Road Trip - Utah to Colorado

Day 2 of our trip started much later than Day 1.  We didn't get going until 8am, I think.  It was nice to sleep in a little.  

After a yummy breakfast of donuts, we were on the road again.  Today's agenda was to get to my sister's house, outside of Fort Collins, Colorado.  

We promised the kids it would be a shorter day in the car than the day before, just 8 hours (510 miles).  That helped.  That, and the iPads they could play on.  

Our route took us into Wyoming.  Our 4th state in 2 days.  

 In Wyoming we saw wind turbines, 

working oil derricks, 

and this monstrous moth in the women's bathroom at one of our rest stops.  

We drove almost all the way across the state.  From Evanston to Rawlins to Cheyenne.  We stayed in the southern 1/4 the the state though. 

It looked liked this pretty much the whole way.  The views of the sky just amaze me.  It's so vast and open.  No mountains or trees to obscure the view.  Not in this part of Wyoming, anyway.  
 

It's beautiful though and we can see why many of our friends from there, end up going back there to live.  

We passed an area called Medicine Bow National Forest.  Suddenly there were amazing rock formations out the driver's side window.  We would have loved to stop and explore, but we didn't have time.  

As we continued on this vacation, we realized that there is so much beauty in this land and so much to see.  Western Oregon isn't the only beautiful place in the country (not that I thought it was!) and the places we saw were all striking in their own way. 

For miles along the way we kept seeing billboards for Little America.  I didn't know what it was exactly, but, thanks to all the signs, I knew they had 50 cent ice cream cones.  So, we totally had to try them. 

Turns out Little America is a large rest stop in the Middle of Nowhere, Wyoming.  I believe there are several of them all over the country.  They have restrooms, gift shops, gasoline, and of course, ice cream.  

Back on the road, the clouds looked threatening.  I think it did rain on us a bit, but, honestly I don't remember.  

Once we hit the Colorado border, we were less than an hour from my sister's.  Yay!  Another state.  That makes 5 in two days, I think.  I'm beginning to lose track.  

It was nice to catch up with my sister again.  Life gets busy and it's hard to find the time to chat very often.  We were able to attend church with her and her daughter.  (Her husband and sons were out of town).  

Again, the sky is so amazing and on this day the clouds were so puffy and white.   

 My sister owns 60 acres!  It's beautiful land.  She is East of the Rockies, but she can see them from her house.

 More pictures from her property. 

She also has animals on her property.  They are petting a baby goat here.

 Taylor was excited to see the horses.  

They also have cows, chickens, bees, dogs, cats and I think ducks or geese too.  And they had pigs, but not currently.  

The kids were thrilled about the trampoline she had too.  They hooked up the sprinkler and sprayed water up from underneath.

The kids enjoyed their visit to Colorado very much.  We all did. 

My sister made each of my kids "travel binders."  I don't know what they are really called, but they were great.  They each had one, with pages to color and pages on each of the states we'd be going through and car games, such as Car Bingo and The License Plate Game.  

It kept the kids occupied for hours!  It was wonderful.  They saw nearly all of the license plates from every state in the U.S.  They lacked a few of the far eastern ones like, New Hampshire, Maine, Massachusetts, New Jersey and Rhode Island.

My sister made banana milkshakes one day.  First, we had to explain to my children what milkshakes are.  I guess we've never made them at home before.  My kids tried them, but didn't care for them.  I think that confirmed to my sister that my children are insane. 

Several days later, I ordered a vanilla milkshake at a restaurant.  I encouraged Taylor to give milkshakes another try.  She finally agreed.  I told her that if she liked it, she could have as much as she wanted and then give it back to me and I'd finish the rest.  She gave it back to me empty!   I had to text my sister right away and tell her there was hope for Taylor yet.