Wanderlust Wednesday

I'm linking up with Emily for Wanderlust Wednesday.

25 days from today Kickass Cousin & I are heading out on Road Trip 2.0.  It's nearly identical to Road Trip 1.0 that we took 3 years ago.  There will obviously be some differences, but it's pretty damn close.  So for the first Wanderlust Wednesday link up I thought I'd take a little walk down memory lane & take a little look at RT 1.0.

Day 1

Kickass cousin & I left Texas bright & early.  A stop at Whataburger for breakfast was obviously necessary, as well as a double take on all of the cops with lights on on the side of the road.  After early morning nourishment & excitement we were on our way!

We made it all of an hour before my awesome self got pulled over by TX State Patrol...3 years later & I still remember how that went down like it was yesterday.

Cop on the side of the road, not in his car, not holding a radar gun.
Me: What's he gonna do?  Say oh that person looks like they're speeding better go get em?
Yes...yes that is what he did.  And speeding I was.  In fact I was going faster than he guessed.  He also pulled me over because I was in the left lane...  On the bright side I didn't get a ticket.

Once we made it to Louisiana we made a stop at the state line where we saw this sign warning us about gators & another warning us about snakes...  Luckily & unfortunately we saw none.  Yay for survival...boo for lack of excitement.

We decided before heading out on the trip that we wanted to back road Louisiana along the gulf rather than take the freeway to New Orleans.  At one point we stopped at the beach & got out so we could play in the sand.  It was crazy windy & there was no way in hell I was getting in the water.  It was rolling mud.  Remember up there when my genius self got pulled over?  And before that when we saw something going down while still in TX?  Well here at the beach we got stuck.  Yep, stuck.  In the sand.  I drove my car onto the beach because others had done it.  Well others had trucks not an Impala.  My cousin had to push while I drove the car out of it.  Shout out to all the strangers who just stared.

Also planned along the way to New Orleans was a stop in Pierre Part so we could find Troy from Swamp People.  We didn't find him.  I did leave over 100% tip on a meal I had no intentions of leaving that large of a tip on because I left the tip line blank (like I pretty much always had prior to that) & filled in the total line with the price of meals + tip.  When I got home & checked my bank account the waitress took the total...and added it to the total...

Stops along the way not planned: getting lost because we refused to use GPS, maps for the win!, & having to stop & ask for directions while staring at the man like "WHAT IN THE WORLD ARE YOU SAYING?!" because backwoods bayou...& also enjoying the accent.

Finally 12ish hours later we arrived in New Orleans.  What should've been a 5 hour freeway trip turned into a 12 hour back road trip.  I wouldn't have had it any other way.  We walked around the French Quarter, got a little lost while driving, & of course stopped at Cafe Du Monde.

Day 2

The next morning we were off again!  Destination: Nashville, TN.

We stopped at a beach in Mississippi & poked at some dead jelly fish.  That wasn't our goal but they were there & well...when in Rome...

Other trip adventures included the "dead dilla game" in which the goal was to see who could spot more dead armadillos on the drive.  There was a whole scoring system.  It was legit.  Of course we also came up with it pretty much as we were leaving dilla country...

We tried boiled peanuts.  Kickass Cousin hated them, I didn't mind them.

I made her try Blue Bell ice cream (RIP)

At some point we crossed into Alabama which called for stops by signs such as Talladega & Fort McClellan.

One of the things that we tried to accomplish (& the only one we actually managed to make time for on the New Orleans to Nashville journey) was a stop at the Chattahoochee River in Georgia.  Because, well, we had to know if Alan Jackson was right when he said it was hotter than a hoocie coohchie.  Now, I've never actually seen a hoochie's coochie but it was hot...

Because we got lost trying to find it, it's a theme I know, we didn't have time to stop in Rome, GA or Rock City, TN.

We also didn't have time to do anything in Nashville because there was crazy construction in Chattanooga.  AKA we sat in pretty much the exact same spot for a solid hour.  Could be longer, could be shorter... all I remember at this point is that it was long enough to where we made a video in my car & talked to other people in cars next to us.  By the time we hit the mountains it was so dark we couldn't see & we crashed the second we got to the hotel in Nashville.  

Someday dear Nashville I'll return to you & to only see you...

Day 3

We had spent so much time in traffic the night before, and in the car in general because of all of our back roading & side stops that for the leg that was Nashville to Chicago we decided to just put on the GPS.

We did make a stop at Mammoth Cave in Kentucky.  Unfortunately we showed up at a time where a tour had just started & we didn't really have time to wait for the next one because we still needed to get to Chicago where we had stuff we wanted to do.

We did take a tiny little drive through Louisville just so we could say it obnoxiously...

Once in Chicago we made way to our hotel...which no longer exists apparently but it looked like it hadn't been redecorated since about 1972.  It was really overcast when we were there but we still went to Millennium park & walked up & down Michigan Ave.

We also headed to Navy Pier to look around.  We did the ferris wheel but because it was so foggy you couldn't really see much.  As it turns out we left our hotel just a little too early because when we got back the lady at the front desk said she had wanted to give us some vouchers to do some stuff for free/cheap but she was pre-occupied with another customer when we were leaving & didn't have vouchers to give them as well.

Then, the magic happened.  The sole reason we're returning to Chicago.  Ok it's also a good stopping point... but Giordano's Pizza.  Also known as heaven on Earth.  We're meeting up with one of my friends for supper when we stop this time around & he thinks he gets a say in where we get pizza.  He's so funny...

Day 4

I really wanted to see Wrigley so we drove over there & parked pretty much so I could walk around the outside of it & take this picture.  Worth it.  Someday I'll actually go to a game there.

Wisconsin is about where the trip started taking a nose dive.  Nothing bad happened.  It was just pretty uneventful.  I was tired of being in the car.  I had been away from home, & far away from home, for the longest I ever had been in my life & I was just ready to get back.

We eventually crossed into Minnesota & an hour or so later I dropped Kickass Cousin off at her house...

...and about an hour after that I finally hit my little dirt road.

I am so unbelievably excited for our spontaneous turned extremely planned out trip.  25 days.  Just gotta get through the end of the school year & moving.

The next installment of Wanderlust Wednesday will be June 10.  Kickass Cousin & I will be on our 2nd to last day of our road trip at that point so we decided to put the next installment in your hands.  You can ask any travel/road trip related questions to us (they can be as general or specific  as you want) & we'll co-author the next post & answer them for you.  So go ahead! Ask away!

**Side note:  I did a much better job of doing a recap of the trip 3 years after the fact than the one I did not that long after it.  If you click the links above one will take you to the original recap & the other will take you to a video of the trip.**