June 21, 2004 (Mon) Florence, SC - Well this should be an experience. It's our first trip with QII (other than bringing him home in May) and our first trip with guests - although there is no way for them to spend the night aboard. And its been years since we've traveled with children, much less a baby. We got a good start - 5:38am 56o - and made our first stop in Freehold to pick up our Daughter Jennifer and Grandson Shane (4 months). This turned out to be our first experience of appreciation for QII. There was plenty of room for all of Shane's travel needs for a week - as well as Jennifer's and our own. This includes several changes of clothes (and diapers) a day, a stroller, a car seat, a "bouncy" seat, a changing pad, a bathtub, a beach umbrella, a Diaper Genie (for used diapers), and a big bag of toys.
The trip will straight forward - CR-53, I-195, I-295, then I-95 all the way to Florida (with a couple of exceptions) But we'll do it in two days with more stops than usual. It had warmed up to 70o by the time we crossed the Delaware Memorial Bridge (into Delaware) at 8:20, 72o as we crossed the Frances Scott Key Bridge east of Baltimore an hour later (vehicles carrying propane are not allowed in the tunnel on I-95) and 83o as we entered North Carolina. Some where in Delaware or Maryland Mark accidentally turned on the windshield wipers and thunk - thunk they hit the base of the CB antenna he'd cleverly placed in the upper-center of the windshield. The antenna now resides along side I-95 and our CB is useless.
The plan was to find a motel for Jennifer and Shane that did not object to an occupied motor home in their parking lot. It turned out to be easier than we expected. The motel we picked, somewhat at random, turned out to have very small parking spaces - hardly big enough for a full sized car much less a motorhome. We decided to try anyway because there was plenty of space in a lot not too far away where some trucks had stopped for the night (it appeared). We were told we could stay where we had parked - in the motel driveway - as long as cars could get by. Jennifer and Shane retired to the room armed with one of our Talkabouts (walkie-talkie) while we prepared to spend our second night in our new motor home.
Q002079 (657mi) Motel 6 driveway dry $0
June 22, 2004 (Tue) Englewood, Fl - QII's bed is more comfortable than Q's, it's bigger and Joy has made a pad from "egg crate" foam, but it's not our air bed at home. That along with it being a "strange" bed, the atmosphere being warm and humid, and being over tired from a 12 hour drive made for a restless night for both of us. We were awake at 4:00 and at 5:15 finally decided to see if Jennifer was awake by giving her a call on the walkabout - thinking that if she was asleep, she wouldn't hear us call. She was awake and willing to get back on the road so we did. We picked up an Egg McMuffin each (except for Shane whose diet doesn't allow it) and were on I-95 again by 6:30am.
We got our cheapest gas so far ($1.71/gal) in southern Georgia. It was also the cheapest we've seen. It was an uneventful morning except for the gradual increase in temperature - 74o to 87o by lunch time in a Florida welcome Center parking lot - but the afternoon brought thunderstorms and heavy rain. (It was good we didn't have a CB antenna interfering with the windshield wipers!) In Jacksonville we turned West on I-10 (via I-495) then South on US-301 to I-75 which took us the rest of the way to Englewood.
Shane has been super - tolerating the trip at least as well as the adults. He complained now and then but for the most part seemed to enjoy traveling - or maybe it was the almost constant attention he was getting. He slept a lot, making the rest of us envious, and babbled and cooed happily the rest of the time. We were very tired after another long day on the road (nearly 13 hours) but realized how much worse it could have been had he decided he didn't like traveling.
QII isn't nearly as upset as Q had been about being banished to the Bank parking lot for our stay here. More mature, I guess.
Q002655 (576mi) SunTrust parking lot (parked)
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