Finally at Rest!

Well, we made the big trip and now we're back home. Hopefully for good this time. I need a rest!

It was an interesting and very fun trip. It was quite long, though, and sometimes it felt as if I was spending the bulk of my time behind the wheel. Our first stop was in Wichita Falls, Texas. We were hoping to see some old friends of ours from Minot. It wasn't to be. After checking in to the motel, we decided to get a bite to eat before heading out for the evening. Had a wonderful dinner (really, it was). However, almost as soon as we got to the truck, I started to feel a bit funny. Before we were even back to the room, I was sick! Very sick! It was ugly. The only thing we could think of was food poisoning. So, no visit to any friends that night, and a long night of laying in bed watching TV. No fun.

Our next day was much more uneventful as we drove to Albuquerque, New Mexico. A much nicer day, but I was still feeling just a bit under the whole day. The next day was our first big stop. We met Melissa and her boyfriend Pete in Las Vegas. It was great to see Melissa of course, and nice to meet Pete. He's a great guy. We ended up staying at the Excalibur and going out to see the town.

Here are a couple of pictures of us in front of the hotel.

Vegas was an interesting town, and not really what I remembered from the last time I was there. It has become much less "family oriented" than before. Not that it was ever really family oriented, but it's now much less hospitable.

It didn't take us long to decide that we'd seen enough of Vegas, so the next day we were off for California! We stayed with my sister Nikki and her family in Simi Valley. It was great! We got to do a lot of catching up and we went to Magic Mountain to ride all the roller coasters, hit Hollywood and the beach. We also squeezed in a little 4-wheeling just for fun.

After a few full days of activity, we wound down with a great meal at an Italian restaurant across the street from Universal Studios. Great food and atmosphere!

John and Nikki

Melissa and Pete

Cindy and David.

So, after some time in California, it was time to head for Utah and the Fail Family Reunion. We were lucky enough that Jen and Dylan were able to go with us. We rented a trailer from Hill AFB and we all scrunched in. It was fun!

We played a little golf. And we hung out at the campground, enjoying each other's company and having fun. Here are some pics.

So, the fun was over and it was time to go home, almost. The night before we left, we were up at 1:00 am taking Cindy to the Emergency room at Lakeview Hospital with a bit of bronchitis and an Asthma attack. We were there for about 2 and 1/2 hours, so you can imagine we didn't get much sleep that night. Driving the next day was very exhausting. But, we drove to Salina, Kansas that night and then home to Louisiana the next day. It was a very long and tiring trip, but it was so much fun. We loved seeing the all the family and getting some time to spend with our kids and grandson. Wish we could see them all more often!