Anyway! Day 5 started in Sterling, CO. We headed out early knowing that this would by far be our longest day of driving. Our destination for the end of the day was Des Moines, Iowa which meant we had to travel through the rest of Colorado, all the way through Nebraska and through a good chunk of Iowa too. Day 5 was totally uneventful. Quick thoughts:
- I wanted to cry leaving Colorado
- The entire state of Nebraska smelled like
popcorn - Gas stations have showers?
- Where can I get a damn salad?!
We finally got to Des Moines where we checked into our hotel and had dinner in the hotel's restaurant. It was a Thursday night and the hotel was anything but poppin'. I had some Italian Wedding soup which was kinda meh but it filled me up. We decided to walk a few blocks to a liquor store for a bottle of wine and some ice cream. We wound up with a bottle of Malibu and headed back to the hotel to watch Clueless. Pretty uneventful day!
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| Des Moines at dawn |
...
The next day we drove the last 4 hours to Madison! We passed by Em's new office (which was so cool!) and then headed to her apartment to check it out and wait for the movers to arrive. While we were waiting, we decided to go to Culver's because everyone told of us we had to try the cheese curds. They were good, but I didn't expect them to be fried!
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| The view from Em's new place |
We spent the rest of the day unloading boxes and assembling furniture. We headed out to a place that specifically specialized in salads because we were all craving some greens. My salad was good, but the shrimp in it tasted a little fishy for my taste. We still had room for dessert so we headed to UW Madison for some delicious ice cream. The University was bustling with people, live music and lots of locals out enjoying their Friday night. It was nice to be back in a city!
Saturday morning we packed up and headed to Chicago so that L could be dropped off at her uncle's and I could catch my plane back to the homeland. We stopped in downtown Madison on our way out of town to visit the Taste of Madison foodie fest and pick up some non-fried cheese curds to bring home. Once on the road again we realized that there are so many toll roads in Illinois! It took us about an hour longer to get to Chicago than we anticipated so by the time we got the airport, I jumped out of the car, grabbed my bags and made a mad dash to security. I barely got to say goodbye to Em which made me weirdly emotional. By the time I got to the TSA agent at security there were tears running down my cheeks and I was a total wreck.
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| Cheese curds from Taste of Madison! |
I made it to my gate on time, and listened to some Ed Sheeran on the flight to Denver. The airport was super dead so I grabbed a bowl of broccoli cheese soup and ate dinner while I waited to board my last flight. I had a bit of a head ache (this becomes important in a minute) so I took some ibuprofen and hung out with my book.
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| Before things got ugly... |
All was fine and good until about 30 minutes into the flight. I started feeling terribly nauseous and my head was killing me. (Warning: this gets a little graphic) I don't know if it was altitude sickness or food poisoning or a combination of both, but about 20 minutes before we landed, I couldn't hold it in any more. Of course there was no barf bag in the seat back pocket so I wound up puking in my canvas bag that I had stowed under my seat. I felt so awful for the people next to me. I was crying and rocking back and forth trying not to get sick again.
Finally we landed and I got off the plane in San Francisco (did I mention I was sitting in the very back row in the window seat...) I ran to the bathroom to clean myself up as best I could. I saw my Dad as I was walking up to arrivals and I just fell into his arms and started sobbing. The poor guy hugged me tight even though I can assure you I smelled awful and was toting a bag of... well yeah, I won't go over that again.
Anyway, I made it back to tell the tale and I'm sure looking forward to more road trips in the future... Like back to Colorado please!!
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