Number of Miles Driven: 465
States Driven Through: NC, VA, WV, PA 
Hours Driven: 4:30 - 12:30 (1 Stop for Dinner/Bathroom)

Ready to Roll!

Whew…what a day! We woke up knowing that our ideal departure time (12 pm) would likely not happen. We took Danielle and Matthew to their final day of VBS and then immediately got to work – we were overwhelmed thinking about everything that still needed to be done. We had gathered clothes for the kids but had not packed anything and we still had two large loads of laundry that needed to be folded. Our bed was an explosion as we folded, selected outfits, and organized them to be packed. We were trying a new packing system – packing cubes for each person containing our outfits for the following 3 days, and then everything else in two big bins. I stared at my bed like a lost puppy as I tried to figure out how to account for the myriad of outfits we’d need in the first three days (hot, cold, rain, swim, water shoes, regular shoes – arghhh), but I finally got it all packed up in the right place after about 1-2 hours (we discovered that night that I messed up Michael’s packing cube – no socks, no pajama shirt, no undershirt…oh well...he’s old enough to pack himself). Michael picked the kids up from VBS and did some last-minute errands (e.g., fish food, groceries), and then we kicked it in to high gear to load the trailer. The kids were helpful for the most part (they’ve been hot and cold – some moments they are quickly doing what we ask and other moments they are audibly sighing about the task they are assigned). Andrew mowed the lawn, Carolyn helped clean up, and Matthew and Dani stayed out of the way.
By 4:30 we were loaded up and “ready” to go – we were all tired and our patience was running low, but the excitement set in when we hit the road. The kids immediately pulled out their “road bingo” game before we even left the neighborhood, and they were counting license plates while we were still on Hwy 55. The worst traffic we saw for this leg of the trip was 5:00 “rush-hour” traffic in Chapel Hill. The drive was fairly uneventful – the kids listened to music on their mp3 players while I graded papers from my summer class. We passed by Pilot Mountain and liked the “mountain” views as we got closer to Virginia and throughout West Virginia. There was steam coming from the mountains and it was pretty neat to see. We passed through a couple of tunnels and we all tried to hold our breath. Andrew and I successfully held our breath for the first tunnel (Dani said she did, but I was struggling, so I doubt it). We didn’t even make it halfway through the second longer tunnel. Fun to try though (and the car was quiet momentarily – ha!). 




We made a pitstop at McDonald’s (kids’ request) around 7 pm and then drove the rest of the night. The kids didn’t fall asleep until about 10/10:30. We were hoping to make it to Pittsburgh, but the drive was going a little more slowly with the rain, twisty mountain roads, darkness, and a trailer. You could tell Michael started feeling it when the speed dropped even more, so we decided to cut it a little short of Pittsburgh. We stayed at Country Inn and Suites in Washington, PA – about 20 minutes south of Pittsburgh. After getting into the room and ready for bed, we were all asleep by 1:30. Stressful and delayed start, but ended on a good (and tired!) note.
The best pic of the the PA state sign we could get in the rain and the dark