15 States in 5 Days

We had hoped that our next moving experience with the Hyatt would be a seamingly painless experience. Having someone come in and pack everything up and move while we enjoyed a comfortable flight to our next destination. Turned out with the economy the way it is, that was not the way things worked out.



We ended up being lucky enough to load up our 26ft Uhaul and head out on our first (and last as far as I'm concerned!) trek across the country from Indio, CA to Boston, MA. My two requests while we made this journey: 1) that I get a shot glass from each state for my collection and 2) that Nathan take my picture in each state we passed through. Here you can see pictures from 14 out of the 15 states we were in. I forgot to take one in Caifornia, but I have many of those! Our first day was light since we got on the road about 4pm, but we managed to make it to Flagstaff, Arizona and enjoyed our first sight of snow.


Day 2 took us through New Mexico and we stopped in Amarillo, Texas for the night. We went to Texas Roadhouse for dinner that night and couldn't count the number of times we heard the phrase "Y'all" spoken! Nathan couldn't believe they actually talked like that. Our waitress even asked if we had seen any tumbleweeds, they have them out there ya know?! We didn't have the heart to tell her that we had tumbleweeds where we were from in the desert too.


Day 3 took us through Oklahoma, Arkansas and to Jackson, Tennessee where we called it a night. By the time we got to Oklahoma, we didn't have the lovey dovey feeling for each other anymore, hence the "just take my damn picture in the truck before we get on the road again!". Arkansas was interesting as we saw a truck with a trailer with a tow dolly carrying a van on the back. Can you tell from my picture where in Arkansas we were?


In Tennessee, Nathan was nice enough to get some cows in the background of my picture. When we left AZ, Nathan spotted some wolves walking, but didn't point it out to me in time, so I missed them. After that, I was determined to see some wildlife along the trip. All that I seemed to be able to find was cows, cows and more cows. I also saw a coyote, goats and peacocks, none of which I considered to be the wildlife I was looking for.

Day 4 led us through Virginia, West Virginia, Maryland and finally into Winchester, Pennsylvania for the night. It was so quick going through these states that some of the pictures I had to take of myself in the truck just so I could get them! Nathan didn't want to keep stopping every 30 minutes just for my pictures.....I wonder why?

Our final day of the journey took us through New Jersey, New York, Connecticut and finally into Massachusetts. This last day we had the shortest distance to go, however the combination of rain and traffic (ie. New York), made it take just as long as the rest of them. That didn't seem to matter much since we knew once we got there we were home free and wouldn't have to get up for anymore 12-13 hour days of driving! I do not look happy in my New York picture because we were not able to stop to take my picture and before I realized it, we were crossing the state line into Connecticut. Therefore, I never got my picture. This is a staged one in our hotel room =(

The one thing that Nathan absolutely loved about Connecticut was their service stations/rest stops. They were situated right on the side of the freeway so all you had to do was slow down and stop for gas/food/restrooms and then you could get right back on the freeway. You can see the car lights from the freeway right behind me in my picture. This was a lot easier to manuever in and out of with our 26ft Uhaul with a tow dolly and my car on the back.

Massachusetts was filled with snow left over from the previous week's snow storm. We did a total of approx 3,050 miles in about 4 1/2 days. Needless to say, we were exhausted when we finally got here. We arrived in Boston, MA on Christmas Eve. As you can see, the hotel is right in the heart of downtown Boston's Financial District.