On the Second Part of the Journey….

After a brief night’s sleep, shower, and complimentary breakfast, the open road beckoned us once more. This time we were able to see the mountains and the vaguely treacherous path we took the night before. Yikes. I was more than relieved to be in one piece after that first day’s trek.

It was at that point that I stressed my need to take over for at least a portion of the drive. Pop had bogarted the first 12 or so hours and I wasn’t about to let him drive the whole freakin’ 1600 miles. So he gave me a great gift: Most of Wyoming. And gee, it wasn’t even my birthday yet!!

We reached Denver, filled up the gas tank once more and then did an anticlimactic Chinese Fire Drill. I was in the driver’s seat for the first time in almost 900 miles.

Wyoming is beautiful. Beautiful! It is rolling green hills, huge blue skies, winding two lane highways, and sporadic peaks and plateaus. The skies are so large we were able to track the thick slices of blue thunderstorms ahead of us. It was then that we learned we were actually driving on an enchanted highway.

1-25 North was created by a wizard. A wizard who hates rain. We saw at least 4 different thunderstorms during our 5 hours in Wyoming and we missed every single one of them. Every time we thought that the road lead straight towards what looked like a mini-monsoon, Magical 25 would curve gently west and allow us dry passage. It was a miracle. Especially considering my car is special and doesn’t have air conditioning. This means that in the 80 degree humidity we would have had to close out only source of air (windows) in order to stay dry. But NO! Magical 25 kept us on a breezy path!

I drove 4 hours (give or take) and in Casper, WY we once again did the ole “Driver’s do-si-do.” Pop seemed up for the challenge of the next 7 hours, and being a bit green when it comes to navigating long distances, I was more than happy to let him attempt the feat.

Everything in Montana is far away. The state is far away. The cities within the state are far away. The mountains we kept passing were far away (even when they were close). We drove through little big horn and gave a salute to Mr. Poor Planning himself, Gen. Custer. We drove through Billings and admired their two (count’em, TWO!) refineries. We drove through Bozeman and then promptly forgot that we had driven through Bozeman.

Then we drove through Three Forks and brushed up on our history. This was a big stop for the dynamic duo Merryweather and William (we are on a first name basis). It is where the Missouri headwaters are and where the mighty river essentially begins. Merry and Will named the three rivers that came together to make the mightier river (like Captain Planet!). They called them Jefferson, Gallatin, and Madison. And to be honest, the state of Montana in general looks like something out of a history book. Most of the state probably would look exactly the same to Merry and Will today as it did 200 years ago.

All of the cities we had driven through had seemed so small that I was getting worried about Helena. Was it going to be unbearably small? Would I have to drive 2 hours just to get groceries? Was the only thing to do there drink and have children?

Luckily when we finally crested over the smaller mountains that surround Helena on all sides, I was shocked to find a nice mid-sized city nestled in a bowl-like valley. House and business lights filled most of my view and Lo! Was that an airplane that just flew overhead? It was! Hallelujah! So it was, that at 11:30 on Saturday the 10^th of July 2010, I reached my new home away from home.

Pop and I promptly found the local Comfort Inn (can’t beat that breakfast!) and slept with the ferver of a first year medical intern.

The Next Adventure: First Week and First Impressions…With Pictures!!

A Little Piece of What I saw...

Road to Helena from K Parker on Vimeo.

Let’s Start at the Very New Beginning…

1600 miles in 2 days. A father. A daughter. A bike. And an apple-red 1994 Volvo 960. A seemingly impossible combination came together in a remarkable way. It was only one trip to Helena, Montana but it felt more like….two…

After a bit of a dispute, it was decided that Pop Parker and I would set out on Friday the 9^th around noon, looking to only drive about 10 hours, reaching Pueblo, Colorado and then sleeping in order to be fresh for another days journey. So of course we left around 2:15 pm and drove over 12 hours to Colorado, Springs where we were near the point of hallucinating from driving so long.

Before we set out, Pop had a few patients and I had to get my body and brain working after a very sweet going away party thrown the night before. We met at the house at around 12:30pm, at which point we started the tremendous process of attaching a bike to car for the first time in our lives. We Jerry-rigged the contraption until it only vaguely looked like the instructional picture, but felt sturdy enough for a road trip such as we were undertaking. Straps were tied together and to the bike and a few zip ties were used. We were satisfied with our work and decided lunch would hit the spot. So only two hours and fifteen minutes after our intended departure time, we headed out onto the open road.

It was a pretty, but uneventful first day drive consisting mainly of flat low lands, prairie brush, and two lane highways. We passed the time during the day playing “Spot the Antelope” and “How Many Ways Can We Make Fun of The Town of Dumas, Texas’ Name.” The latter surprisingly outnumbering the former in volume.

We listened to oldies, singing whenever Mick, Robert, or Jim came on. Trouble didn’t start till around 12am. At that point, the sun had been down for about 4 hours and Pop had been driving the entire length of the trip (not without my protestations). We were in Raton, New Mexico and were about to hit a narrow stretch of road that lead over a pass of mountains and into the much thinner air of Colorado.

That was when I started to doze in and out of consciousness. My only motivation to stay alert was to continue talking to Pop and thus keep him driving on the road and not into or off of the mountains. I would doze, the jump with a start, spewing the first sentence that came to my mind. I probably confused Pop more than helped him and alas slept for a solid 15 minutes right when the roads became most hazardous. I didn’t learn how close we were to death until 2 days later, when Pop confessed the extent of his exhaustion. I’m thankful I didn’t know at the time. After my 15 minute sojourn I was almost perky. My energy fortified Pop’s resolve and we dumbly decided to go past our intended stopping point and 45 minutes more to Colorado Springs.

Thankfully, some higher force guided us safely to the city. It was around 2:30am when we first tried to stop at the Best Western. Upon pulling into the arched driveway, we saw a large pinched looking woman stalk from the hotel back to an awaiting car. She forcefully opened the sedan door and sat down roughly, making the car shake with her weight and anger. With a slam of her door and the muffled sound of expletives they roared away. It all felt so ominous. Alas, when I entered the lobby the beat-down night manager was ready for a fight. I asked in my nicest, most road-weary voice I could manage, if there were any rooms and she said in a rehearsed and exasperated voice that they only had the large suites available for the highest rate in the hotel. I gave an apologetic look, knowing now how the incensed woman from before came to that state. I said not thank you and went back to search for another place to go comatose.

We went directly next door (after accidently driving the wrong way down the back road a bit). Sure enough, the pinched woman was there as well. She was checking in when the automatic doors crawled open for me. She had a look on her rotund, squished face that indicated she was about two wrong words away from resorting to violence. I stood 5 feet behind her and tried to blend in with the beige-y striped wallpaper. She got her room. I got ours (for a discounted rate due to Pop’s number of birthdays he had racked up). And after unhitching the miraculously undamaged bike from the car, we dragged ourselves, our overnight bags, and the bike to our second floor room. I had to make my sofa-bed, but Pop simply fell onto his king, turned on the TV, and turned his brain off. I soon followed, but only after setting my alarm early enough to get the free breakfast. I have a motto that has never led me astray:

Never skip a free breakfast.

Next Adventure: Day 2 of the Journey