The beginning of my cross country journey

I wish I'd had time to update this on a day to day basis, but we were driving so much I only had time to mapquest directions each morning. So, I will try to remember as many details as possible about my trek across the country.

Monday was the beginning, I met up with David and Jonathan a little later than I wanted because I had to repack things into a smaller suitcase. We quickly realized that we wouldn't be able to use Jonathan's GPS like we planned, because my car charger doesn't work. Since we were already on the road at that point, headed to KY, I called my great friend Austin Duke to help me with directions. He has memorized that route because of the many trips from Raleigh to Lexington, KY to visit his girlfriend (now fiance!) Amanda. So, we got to my friend Jamie's house in Lexington around 8:30pm, and she took us to Wal-Mart so David could buy a wall charger for his phone. Then we went downtown and took pictures for a while. Here are a few photos from downtown Lexington:





That's Jamie sitting on the wall...I think the motion blur is cool!

The next morning Jaime offered to take us to Magee's Bakery and buy us breakfast! (Thanks again, Jaime!!) It was great. Then we went and took a few more pictures before heading to MO. We stopped in Louisville, KY for a picnic lunch by the river and took some pictures there. Then we stopped again in St. Louis and took pictures of the Arch and the river. It started raining soon after that and we were off again. We arrived at the KOA campground in Missouri close to 10pm and set up our tent (well, David set it up). Then we ate a late dinner of PB&J and watched Transformers before going to sleep. Here are some images from Tuesday:





©Jonathan Andrews (Jonathan took this picture, but some people specifically requested to see some photos of me on here, and so I'm putting this up. Thanks Jonathan!)

David and Jonathan eating lunch in Louisville, KY.

Above is Louisville, KY...Images below are St. Louis, MO.







Wednesday morning we woke up and headed out around 10:45am for our drive through Kansas and into Colorado. We drove through Kansas City, and I think that was about the most interesting thing on that drive. Once we got to the KOA we were staying at in Strasburg, CO we went around the town (which was very small) and took pictures. David and Jonathan did more than me, I think they were a bit more inspired by it than I was. Oh, and also because it was freezing cold and I had a hat on, plus my hoodie, and a big blanket wrapped around me too. (I didn't really prepare for cold weather because I was moving to Los Angeles, you know?) So after the picture taking we ate dinner and then watched The Others on my laptop, and then went to bed. Here are some of Wednesdays images:








Thursday morning we woke up and showered and headed west about 30 miles to Denver, just to see it since we were so close, and then started our drive south into New Mexico and then west again into Arizona. That was our long day of driving, almost 10 hours. It was my favorite driving day because we saw such crazy changes in the landscape and the weather (just look at the photos)! Colorado was pretty flat until we saw the Rockies, and then as we went south it was cloudy and pretty flat again until we got closer to New Mexico and then large rocks and small mountains would appear every once in a while. It was so cool. And we saw the sun set in Arizona during our drive before we arrived at the KOA in Holbrook near the Petrified Forest. The people who worked there were SO friendly, I really loved them. Once we arrived there we checked out the campground and then walked up the street to the Burger King for dinner. After that we set up our tent and watched a few episodes of The Office (Season Two) before going to bed. Here are some images from Thursday in order:











Well, that's all for now! I figured I should go ahead and post this so you guys would have a little update while I start writing about the rest of the trip and editing those pictures. Hope you've enjoyed reading this! Coming up - The Grand Canyon, The Hoover Dam, Las Vegas, and my neighborhood!