Wild West Wanderers - Takin' it to Vegas

Today is Day 4 of our Wild West Tour. This tour includes Rex and I (who are en-route to moving to Vegas), and also our friends Jake and Kaitlin. So far it has been a BLAST, and I highly suggest you check out my video blog to keep up with all of our adventures. It can be found at YouTube under my old YouTube channel, "cknasel."

Right now I am blogging from Middle-O-Nowhere Wyoming, where we have stopped for breakfast. We were surprised they have even heard of "WiFi." We had to drive through five towns to even FIND this McDonalds, so internet is like gold around here. Who knew middle America was so desolate? I mean, as a kid I used to look on a map of the United States. I would see that the Dakotas and Wyoming are mostly blank, and I would think, "Nah. There's gotta be SOMETHING there...it's just not on this map." NOPE. There's really not much of anything. Just a lot of fields containing cows, horses, and antelope. For each town we drive through, there is a sign that says, "Welcome to __________. Population: _________. The last town we drove through had a population of FIFTY. That's it! The biggest city we have been through was population 5,000, and we were all freaking out about what a "big city" we were in. 5,000? There are high schools with more people than that. Comparatively, though, it is a HUGE city. They had MULTIPLE restaurants and hotels to choose from. WHOA!

This trip was almost ruined before it even started. We got off to a very dramatic beginning when, on the morning that we were supposed to be leaving, Rex checked his e-mail and discovered an acceptance letter to a physical therapy school he really likes in Virgina. He suddenly turned to me and said, "Okay...actually we might be going to Virginia instead of Vegas." Out loud I said, "I promised to follow you anywhere, and I will do that. Just let me know where you want to go. If I can propose my wifely vote, though...all of our stuff is already in the moving van to Vegas, I have a job there, we signed a lease on an apartment there, and our two friends are here to help us move out there. But seriously - I will follow you wherever you choose." And I really meant those words, but inside my head a part of my brain was screaming, "ARE YOU FREAKING INSANE?!?! WE ARE ALL SET FOR VEGAS!! THERE IS NO WAY ON EARTH I AM SWITCHING EVERYTHING AROUND AND MOVING TO VIRGINIA NOW!" Luckily, after a couple hours of comparing the schools and trying to decide where to go, Rex chose Vegas. PHEW! So here we are...on the road to our new home.

So far the trip has been really fun, but I feel like I have been on the road for a lifetime. It's amazing how time slooooooooooows down when you are on a long road trip. We have packed a lot in, though! Yesterday we saw Mt. Rushmore and hiked through the mountains to some BEAUTIFUL waterfalls. The day before that we went to "Wall Drug," this drug store that is apparently a BIG DEAL in South Dakota (we saw 97 billboards for it, so we decided we should probably stop). It was fun, but it really just shows you how much of NOTHING there is in South Dakota. We found a SWEET hotel, though, that had a full size water park inside! All four of us were freaking out and playing on the slides as if we were six years old again. But the slides were SO COOL! They even went outside! And the hotel was REALLY nice. I felt a little guilty about splurging...but then we stayed at a SUPER crappy hotel called the "Econo-Inn" last night so I think it all evens out. We might have tried to find a less sketchy hotel, but we didn't get out of the mountains until 1:00 AM. We had planned to stop at 10:30, but we got lost and then kept getting redirected because of rockslides, snowstorms (SNOWSTORMS! In JUNE!), and steep inclines. Oh, and it was the middle of the night. It was highly creepy. I told my traveling companions that it was the perfect setting for every horror movie, and we were probably going to die. They didn't believe me. Oh well, it turned out that they were right anyway. We lived. But the SECOND we got to the bottom of the mountain, we just checked into the first hotel we could find. It was the definition of "janky," but we all just fell asleep so fast that it really didn't even matter.

Now I'm blogging while I wait for my "Day 3" videos to load onto YouTube. I was all excited about the Wifi, but I should have known that the connection here would be S-L-O-W. We have been here for an hour, and I have only uploaded three clips (out of 18). I think perhaps uploading to the video blog will have to wait in favor of going to Yellowstone National Park. It's a close call, but....Yellowstone sounds more fun than this McDonalds. Sorry.

I will continue to fill you in as we go! It's a great trip so far!