Day 1: December 23, 2021:
A few days ago, my family (my mom, my dad, my sister, my dog, and me) and I started our trip to Arizona. Mom told us all to “pack light”, but in the end, we packed too much stuff that I cannot mention. After arguing about buying a Travel Case for our Nintendo Switch, my family, including me, got into our van, and we were off!
We passed so many towns, New Berlin and Mukwonago just to name a few. My sister Abby started to play on the Nintendo Switch where she was playing Animal Crossing: Happy Home Paradise. My mom and dad on the other hand were talking to each other in Nepalese about who-the-heck-even-knows. I, on the other hand, am writing this whole report down for the whole day. And my dog, Simba, was sleeping on my foot, so that’s what I THINK you should call “heated flooring”?
We also stopped at Panera Bread to get some food. After I put on hand sanitizer, my hand started to sting a little, so I had only one option: scream, so I did. The reason why my hand stung was because of the fact that one of my hands had a blister from Golf Club yesterday, so when I rubbed my hand sanitizer on that hand, you already would know what happened.
At 11:35, we already left the country and headed to Illinois. We had about four more hours of gas, but I was fine with that because what is worse than four more hours of gas? NO GAS AT ALL. Obviously.
In case you are wondering what my whole family did after that, see paragraph two. But there were always a load of Dad’s annoying jokes, dad version, super terrible. Simba was still sleeping on my foot and Mom was downloading a podcast-making app on her phone. Does that count for breaking her own only-one-hour-and-forty-five-minutes-on-phone-or-Nintendo rule? And all I have to say about Illinois are five words: Too. Many. Hotels. And .Waterparks. Okay that kinda counts as six words but who cares?
We also went to Dairy Queen to go to the bathroom. Enough said. Not to mention we saw a real plane fly past us. No biggie. <smiley face> We also got to drive by Kishfallkee River. And there is also a place in Illinois that is called Paw Paw (for some reason Mom thinks that this is funny). Mom also played Nepalese music which actually is REALLY catchy. We then made our way to St Louis where we got to drive under the St Louis Bridge over the Illinois River, OBVIOUSLY.
After a looooooooooooong and boring time of driving (“Oh look, more wheat”- quoted by Abby Subedi) , we stopped at a Culvers and got our lunch, and also got more gas in our van’s engine, which obviously is a good thing. We then went back on the road, again.
After another looooooooong and boring period of time, we all arrived in St Louis, Missouri, where we saw the beautiful landscape of the city, the sky also had a nice touch to it, having shades of orange, purple, pink, green, blue, black and yellow, during and after my turn on the Nintendo Switch.
*sniff sniff* And my dog farted. What a way to ruin the mood. Not to mention the thought of Mom playing Breath of the Wild on the Nintendo Switch. And the dad jokes Dad made. At that rate we had traveled 363 miles in 6 hours, for a stat loving person.
Then after a SUPER LOOOOOOOOOONNNNNNNGGGGGGGG period of time, we arrived at Candlewood Suites, a pet friendly hotel. My family and I took out some important stuff from the van. After a period of time, my sister, my dad and I decided to take the dog out for the bathroom and get our suitcases. The second we left the hotel, sad music started to play (no kidding, this actually happened) and something made a thump-ing sound. I did not know what happened, but both Abby (my little sister) and I ran, retrieved the suitcases, and ran back to our room in the hotel. After a load of hectic events, we all went to sleep on our first day on the road.
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Day 2: December 24, 2021, Christmas Eve:
The next day, my dad, my mom, my sister, and I woke up after a long, long night. I woke up with my hand out of the bed, and my dog licking it. My family then got dressed, got out of the hotel, and went on the road on Christmas Eve. We also stopped at a Starbucks to get breakfast, and after a couple of minutes, we got out of Missouri and entered Oklahoma.
To continue further on exploring Oklahoma, we had to pay a few tolls, but it didn’t take that much time. And after that we drove for a looooooooooong period of time. We then stopped at Walmart to get food for ourselves. We then started to make our way to Amarillo (which is in Texas, mind you), but a bunch of the time we were stuck in Oklahoma City, much to Abby’s dismay (“I hate Oklahoma”- quoted by Abby Subedi).
After a reeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeeaaaaallllly long period of time, we finally arrived at Panhandle, Texas. It was very windy there, but the heat was okay. We stopped at a gas station to refill and get ice cream. When I felt the ice cream container, it was WARM. AND ICE CREAM IS NOT SUPPOSED TO BE WARM!!!! Anyway, Amarillo was just a few more miles away, so we could NOT agree to stop.
After another reeeeeeeeeeaaaaaaaallllly long period of time, we arrived at New Mexico, so that meant that the state after we went through New Mexico was our destination, Arizona. My sister and I were really bored during the trip. We tried playing some music, but the mood didn’t magically change after that. The whole ride was still BOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOORRRRRRRRRRRIIIIIIIIGGGGG, even with the music (which was mostly ballad or something and rhythm songs, and the videos kept on glitching).
We all felt tired, since the hotel we were going to was SUPER FAR AWAY FROM OUR CURRENT SPOT!!! But however, we got to see the beautiful outlooks of the cities in New Mexico. After stopping at a hotel called La Quinta, we took a shower, brushed our teeth, and went to bed, after a long day. Not to mention I learned this really cool song called “What Are You Waiting For” (at least, that’s what I think it is called).
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Day 3: December 25, 2021, Christmas:
When I woke up the next morning, I think it was about 7am or so. Either way, I got a peppermint stirring stick (from Abby) and a pillow (from Mom) for Christmas. My whole family then went to the main room of the hotel to eat breakfast. I ate two waffles, drank a glass of milk, and drank two glasses of orange juice. We then packed our things and continued our journey to Arizona.
We then got to see this place called the Blue Hole. It is exactly 80 feet deep and 60 feet wide. There were a lot of cacti surrounding the Blue Hole. I cringed while looking down at the blue nothingness and the chance of any of us falling into the water, and sinking. But overall, it was pretty interesting (I then got used to it and boi was it beautiful (I even saw a fish in there))
We then started heading for Arizona again. Along the way we saw a lot of plateaus. It was absolutely magnificent. Seeing many rocks and plants from a view like that was absolutely breathtaking. Mom also started playing music which I could not understand the lyrics to.
But then, while we were driving, The car suddenly moved forward forcefully. We all were forced back and slammed into our car seats. Dad ran out the van to see what was going on. It turned out that some other people accidentally drove into our van, on their way to a Christmas party. After a talk from the police (don’t worry, everyone was okay), we moved on to the road again after a lot of chaos
After a reeeeeeeeeeeaaaaaaaaaallllllllyyyyyyy long time, we arrived at Pastora Peak. We only got to have a good, breathtaking look at the mountains, but it was a really relaxing site. Finally, we kissed goodbye to New Mexico and said hello to our destination: Arizona!
After a few gas station stops and run-ins with stray dogs, we made it to the hotel. We then put on our pajamas, brushed our teeth, and went to bed at 11:45 pm.
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Day 4: December 26, 2021:
Our whole family woke up and got ready at 9am. We were in a hurry to get to breakfast on time. When we all ordered breakfast, we already got our souvenirs (I got a bag of magnetic rocks). But the breakfast was tasty though.
We then left the hotel and finally got to our actual destination: The Grand Canyon! First the weather was really foggy, we could barely see the canyon itself. We then were about to leave but then the fog cleared up and we saw one of the World’s Seven Natural Wonders. There were shades of red, orange and yellow. The view was so clear that we could see the Colorado River from the place we were standing. There were also volcanoes that we could see. After a super long time of looking at the view of the colossal land form, we went to a gift shop (I bought nothing :)). We then started our journey to the west side of the Grand Canyon.
Also, YES, it does snow and get cold in Arizona. There, you learned something new today.
But after a short amount of time (5:47pm to be exact), we went to a hotel. Mom and I then washed our dirty clothes and we all went to bed.
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Day 5: December 27, 2021:
My whole family woke up the next morning. We all got ready, ate breakfast and sped over to the west side of the Grand Canyon.
At first, my parents wanted to go zip-lining over the Grand Canyon, which I was scared about (you only had to hold onto a bar instead of the usual way people go zip-lining), but zip- lining was canceled for the season, so we just decided to just go on the Sky Walk and go hiking. No pets were allowed so we had to put Simba in a kennel (not to mention Mom and Abby played a shooter game and failed horribly). We then set out for the Sky Walk.
For the Sky Walk, we had to take out any coins, watches, phones, and blablablablablablabla. Anyway, there was this guy that took many pictures of us and sent them to us. Then for the hiking, it was stressful (if you had acrophobia, would YOU be scared?), but all of us managed. The view was absolutely breathtaking. After eating breakfast, and picking up the dog from the kennel, we then set off on our way home.
We then encountered the Hoover Dam, which I have no idea about why it is famous. Anyway, I am still wondering: Is the Hoover Dam in Arizona or Nevada (it is straight in the middle of the two darn states)? We then made it to Las Vegas, Nevada. We struggled to find a place to buy food, and we had to use a place where the workers spoke SPANISH to use the bathroom (the one at the restaurant had a fully stocked line and bathroom (also I should’ve said “Tu hablas ingles?” (translation is “Do you speak English?) to one of the workers)).
After a short amount of time, we arrived at the hotel. It was large in size and the bathroom had a jacuzzi. However, I did not want to stay there forever like the Lotus Casino (from Percy Jackson), YOU STAY THERE FOREVER. Anyway, after a long night, we finally got some sleep in the PROTOTYPE OF THE LOTUS CASINO. MUAHAHAHHAHAHHAHHAHAAAA.
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Day 6: December 28, 2021:
Not that much to say for that day, we left the hotel, left Nevada, and traveled through four different states (Nevada, Utah, Arizona and Colorado). We also stopped through loads of gas stations, and it snowed. So yeah.
We also stopped at the hotel where Abby went swimming (not to mention there was this woman that was wearing a really revealing bathing suit and was drinking in the hot tub (Yikes that pool really needed a lifeguard)). We then went to bed and the next morning, Simba made a lot of racket. So yeah.
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Day 7: December 29, 2021:
The whole family and I then woke up, got dressed, and left the hotel.
We were still in Colorado (it also snows in Colorado (gasp)). There were many gas station stops and we also drove up a mountain (elevation was 11,552 feet). Soon, there was less snow than usual. And not to mention, there were TWO DAYS UNTIL THE END OF FREAKING 2021! We were also going to take a train to Pikes Peak (my sister and I did not want to go to a place that is -2 degrees fahrenheit).
In the end, we got up to Pikes Peak by train (the conductor for our train is like the coolest , it was really cold up there. There was a cafe up at the peak, where I got Mac n’ Cheese. But soon, I kinda felt a little wonky.
I felt like I wanted to throw up, and I was baking too. It turned out that my lungs were getting used to the air up in the mountains, but Mom gave me a cinnamon covered doughnut so then I felt so FIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIINE (traumatized Tord from Eddsworld noises). Soon the train was going to leave, so I told Dad to get in the train, but he just didn’t listen (if the train left, you would not get the chance to return back up the mountain (you were stuck there almost forever)). Mom went with Dad to take pictures of them on the peak. I (as the overprotective self I am), led my sister to the train and sat by ourselves, until Mom and Dad got on the train with us.
After an apology from our parents, we returned on the road and after a loooooooonnnnnnggg ride. To our cousin Pawan’s house. He has a Boston Terrier named Scooter, but he and Simba didn’t get along that well (they chased each other all of the time).
After a family picture, we then got back on the road (with additional gas station stops), we arrived at the hotel and went to sleep.
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Day 8: December 30, 2021:
Again, that day was not that exciting, but we DID see a city called Ovid (add the letter c and you know what you get (hint: we are in a pandemic of this right now)) and entered Missouri. We also went swimming that day.
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Day 9: December 31, 2021, New Years Eve:
When we woke up the next morning, it was 9am. We did not want to waste any time, so we left without eating breakfast at the hotel. For breakfast however, we just stopped at a chicken finger restaurant called Raising Cane’s (this folks is the key to happiness) and also stopped at a Starbucks. Soon, we got back on the road to OUR HOUSE (woo hoo(I know, so lame))
We stopped at gas stations a lot and my sister and I played Nintendo (where Abby was getting really good villagers and both of us wanted to save power on the console so we could celebrate New Years Eve on Animal Crossing: New Horizons (of course)). We then unknowingly got to Illinois (we got to the border (which is the Mississippi River in case you’re wondering)). Not to mention that the night was very foggy, and raining a little bit. BUT MOM WAS PLAYING CATCHY NEPALI MUSIC SO WHO CARES!
While I was getting used to the lighting on this STUPID LAPTOP (this laptop is actually really cool, so I should be ashamed of myself), Dad was still driving. And driving. And driving. And also Mom played a song in which one part involves kissing (which is the start (why am I using the word “which” a lot)).
After a looooooooooooooonnnnnnnnnnnnnggggggggggg period of time with me and Abby watching videos and me sweating my arms out and stopping for food and bathroom breaks, and after a stop at Metro Market, we finally reached home. Still with my annoying dad.
My life didn’t magically change after that whole thing. I still had my annoying dad, my nagging mom, and my sister as my one friend. But the whole thing was a good adventure…. I guess.
From a blogger,
Nova Subedi