Road Trip Day 2: Illinois, Missouri, Kansas

What a better way to begin another day in the car than by stopping at Cracker Barrel? Ha ha...let's try again. How about the breakfast buffet in St. Louis at Whole Foods (a favorite organic and natural food store)? Yeah, now that is more our style! Organic scrambled eggs, french toast, tofu scramble, fresh baked bread, fresh fruit, and home potatoes joyfully slid down our throats to join the digestive juices in our bellies. Some may think that road trips are all about gas station food (Snickers, Coke, and Doritos), but we prefer to be a little more selective with our road trip cuisine. In fact, Charlie even suggested we do a Google search for the best vegetarian restaurants and build a route around our findings (too bad the best veg eats are located in New York, San Francisco...a little out of our way). After a good and healthy Sunday brunch, we pushed through Missouri and then the long haul through Kansas (with a sweet picnic lunch in the late afternoon).

Road trips are fun because you have an ample amount of time to relax, converse, and listen. On day two, we finished listening to the audio-book, “A Walk in the Woods” by Bill Bryson, a great story of two men hiking the Appalachian Trail (AT). Very apropos since we lived in a place (Athens) that was only 40 miles away from the AT. Bill Bryson is a great writer with a nice balance of intellectual and factual information about the trail as well as a splattering of very funny moments on the trail. It was a good six hours of entertainment. The rest of the time, we talked...it's not hard for Charlie and I to stumble upon an intellectual (or not so intellectual) conversation and be entertained for hours on end.

Amidst all of the “Jesus loves you” billboards, Charlie spotted another winery, Les Bourgeois, in Missouri and that is where we met the pink pig. According to the wine pourer this pig is the most photographed pig in Missouri. Oh yeah and there is a special grape in Missouri, the Norton grape, and now we can say we have tasted it in all of its splendor (or not). Even though we did purchase a bottle of the semi-dry red wine, I am not sure I would recommend you stop only to taste the wine, the pig was much more interesting.

Finally, we arrived at our overnight destination, Manhattan, Kansas (another university town, home of the oldest institution of higher learning in the State, Kansas State University). Do you see a pattern here? We ate at Coco Bolo's, drank some margaritas, and drove through campus to gawk at the beautiful castle-like architecture.

Roadtrip to Georgia!

A road trip across the U.S. is enough to get me back to my American roots! My father & I loaded the SUV and headed out on the road...for a 4 day trip to Georgia!

KANSAS- After driving nine hours from Colorado in the 103F/39c weather, we were ecstatic (and a bit stiff from the car ride) when we arrived in Overland Park, Kansas. We could not believe how friendly everyone was (even the grocery store cashier was genuinely happy as she scanned our cheese and bananas.) You see, the international stereotype about Americans is that we are superficially friendly. Yet, I have come to the conclusion that our avid culture around small talk, smiles, general friendliness and openess to complete strangers is actually filling a void; it makes us feel connected in an unconnected culture that values independence. And let me qualify this by saying...not every American is genuinely friendly.

MISSOURI- We found ourselves shopping at a HUGE Walmart (a hypermart)! Yes, if there is any store that represents down-home USA, it is the sprawling piece of concrete that is known for being the biggest gun-seller and the largest employer in the U.S. (according to Money magazine). We grabbed some strawberries, a wine opener, and browsed the gun aisle (ha, ha!)

ARKANSAS- After a seven hour drive through the sweltering heat and beautiful green, lush farm country of Arkansas, we arrived in Little Rock. Home of Bill Clinton and the beginning of the southern drawl. We found the best Indian restaurant in Arkansas and enjoyed some chicken tikka masala. Ok, we cheated! Normally, when we travel we are ardent about trying the local cuisine...but the south is known for the unhealthy, greasy food and therefore we declined the opportunity to clog our arteries.


MISSISSIPPI- This is officially the fattest state in the motherland. I think it might have something to do with the local cuisine: fried pickles, fried green tomatoes, biscuits and gravy, grits, fried chicken, Mississippi mud pie (this is chocolate heaven), sweet potato pie, and fried okra. Yummy! Mississippi is also in the "bible belt". This was evident as we passed more churches than mile markers. I fully enjoyed the big billboards, "Don't make me come down there. -God", "No God, no peace; Know God, know peace." It just brought (some) truth to the international stereotype that Americans are uber religious.

ALABAMA- We exited the main highway and headed towards Joe Wheeler State Park on a good ol' country road. Now, this is where we experienced the true deep south. We drove through many counties that were dry, meaning NO ALCOHOL sales. Crazy! Many of these dry counties have been dry since the prohibition days of the early 1900's. Since this is a democratic country, the people (within the county) have a say in this policy; as the dry county issue appears on the ballot every year. Yet, just across the county line, you will find "package stores" (the old-school name for liquor stores). We spent the night at the Joe Wheeler State Park resort lodge, which sits right on the lake and luckily we managed to buy a 6 pack of Corona, as the park is located in a dry county. Our room had a balcony overlooking the pool and marina with 2 beautiful wooden rocking chairs. It was a great spot to spend our last night on the road. The next day, as my father went to throw out the beer bottles in the hallway (so no one would know that they were from our room), he found that we were not the only heathens...the rubbish bin was full of beer cans.

GEORGIA- Ah, we made it...just in time for Atlanta rush-hour. EWWWW! More on Georgia later...