Arrival in the Promised Land

We made it! We drove up to Grandma's house at 7 p.m. this evening. She had dinner waiting for us, despite our 3 hour delay at the tire shop. (By the way, it was a nail in the tire this time.) It is so good to be here, and we're excited to become Utah homeowners tomorrow morning!

After a car trip 2323 miles long, Coda says, "Don't ever do that to me again. Dibs on the bed!"

Tiring

What's a day without a trip to a tire store? We started out all hopeful this morning only to have a new flat tire indicator on the dashboard!

We're chilling at Tires Plus, hoping for the best  (a patch). This is sixth tire store in 6 days!

1. Firestone in Ashland, KY
2. S&S In Huntington, WV
3. Bridgestone in Betzville, IN
4. Mini Cooper dealer in St.  Louis,  MO
5. Bridgestone in Lake St Louis, MO
6. Tires Plus in Aurora, CO


Not to mention 5 gas stations where we pumped up air. Is the saga over yet?

Pie, Goodbye

We seem to always end up having pie from Village Inn our last night in Denver. Yesterday we followed tradition, and had no guilt about it after our long morning hike!

Thanks, Verlene and Paul for the hospitality. We look forward to having you visit us in our new home in Alpine. Don't forget to bring the dogs!

Climbing the Manitou Incline

Crystal planned something special for our visit to Colorado, a hiking trip up the Manitou Incline. This was a hike up railway ties straight up the side of a mountain! It was 2000 feet of straight up!

I was proud of Crystal for suggesting it, and didn't want to admit it might be daunting for Ed and me!

But when we stood at the beginning of the trail and looked up, we were a little nervous about whether we could actually do it or not!

We stopped frequently for drinks and to rest up, as it was an exhausting climb!

The view was beautiful looking back as we started to gain altitude.

About 2/3 of the way up, there was a bench and a turnaround point, just in case you wanted to go back down on the switchback trail. We decided to eat some trail mix and keep on going.

After 2 1/2 hours we finally reached the summit! We were so proud and so tired! Amazingly, we only got 3000 Fitbit steps out of it! But we did get 200 flights of stairs!

The trail down was gradual and full of switchbacks. While it was not too bad, it took another hour and a half!

By 3 p.m. we were ready for lunch at Dickey's Barbeque Pit, where we really enjoyed relaxing and talking about our triumph! We were so proud of ourselves, but two of us have vowed never to do that again!

If you want to try the climb, see:
 http://www.manitouincline.com/

In the Dog House

Coda finally got to meet her doggie cousins today--Brandy and Holly. It took Ed, Crystal and Verlene to corral them into getting their picture together!

We arrived in Denver about 4 p.m., with NO FLAT TIRES today! It was an uneventful, but happy trip across Kansas and eastern Colorado.

We had fun visiting with Crystal and Verlene and Paul. We're trying to talk Verlene and Paul into retiring to Utah. They're sending us out ahead to see if we like it first!

Paul made dinner for us, and it was great having a real meal after eating out of our car for 3 days. Having a dog on your travels complicates eating out!

Coda hasn't eaten a lick of dog food since we left home, so Aunt Verlene gave her some moist and yummy canned dog food, which she ate right up. She might want to stay here rather than follow us to Utah!

Tired of Tires

Ed said our trip to Zion has been fraught with hardship, just like the pioneers. We've been tested today. Here we are fake smiling at the third tire store of the day!

Our planned nine hour trip from Bardstown, KY to Topeka, Kansas was derailed in Indiana when my new tire (from yesterday) hit a pipe and got a flat. We tried to fill it up at three gas stations before we were able to get enough air to limp to a tire store!

We were lucky to find a Goodrich store in the middle of a cornfield in a small town called Bretzville.

Two very accommodating young men patched it up for us and sent us off to the big city to get the run flat tire we tried to get the day before.

We spent a couple of hours cooling our heels at the Mini dealer in St. Louis, and came out with a brand new tire! We were ready to hit the road, with high hopes of arriving early enough in our hotel to hit the hot tub!

A half hour later, Ed's Genesis picked up a bolt and forced us to look for another tire dealer!

Happily, we found a Firestone dealer in Lake St. Louis who had our name in the system (from Tuesday). They patched his tire and sent us on our not so merry way!

We arrived in Topeka at 10 p.m. central time, too tired to put on our bathing suits, and hopeful that the last of our tire troubles is over!

Some day this will be a funny story, but not today!

Visiting the Brady Cemetery in Texas, Kentucky

We, wanted to stop by to visit the graves of Thomas Brady and Elizabeth Bailey Brady on our way to Utah. They are the parents of Lindsay A. Brady, who joined the LDS church in Kentucky and went west , eventually ending up in Utah.

We had some rough instructions of how to find the cemetery, which were go south from Mackville, KY on the Texas road for 4 1/2 miles. Park, and look to the right over a ridge. You'll see the cemetery from the top of the rise slightly to the right in a stand of trees.

After wandering around in a farmer's fields for an hour we were lucky to finally get help from a local named Chad Warner, who knew exactly where it was! We parked by this fence (this is facing south, and the car is facing north).

Look to the right from the fence at a rise in the topography. Climb that rise!

From the top of the rise you can see the cemetery nestled in the trees!

We enjoyed the beauty of the place and reading the names on the stones. Ed and I are standing by the stones for Thomas and Elizabeth.

We pinned our GPS location to help the next happy travelers. See the pin at https://goo.gl/maps/iEqF6YeqXot

If the link doesn't work, the GPS coordinates from Google are: 37.682885,-85.087584! Let me know if this helps you find it someday!