Just wanted to give a quick update on our adventure so far. We left Virginia on 5/18 and spent one night in Pittsburgh with some friends. Then we drove to Ohio and spent a few days with my parents, and my sister came into town, which was awesome. We played some games and just spent some time together.
After that we went to Cara's parents and spent a few days in Michigan, seeing a few friends and her parents were awesome and threw a party for us and so we got to see some of her family and a few more of our friends. We also dropped into Crossfit Grand Trunk, which is a great spot. If you're in the South Lyon area, check them out.
Then we headed off to Chicago and saw some college friends and Cara's brother, and went on the Lagunitas brewery tour (more info on that tomorrow) as well as got some pretty awesome tacos. After Chicago we made one night stops in Madison and Minneapolis to see some college friends and then made our way out to North Dakota to see Cara's college roommate and her family. In a few days we'll make the trek back to Ohio with a pit stop in Milwaukee to see my college roommate and after a short stop there we'll be packing our bags for the rest of the trip and heading off to Maine before leaving the country. I plan on taking lots of pictures in Maine, so those will be showing up here sometime, depending on our access to the internet.
So far its been an awesome trip, although it still feels like a vacation and like we'll be heading back to work. The whole "year traveling" hasn't really set in for us, and I'm not really sure when it will. Probably when we leave for Maine with only the things we'll be carrying for the next year.
We have also planned most of the rest of the summer while we've been on the road, and now only need a few nights of lodging to have us all booked until flying to Africa on October 10th. Once the road trip is complete I'll post a summary of how much we spent on this leg too, and our estimate for the rest of the year.
-Jeff