Thanksgiving in Branson, Missouri

Even though we were tired, we had a very busy day ahead of us! After phone calls to family members, we went in search of Dick's 5 & 10, which was advertised as an old time toy store. Unfortunately it, along with most other stores, were closed.

If you look closely, you can see water shooting up by the tree. This was similar to the Bellagio water show. Except this one was playing "Kung Fu Fighting."

Our plan was to go mini golfing before our Dixie Stampede show but decided to make a quick stop at a souvenir shop before. Great idea. We walked into this small room where a woman is trying to sell a group of five adults a timeshare. They came to buy tickets to the Dixie Stampede show the next day for seven adults and the woman said that she could give them three free, saving them $150, if two of them would attend an hour and a half seminar the following morning. We might have been interested if requirements didn't require that you be married with the same last name and address that matched your credit card. After 30 minutes, in which the woman told them the requirements and other details a million times, we were finally able to purchase our six postcards and t-shirt.

After all that, we did not have time for mini golf so instead went straight to the show. If you've ever been to a Medieval Times show, you'll have a pretty good idea what Dixie Stampede is. Instead of cheering for one of four knights, you cheer for your side: North versus South. You can choose your side when you purchase your tickets and we chose the North. During the holiday season, however, it's North Pole versus South Pole. North Pole won, of course. We were both very surprised at how much we enjoyed the show and would actually do it again if we ever find ourselves back in Branson. For Medieval Times goers (you know who you are), this was much better food and entertainment. Just saying.

Dolly Parton's Dixie Sampede!

We were very excited for our next stop but it was not yet dark so we decided to go mini golfing. This was not just any mini golf course, though. This was 3D Glow-in-the-Dark Mini Golf. Thankfully the girl that rang us up informed us that the 3D glasses were just not worth it so it was just glow-in-the dark for us but it was still pretty cool. Surprise: Sarah won. But not by too much! We were going to leave but caught sight of two air hockey tables and just had to pay a few games. Halley scored the most points by a long shot but unfortunately for her, most of the goals were for Sarah.

We needed a card to play games but it's never that simple.

The World's Largest Banjo.

Onward to the Trail of Lights, a two and a half mile drive-thru animation display of Christmas lights. It was very pretty and definitely put us both in the holiday spirit. We went into the gift shop at the end of the trail, in Inspiration Tower, but did not stay long once we saw a a t-shirt that said, "My Lifeguard Walks on Water" and couldn't hold in the giggles. Sorry if that offended...

Halley's convinced that it's really 9 ladies dancing and 12 drummers drumming. Thoughts?

Let it snow!

Santa's barn.

Gingerbread playground.

Rams butting heads.

Why yes, it is just like Zoo Lights at the National Zoo in D.C. but better and less expensive.

Well why wouldn't the dinosaurs also be happy?

It was finally time for our own Thanksgiving dinner. We were very proud of ourselves as we turned this:

Into this:

We had mashed potatoes, cranberry sauce, corn, stuffing, bread, sliced deli turkey and sliced Havarti cheese.

Halley even made gravy from "scratch" thanks to encouragement from The Honest Chef. It wasn't great, but it wasn't bad either.

And then we fell asleep before we got to the pumpkin pie.

Texas-Oklamhoma-Missouri

All stops for today's adventure weren't far off the beaten path and we made quick work of them as we were eager to get to Branson, Missouri for our Thanksgiving stay.

Up first was a trip to Cadillac Ranch where a gentleman has placed cars on his ranch to be spray painted. We did not buy spray paint but we had enough fun trekking out to the cars and avoiding stares from nearby cows.

Got it.

Next "stop" was a drive by the Largest Cross in the Western Hemisphere.

Then the former World's Largest McDonald's in Oklahoma.

This picture doesn't do a very good job of showing how the McDonald's building spans across both sides of the interstate.

Our last stop was in Joplin, Missouri which is where Sarah's grandfather's parents' parents are buried. It was starting to look a little cloudy when we arrived at the cemetery and no one was there to give us an idea of where to look. After 20 minutes or so, lightening appeared and we ran to the car, narrowly missing the downpour. We were going to to wait out the rain but clear skies were nowhere to be seen so we headed on toward Branson. We turned on the radio in time to hear that we were leaving tornadoes. Yay.

There's No Place Like...Kansas.

The first half of this post is dedicated to The Honest Chef.

We got an early start this morning and made a bee line to Wamego, Kansas for the Wizard of Oz Museum!  It was everything we wanted it to be and more.

Dorothy!

Pay no attention to the man behind the curtain.

 After a few purchases at the gift shop, we drove a few more hours to the Underground Salt Museum, a very much anticipated stop by Sarah and slightly feared by Halley. The Underground Salt Museum is one of Kansas' 8 Wonders and involves an elevator ride 650 underground. To a museum dedicated to the salt mine.

Miner G-miner.

Holes for dynamite.

Another miner.

Something we definitely did not know: Salt mines are ideal places to store and preserve artifacts from movies/television shows. Pictured here is one of the many boxes from "Friends."

After our self-guided tour, we went on our Dark Ride. The ride involved us seated in a tram looking at different parts of the non-active part of the mine.

When part of the mine is no longer being used, they need to close it off so that air is no longer circulated there. Today they use thick yellow curtains but before that they used empty dynamite boxes, shown here.

Pile of salt that we were allowed to take a few small pieces from.

When a room is completed, the miners sign their names and, in this case, a catchy phrase.

 After reaching the surface, we embarked on the long drive to Amarillo, Texas for the night.

A beautiful sunset always makes the drive seem shorter.

Happy Thanksgiving!

A VERY happy Thanksgiving to everyone! Blogging will return after a brief holiday break.

Topeka, Kansas

Today was another driving day so again, not many photos or stories but when we got to our hotel, we discovered that Sarah is in fact the Guest of the Day! What does this mean? It means Sarah got two free items from the little convenience market located in the lobby. And what two items did Sarah receive? Two bottles of water. Very cool.

Boys Town, Nebraska and Ankeny, Iowa

We woke up bursting with excitement. Today we were going to see Sarah G's good friend Sara G! Before that, we had a little other excitement in the form of Harry Potter and the Deathly Hallows: Part One. Did anyone really think we weren't going to see it just because we were on the road? If you did, you were wrong.

Um, it was amazing. And now we can hardly wait until part two comes out this summer! We made a brief stop after the movie at Cheeseburger in Paradise (HI LORI) before heading to Boys Town.

And what exactly is Boys Town? I'm glad you asked. Boys Town was founded over 90 years ago by Father Edward Flanagan who wanted to help boys with no home. He felt that every man could be a productive citizen if given the chance. He welcomed boys from all over Omaha regardless of race or religion. Today, Boys Town is one of the "largest publically funded nonprofit childcare agencies in the country, providing compassionate treatment for the behavioral, emotional and physical problems of children and families."

Statue as you enter Boys Town of a young boy carrying a younger boy on his back. Not weird at all.

But this isn't why we came to Boys Town. No, we visited Boys Town for the World's Largest Ball of Stamps.

And then we had this funny joke between us that we should get Omaha Steaks. Do you know what's right by Boys Town? Omaha steaks. Didn't get any but laughed pretty hard. Probably just us...

AND THEN we got to see Sara and Joe! We had a wonderful dinner and major YouTube session and got to spend some time with their incredibly adorable kitty, Dexie. Thank you two again so much!

Dexie.

Lincoln, Nebraska

Again, not a huge photo day as we spent most of it driving to Nebraska. The photo we'd like to share is to give you an idea of the weather from Denver to Lincoln:

Lady's left side mirror.

While it was raining so lightly we could barely tell there was any precipitation occurring at all, Lady's mirrors showed us that it was actually so cold that the nearly invisible rain was freezing to her. The ice pictured above accumulated to several inches on both mirrors and the front grill. Nice.

Like we weren't already a little concerned about the ice forming on our car, we saw several cars pulled over to the side and two very large accidents where tractor trailer trucks had flipped over entirely, taking a car with them. We promise we were very safe, which is way we arrived at our final destination so late.

Denver, Colorado: Day Two

Believe it or not, Halley did not use her camera on day two in Denver so there is no pictorial documentation. Sorry.

We woke up...early...and went to Snooze, the coolest breakfast place you could ever hope to visit. Ever. We had (stop reading Grandma) Graceland Pancakes and the Bella Benny. The Graceland Pancakes were covered in peanut butter and banana gooey-ness. We're not exactly sure what else was in/on them, just that they were out of this world amazing. The Bella Benny is one of their spins on Eggs Benedict with prosciutto, brie, arugula, cream cheese and a balsamic glaze. Oh. My. Gosh.

We somehow managed to roll ourselves to the car and get Lady a very well-deserved bath. She had gotten pretty dirty in the desert and we were getting embarrassed for her so got her a deluxe wash. Very classy.


We did a little laundry while we waited patiently for Rachel to return from work. We had a wonderful dinner with her which turned into a fantastic evening, complete with Halley being appointed Rachel's Love Advocate (you told me I could write that, I swear) and a walk to Safeway.


A HUGE thank you again to Rachel for putting us up for an unprecedented three nights. Our families know what that's like and trust me, we are extremely grateful.

Denver, Colorado: Day One

Since Rachel had to work, we didn't really do anything. We did a few loads of laundry and that's about it. Once Rachel came home we went to dinner before heading to the Newman Center for Performing Arts at the University of Denver to see Halley's cousin play this amazing piece on the clarinet. Congrats to Jeremy on a job very well done!

Aw, family.

Fruita, Colorado

Fruita, home of Mike the Headless Chicken and dinosaurs.  First stop of the day was the Dinosaur Journey Museum that had dinosaur bones and robotic dinosaurs. The robots were a little creepy, not gonna lie. One of them spit water as it swung its head around.

This guy spit water.

Earthquake simulator!

Um, can you say awkward? We thought this was kid-friendly then turned the corner to find this scene.

Real dinosaur bones!

On a suggestion from the woman manning the ticket counter, we drove into downtown Fruita to try an amazing turkey pesto panini at a little coffee shop. What was right in front of the coffee shop? The statue of Mike the Headless Chicken!

Mike the Headless Chicken and Sarah the Headless Traveler.

Grrrrreta the T-Rex! Apparently during the holiday season she gets a Santa hat on her head and the Grinch in her mouth.

Really what we came to Fruita for was some Mike the Headless Chicken swag. We stopped in a gift emporium and the woman there sold us a sweatshirt but told us to check at the Parks and Recreation Department down the street for more stuff. Jackpot! Cookbooks, hats, t-shirts, postcards, shot glasses; you name it, they had it. Needless to say they will now need to restock.

We had a relatively uneventful ride to Denver, very impressive as it had just snowed 8-12 inches in the area we needed to drive through and the road was actually closed for a large portion of the day. We're giving a shout out to Colorado for getting their roads cleared fast and effectively.

Once in Denver we had dinner with Halley's cousin, aunt and uncle before finally getting to see Rachel!

Arizona-New Mexico-Utah-Colorado

This was a long day, hence the delay in posting. We woke up very early to get to the Four Corners by 7am. On the way we stopped at every gas station looking for a deck of cards that said New Mexico on them. No luck. But we did make it to the Four Corners by 7am!

All four states!

All four states!

Onward to Mesa Verde, which is one of the coolest national parks visited thus far. We had an incredible tour guide, Craig, who knew a ton about what we were looking at and shared this info in a way that made us hang on every word. He also had some very humorous one-liners.

One of two coyotes we saw.

The inside of a kiva, an extremely sacred spiritual place. This village had eight kivas. They remained a nice 50 degrees all year round so they were great in the summer and only a small fire was needed in the winter. A tourist fell into this one a few years ago and a local tribe came that night and smoked it out to clear it of any bad medicine.

The Spruce Tree House cliff dwelling up close. It is estimated that 60-80 people lived in the 130 rooms.

Craig quotes: "The archeologists really don't like the ground squirrels digging here because ground squirrels don't document their findings." "...And then they made a rainbow appear and it reminded me of a hallucination I had in the 70s."

Above this village is a ledge where they grew crops like corn. How did they manage to build here? No idea.

Wild horses.

Mule deer! There were a group of them just chilling by the side of the road when a very rude sports car drove by very fast and revved its engine, causing them to scatter across the road. Good thing Lady has excellent brakes.

 After the great tour we made our way into Utah to visit the Hole in the Rock, which should really be named the Home in the Rock. This couple spent 12 years (eight to build, four to clean up) creating a home for themselves in a huge rock. We were not allowed to take pictures inside the home but it is amazing. It's 5,000 square feet and really had everything you could ever want. It started as just a diner and kitchen and eventually became their home. The husband liked to taxidermy animals and they were all there. Our favorite was the first one he ever did, his favorite horse. This thing was beyond scary. Again, it is very unfortunate that pictures were not allowed.

One of the many spectacular views we saw on our drive.

Hole in the Rock?

Hole in the Rock.