California Adventures Day 1

We had a busy day on the road today. We left our house at 5 am, while it was still dark outside! James was ready to go first. Matt woke up at 3:30 and ai followed shortly after. James woke up around 4, came into our room and told us how excited he was to be going on our big trip. We left as soon as the car was loaded and kids were up and ready. We had muffins and grapes in the car with special juice pouches. Road food is so much fun, even when it's same stuff you have at home--it just tastes better in the car somehow.

Jacob with his muffins and glow sticks.  We left the house while it was still dark, so the glow sticks added some excitement to the beginning of our journey.

Everyone got cool new shades for the car as well.

I tried to have something special for each of the kids that was theirs alone, to pull out when things started getting a little mundane or there was a long lull between videos or stops.  I didn't want them to watch videos for the entire length of the car ride, so we mandated that new videos could only be started after we had stopped for whatever reason (potty, food, etc).  Jacob got a Captain America toy, which he absolutely adored.  Julia got some little princess dolls.  James got a cool Gyro Wheel toy.

 We took highway 93 through Nevada. My experience with this road has been that it is a very desolate place. There was actually a fair amount of traffic with many places to stop. We made great time. Total driving time was right around 16 hours, arriving in Arcadia around 8:30 Pacific time. There were, as always, a few comical and interesting things along the way. When we were just a few miles away from the freeway to Las Vegas, traffic came to a dead stop on the highway. We could see the freeway in the distance, yet we could not move. When we finally started moving again and could see the problem holding everything up, we saw that a big rig truck had been on fire. Not only was it a big rig, but it was the very same big rig we sat beside while eating our lunch just a few hours prior.

This was the outside temperature as we approached Las Vegas!!!!