I have two weeks off school and Dad has vacation to burn by the end of the year, so last Thursday, Mom and Dad woke me up super early in the morning and told me were going to Arizona.
They had been telling me about our cousins Ellie and Nate in Tucson, Arizona, for the past few weeks. Ellie is my age and Nathan is Hazel's age, and they sure sounded nice. So, I at least knew something about a trip to Tucson in the works.
This trip was different than our last few road trips though because we left very early in the morning - five o'clock! The drive was so long that even splitting it over two days was going to make for some very long driving days. Dad wanted to leave early so we would have time to stop at fun places along the way and still get in before it got too late. Plus, Mom doesn't like driving at night. So they loaded up the car, put us kids in our car seats -- still in our pajamas -- and headed out.
Hazel, Turner, and I immediately fell asleep, and so did Mom. Unfortunately for Dad, who was driving, the weather was not too cooperative. It was rainy and foggy, so Dad had to drive pretty slow the first few hours. He did get to enjoy watching the sun rise though.
By the time Mom woke up, it was light outside and the weather had improved significantly. Before too long, we were making good time and already making our first stop. We stopped at a gas station, where we gassed up the car, changed out of our pajamas, used the bathroom and ate a nice breakfast. By the time we finished all of that, we had spent almost an hour at the gas station. That was pretty typical of our pace the first day -- we'd stop about once every three hours for around an hour. Mom did a great job of packing snacks, books, and toys for everyone, so Hazel, Turner and I did great on the drive.
A lot of people had warned Dad that there wasn't a lot to see or do on the drive out to West Texas, but we found plenty of things to do. For lunch, we stopped in a town called Fort Stockton. In case you don't know, Fort Stockton is home to
Paisano Pete, the second largest road runner statue in the United States. (The next day we drove by the place outside Las Cruces, NM, where we could see Pete's nemesis, the country's largest road runner statue, overlooking the highway.) Hazel and I thought Paisano Pete was pretty cool.
Unfortunately, there was no place to eat around Paisano Pete, and it was very cold outside. Mom had made a delicious lunch for us, but we really didn't want to eat it in the car, since we had already been in the car for six hours. That's when Mom spotted the Fort Stockton Visitor Center and Chamber of Commerce. Dad ran in to see if they had an inside table we could use. The people in the Visitor Center could not have been any nicer. They offered us their very spacious and nice business meeting room to have a picnic lunch in, and even offered us extra food and drinks. The also gave us Paisano Pete pins and stuffed bears. Dad took Hazel and me on a tour of a railroad car at the center as well. We were so thankful for the kindness and generosity of the Fort Stockton Visitor Center. If you are ever nearby, I definitely recommend that you visit.
After lunch, we proceeded on our drive to El Paso, Texas. With the help of an extra hour due to the time zone change, we made it to El Paso way ahead of our goal. In fact, we were so early, Mom and Dad took us to the El Paso Science Museum, where we played for an hour and a half. We then checked in to our hotel for the night, eager to get a start on what would be a much shorter drive on Friday. Mom and Dad agreed that the trip so far had gone surprisingly well. It was getting pretty cold outside though....
Hazel woke up pretty early in the morning with some screaming that got all of us up. While we would have preferred sleeping in a little later, Dad thought that maybe it was for the best since we could get an early start and end up with moe time to spend in Tucson with our cousins. Dad took us kids to the breakfast buffet at the hotel. He was shocked to see on the TV that the road to Tucson, I-10 through New Mexico was closed due to bad weather! He looked at the window and sure enough, everything was covered in snow! Mom had no idea it snowed in the southwest. This was definitely a bummer Not only did it delay our trip, the roads were so bad in El Paso that everything in town was closed, and we were pretty much stuck in the hotel the whole day. We did have one surprise - there was a Rudy's barbecue next door, so we walked over there for lunch.
Even with our fun lunch break, we were all going a little stir-crazy by the end of the day. Around 4:00, I-10 opened back up, so despite Mom's hesitation, we packed the car and headed out to see if we could make it to Tucson. Unfortunately, the roads were still very icy, and we wound up having to turn back and spend another night in the El Paso Holiday Inn Express. Hazel even noticed how much our minivan was sliding on the ice -- she said "That was crazy" after one bridge, which was Dad's cue to turn back and try again the next day. The hotel staff couldn't have been nicer, and were especially nice to me, Hazel, and Turner. I passed a lot of time by playing on the computers in the business center. Mom's habit of overpacking toys and food finally paid off.
Saturday, I-10 was closed again but opened up again mid-morning. Mom and Dad decided to give it another shot, this time during the early afternoon when they hoped the sun would melt the snow. They started driving, and even though there was a lot of snow on the ground, the roads were no longer icy. It was a huge relief.
However, traffic was pretty bad since everyone else, like us, had been waiting for road conditions to improve. We spent a lot of time just sitting on the highway. At one point, Mom actually got out of the car, grabbed a big handful of snow from the side of the road, made a snowball, and got back into the car. She gave the snowball to Hazel to hold, and then to me. It was pretty neat. Then, before it melted, she threw it back out of the car. Mom had been smart to bring her camera along, and took some great pictures along the way from the road. She took pictures of
wind farms in West Texas, prairies in New Mexico, long, long trains, and mountains in Arizona.We also saw strange signs, like a notice that a prison was nearby and not to pick up hitchhikers and another sign that said dust storms sometimes kick up in the area, and there can be zero visibility.
We sped through Arizona pretty quickly, stopping only in one area. Signs had been up for over 100 miles advertising "The Thing?" and we all fell for the advertisement. Having anticipated "The Thing?" for over an hour, we were extremely disappointed to get there and find it closed for Christmas Eve. Undaunted, we kept going, with our cousins' house only an hour away. Just before dinner time we finally made it!
After a pretty tough couple of travel days, we were sure happy to see our cousins Ellie and Nathan and their parents, Aunt Mindy and Uncle Steve. They came outside to greet us, and then had tons and tons of toys for us to play with. While the grown-ups helped unload the car and get ready for dinner, we all played with the toys and got to know our cousins. Aunt Mindy made a delicious Hanukkah latke dinner and we lit the candles together and all opened some fun presents. We were so excited it was hard to get to sleep. Mom and Dad didn't seem to have much trouble falling asleep though.
On Tuesday, Ellie and Nate went to school, Aunt Mindy and Uncle Steve went to work, and we were on our own again. This time, we went to the Tucson Children's Museum. It was pretty fun and their staff was really welcoming. In the first room they had a firetruck and a motorcycle that you could ride on. The next rooms had a Lego table where I spent a lot of time building things. They also had a neat room where you could write with light pens on the walls. Hazel did that for a pretty long time, then she went over to another room to draw on chalkboards. The last room we went in had fruit and vegetables you could pick from trees, shopping carts, and a kitchen with blenders. I made Mom and Dad some smoothies. It was a fun time, and after driving around a bit, we headed back home for a Tamale dinner with our cousins.
All of us kids got along so well during our visit. Hazel followed Ellie around a lot, and loved
playing with Nate. I spent a lot of time talking with Ellie too. Mom
and Dad thought it was really great watching us all interact. 
