www.ci.loveland.co.us/  came into play! WHOOP!!! I try to get out there every few years when I don't get out there, Debbie comes here so that we can try to see each other at least once a year or every other. But with the wildfire still burning, there was a question as to if we should even go. Smoke was the biggest factor as it's been like a fog at times but Mike still wants to go so that's where we're headed.

I'm looking so forward to getting out on the road! With Facebook, I have been fortunate to have my path cross with the paths of so many people that I went to school with, and with that came a seemingly deeper connection with these fantastic people than was ever there before and I feel very blessed to have been given that gift.

And Nebraska? Well, the drive back from Colorado is so boring that I thought I would find something to make it a bit more interesting. So I found some museums and things to see in Omaha and Lincoln to try to break up that drive home a little bit.

Monday is not going to come quick enough!