Day 3

Day 3: Sunday September 14, 2014

Planned Destination: Lincoln, NE

“Is this Heaven?” “No, it’s Iowa”

10:30 AM – “Where’s our jam?” Meg wants to know as she's packing our road cooler…. NOOO! we've left it at Joe and Reb's next to our junior mints in the refrigerator….awesome. Oh well, the kids and I just destroyed the continental breakfast then we practiced our cannon balls in the pool. Tough to beat starting days like that, even if it does mean not having two of my favorite things.

Noon – We’re tearing apart the van. We’re missing the working set of wireless headphones. This is the worst day of my life. Okay not really. They’ll turn up. And they do.

12:05 PM – “Guys, it’s fun living in the car!” exclaims Sam.  I’ve got to agree with the little guy, so far so good.

We spend the rest the day driving thru farmland and corn fields; we even unceremoniously crossed the Mississippi River….not that I expected a parade but I did expect a little more than the standard green sign. I mean if you can’t spell Mississippi by the first grade you get put in the slow group in reading class, shouldn’t the sign letting you know you’ve crossed that river have some lights or something?

I momentarily considered taking the 100 mile detour to visit the site where Field of Dreams was filmed.  Notice I said I considered this….  We ended up not going. Apparently the miles and miles of driving by nothing but corn fields was good enough for Meg.

Around supper time we see a glow off to the side of the highway ahead. As we get closer we see a sign, “Worlds Biggest Truck Stop”. It was like Vegas springing up in the middle of the Nevada desert…except we’re still in Iowa. I inform Meaghan that I’m treating her to a fancy dinner and take the exit. We end up eating at a little place next to the truck stop called Grandma’s Kitchen. I can remember the name because they gave the kids tattoos and I read it on Sadie’s leg for the next 5 days (at least she didn’t put it on her face).  After supper we took some time to run around Disney World for truckers. This place is pretty cool, complete with a game room with a pinball machine. Sam and I play his first game of pinball while Sadie spends 30 min in the bathroom. At this point it’s 8:30 and the late night last night is starting to catch up to me so I decide I’m going to treat myself to a liter of Mountain Dew. As I stroll toward the counter to make my purchase I hear a voice behind me sternly say, “put that back.” I whirl around half expecting to see an embarrassed parole officer who had mistaken me as her parolee. Nope, just my beautiful wife making sure I don’t waste $2.22 on a jug of caffeine and high fructose corn syrup. I decided on my own to just put it back and risk falling asleep at the wheel. Just as well, we drove another couple hours and decided to call it a night a little short of our goal. 

States Traveled: Ohio, Indiana, Illinois, Iowa

Final Stop: Fairfield Inn – West Des Moines Iowa

Daily Mileage:  573 miles

Trip Mileage: 1,513 miles

Day 2

Day 2: Saturday September 13, 2014

Planned Destination: Niagara Falls and beyond

9:45 – We got a little later start than we wanted but had a hard time leaving Joe, Reb and Ro.

Meg packed some old CD’s for the ride and appropriately pulls out BNL’s greatest hits. I forgot how much I like these guys, they crack me up. I decide if ever start a band I want it to be like theirs. As I sing along I realize that the only people in the van not covering their ears are those with the aforementioned headphones on….hmmmm……I’m going to hold off on starting a band for now.

We blaze thru the beautiful Berkshires and into upstate New York. Sadie has to pee so we stop along the side of the I-90. Just to show moral support, I pee in an empty McDonald’s cup (sorry, you chose to read J this blog). Sam’s ocular lock from the movie is broken and he looks outside. “Where are we?” he asks. “New York” I respond. “WOW! New York has the greenest grass I’ve ever seen!”

Maggie meanwhile has unpacked the bag beside her and has tried to put three shirts on her head. One is stuck. After rescuing her. We laugh some more.

4:30 We find a parking spot near Niagara Falls for $5 which is a deal because it comes with a free t-shirt from the smoke shop across the street. More on this later!

We had discussed taking the Maid of the Mist boat ride to get a closer look at the falls but IT’S COLD OUTSIDE! I saw a kid in a down snowsuit. I’m not kidding. And because we have packed for California we are all wearing shorts.

We trek over to the falls, take a few pics, head up to the observatory deck, have our hearts stop as Sadie scales the protective fence, and decide to go get something to eat. This is fine because the kid’s more interested in going back to watch the squirrels we just saw in the park. Plus, It’s COLD OUTSIDE.

We find a pub and order a pizza, this sounds good at first but ends up taking FOREVER. It doesn’t help that Sam decides he has to poop. Sounds minor but good golly that kid has to think about it!

We’re almost back to the van when Meg spots the free t-shirt store. “Oh let’s go get the free t-shirt!” she says. “it might be cool.” Anyone reading this ever get a free t-shirt that’s cool? My point exactly. Anyways Sam and I go over to find the free t-shirt. Sadie and Maggie destroy a couple sections of the store. In the end I have Sam pick out a t-shirt for his sister. Everyone’s happy. Let’s go.

8:30 PM – Holy Toledo. The kids are sleeping so we decide to put some miles behind us and head for western Ohio….about another 350 miles or so.

11:30 PM – Ugh!

1:15 AM – I walk into the Marriott and the gentleman at the front desk looks thru his paperwork and informs me he doesn’t have a reservation for us. I didn’t say anything. I must have had the look of a guy with 750 miles under his belt at 1am look on my face. He scrambled to the computer. There we are, phew!

States Traveled: Massachusetts, New York, Pennsylvania, Ohio

Final Stop: Fairfield Inn, Maumee, OH (Western Ohio)

Daily Mileage:  743.4 miles

Trip Mileage: 940.4

Day 1

Day 1: Friday September 12, 2014

Planned Destination: Mullen residence – Brimfield, Massachusetts

(Picture of Planes, Trains, Automobiles)

3:45 PM – We’re off. Packing wasn’t that bad. I counted a few times (socks, underwear, etc….) and let Meaghan worry about the rest (I need to get this out of the way now, she’s a rockstar, I can’t underscore that enough). We ended up with a lot of stuff so we ditched a captain’s chair from the Odyssey and took off.  Sam and Sadie are in the back seat with a big box of coloring books, games, puzzles, etc. They have the kids on Christmas look on their faces as they excitedly dig into the box. They should be busy for hours.

3:52 PM – Sadie: “okay we played with all this stuff, what else we got?”

3:57 PM – After 2 ½ years of owning this van I have just now discovered that the wireless head phones make it so we don’t have to listen to the kids movies. Actually, we can listen to whatever we want in the front. I tell Meg this is the greatest day of my life. She thinks I’m serious. Whoops, well only 3,394 miles to go!

3:58 PM – bad news. One of the head-sets isn’t working. I remember seeing a jack near the back seat so I steal Meg’s earbuds and surf across everything we own and find the jack. Crisis averted. I want to find and hug the Japanese designer who convinced his boss that they should have a fail-safe built into their minivan just in case a wireless headset goes down . Brilliant. Just brilliant.

4:30 PM – Never feed Meg chili before a three hour ride. Good thing the windows work.

7:15 PM – We make it to our destination and my favorite niece Rosealee is so excited to see us she’s literally dancing in the driveway. Maggie sees her and starts laughing hysterically which is good because she was about to lose it.

Rebecca got me some junior mints for the ride. This makes me happy. We stash the raspberry jam we’ve brought to get thru the next six months in the fridge (my mom’s. it’s the best.), enjoy the nice supper Joe grilled for us and we head to bed.

States Traveled: Maine, New Hampshire, Massachusetts

Daily Time: 3.5 hours

Daily Mileage: 197 miles

Total Mileage:  197 miles

You're doing what?

“Why are you driving?” 

As we informed friends and family of our plans to drive the +/- 3,400 miles from Brunswick Maine to San Diego California it usually drew out that questions.  And it wasn’t typically asked in an inquisitive manner, in fact, the interrogator usually had a look on their face as if they were watching me sprinkle broken glass into my morning oatmeal. The conversation usually made light of how painful the experience would be, followed by “oh that’s going to be so good for you guys.” Maybe this is going to be painful. Maybe I grab a barrel at Niagara Falls and Meaghan goes on for years from now telling people how brave I was until that point. But maybe it’s not that at all. Maybe we have an awesome adventure, cry a little, laugh a lot, grow closer and stronger as a family. Our kids have this uncanny ability to make people that don’t know them smile. Maybe they leave a string of smiling faces for the next 3,400 miles.

So, me? I’m betting the good stuff. Win, place, show for Sam, Sadie, and Maggie (in no particular order) with my beautiful wife and I holding the winning tickets. I bet we block the bad stuff and go on for years telling people how great it was; and even if the kids don’t remember I bet this is one of those experience they remember because we’re always talking about how fun it was. Buckle up for the next 3,400 miles, Team Mullen is off to the left coast……ride with us and enjoy “Miles by Mullen”.

The Beginning

Today is the day we begin our journey from Brunswick, Maine to San Diego, California. I WILL fit everything into the van! It's going to be a snug ride. Today we will travel to Joe and Rebecca's in Brimfield, Massachusetts. That's only a 3 hour drive from here. A nice little trip to start off with.