Category: Travel

One Month on the Road – An Infographic

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We just passed the one-month mark of our adventure! That means it’s time for an infographic! (with a written update following the infographic)

It was a pretty hectic start to our adventure as we tried to move everything out of our house and prepare our new “houses wheels” for the journey ahead.

Since the actual house was FINALLY set to close (and we were feeling pretty confident about it), we decided to sign all of the paperwork early and hit the road a little over a week before the close. Silly us. Just three days before the closing, we got news that our buyers’ house sale fell through.

After several days of stress, we decided to continue on our adventure at least through Christmas as planned rather than coming back to an empty house. Unfortunately, this meant that free evenings had to be spent doing a bunch more web design work to pay the mortgage rather than writing new blog posts 🙂

A couple weeks later, our buyers were able to find a new buyer for their home! We’re now set to hopefully close (for real) at the end of December so we can continue our journey in the new year.

While the updates here will continue to be sparse over the next month, Kimberlee’s been slightly more successful keeping our Instagram account updated. Until next time – happy holidays!

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It’s actually happening!!!

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Woohoo!!!! It’s almost time for our departure!! After a bunch of unexpected setbacks, we’ve finally reached the official launch date for our adventure! On Tuesday, October 24, we will set off on this crazy trip of a lifetime!

The truck has been fixed, the house is set to close (fingers crossed!), and we’re now cleaning out the final remnants of the house while trying to pack everything we think we might need without over-packing too many things we won’t.

Since we want to finish our travels in time for Quintin to start kindergarten next fall, we’ve modified the route and will now be on the road for 9 months instead of the original year (Maine – I won’t be seeing you this time, but I’m still coming for you one of these autumns!)

We’ve updated the travel plan on the website and will be marking our progress as we go, as well as posting blog posts and instagram photos more regularly once we hit the road. Don’t forget to let us know if you want to see us along the way!

One last campfire at our house before we depart!

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Broken Trucks and Broken Arms – Our August Adventure

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As Kimberlee wrote in our last blog post, we’ve had a number of setbacks that have delayed the departure on our journey. Not wanting to feel like we’ve had to totally give up on our plan, we decided to go ahead and do a modified version of our August plan. Most importantly, the LAKE SUPERIOR CIRCLE TOUR!

I grew up spending a week each summer up on the Keweenaw Peninsula of Upper Michigan. Many days were spent on the shores of Lake Superior – looking for agates, picking blueberries, skipping rocks, playing in the huge sand dunes, and every once in a while trying to brave the always cold water. Yet in all that time, I didn’t realize there was this whole official “drive around the largest freshwater lake in the world” thing.

We were originally going to just do part of the circle tour and then head east through Canada. Then the house sale fell through. So we figured we would just do the whole circle tour then come back to Illinois until the house sells. Then the truck broke. So sadly we decided to leave the “Houses Wheels” at home, and make the trip cramming as much stuff into our small Honda Fit as we could while tent camping along the way. So off we went to spend 15 days traveling through Wisconsin, Michigan, Minnesota, and Ontario.

The biggest challenge on the trip came when Kimberlee broke her arm protecting the children from a wild bear. Or… maybe she just tripped while hiking. Regardless, she hiked back 4 miles with her arm in a makeshift sling CARRYING A 30 POUND CHILD ON HER BACK (I was carrying the other child – I wouldn’t do that to her!) It was rather fitting that she was wearing a shirt that said: “Strong Women: Be Them, Know Them, Raise Them.” Damn right.

Thanks Canada for your national healthcare – $650 as a non-citizen is still cheaper than an ER visit in the states with insurance

Despite that setback, we still had a wonderful time. Here are some of the highlights of the trip:

Spending time with friends from seminary

Going on a hike with our friends

Spending time with Nick’s parents and grandpa

Picking blueberries with the fam – had blueberry pancakes for dinner!

Camping together

Hello!

S’mores were a big hit, of course

Hiking together

We saw LOTS of waterfalls

Our favorite hike on the trip – the Southern Headland trail at Pukaskwa National Park in Canada

This was before the broken arm

Doing some cool stuff

“Mine” your own amethyst was a hit!

We went on a shipwreck tour

The boat had a glass bottom – pretty incredible to see a 100+ year old shipwreck!

Seeing some INCREDIBLE views!

A few of the views from our trip

The rest of the trip is still on a temporary hold as we wait to sell the house. We’ll have to redesign our planned route – but we knew we would have to be flexible with this whole thing. In the meantime, if anyone is looking for some web design work, feel free to send me a note 🙂

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