Day one

It's 10:42 in Amarillo. Which makes it 8:42 in Flagstaff. I forgot all about the time change and figured we'd roll into town around 5:30 and instead we got in at almost 8:00.

I had another blog once. It was oneyearofopus.blogspot.com. Five years ago almost to the day, I took this same trip, although Jay was 10 and still sitting in the back seat the whole way. He couldn't yet read a map for me, or carry most of the bags into the hotel. We didn't stop much on that trip. I was pulling a Uhaul trailer (first time ever) and I just wanted to get to my destination. This time we're stopping more (no trailer) and we can talk about more things. The adventures of Spiderman got very old, very fast on that first trip. Haha. I wrote about that trip, but just a little, in that other blog. It's fun to have a chance to do it again.

We left Flagstaff around 7:45 this morning (Later than I wanted). Starbucks for bacon sandwiches, then heading east on Highway 40. First stop, Holbrook. Jay and I used to go through Holbrook on the way to my parent's cabin in Pinetop. Jay always wanted to stop at this funky gem and rock store but we never did. I was in a hurry to get to see my mom and dad. So we went there this morning. I forgot it was Sunday so it was closed but the main thing was to just see the place again. We also took pictures at The Wigwam Motel

Then, on to this weird store at the state line. If it's your store, sorry. I don't want to offend anyone in this blog, so if I offend you, stop reading this blog. We always see this place from the train. It's a tourist shop (moccasins anyone?) but it has quite a few large fake animals on the cliffs outside. It was kind of a goofy place and I'm not going to say anything about Jay and the motorcycle.

We have a big cooler in the back seat with cherries, carrots, BBQ chips, a chocolate sea salt soiree bar, pepsis, waters, chocolate dusted almonds, crackers, sunflower seeds, and cracker jacks. It feels so rich to have all that stuff in the back seat. We still ended up getting dollar meal crispy chicken sandwiches in some small town :)

Finally, we stopped at Cadillac Ranch.  It's a huge empty dusty space with 7 or 8 Cadillacs buried halfway in sand. They are nose down, and there are spray cans everywhere. It's a big, ever-changing interactive art exhibit. Jay got to experience tagging for the first time ever. Another promising career choice.

I forgot to talk about the "oh no, I am completely out of gas" experience.......

--jill.