Kline Road Trips

We’re home!!!

What a great trip. We laughed and we cried. We might have even chortled once or twice. We drove 5,438 miles. From the heat of the Badlands, to drinking Starbuck’s on top of the Space Needle in Seattle, to peeling back layer after layer of American history – it’s been amazing. We’ve been from sea level up to up over 12,000 feet in elevation. We’ve switched our clocks four times and we’ve crossed the Continental Divide at least six times. We’ve seen some of America’s tackiest places and some of American’s most beautiful locations as well.

Now it’s all over. The six months of planning was worth it.

We know this wasn’t the most fabulous trip, or the most expensive. In the end, the blog was probably more for us as a journal than anything else. With that said though, it was great having you all along for the ride. As Dennis mentioned – the tent was cozy with you all in there with us. We loved every minute.

Everyone needs to do a trip like this once in their lives. We live in an incredible country. As students of history, there was nothing more fascinating than traversing the west in a Chevy. Although far from a Conestoga wagon, the feeling of carrying your belongings with you on your journey is an exciting one.

We ended up camping 11 of our 17 nights. National Forests are the way to go. They are cheap, beautiful and filled with friendly people. We met people from all over the world on this trip. It was a very enlightening experience for us.

What’s next? Well… we’ve got 1,762 pictures (thank god for digital) to weed through. Then we’re doing a quick canoe trip up to the Boundary Waters with our friends Mark and Stephanie. After that we need to start thinking about work again. It’s getting to be that time of year. The back-to-school commercials are starting already! It’s time and we’re ready.

Thank again for everyone who hung in there with us. We look forward to seeing each of you in the not-so-distant future.

Love,

Jeff & Amy

We called an audible on our travel plans and we’re now in North Platte, NE versus being just outside of Denver which was our original plan.

We had a GREAT day yesterday in Steamboat. Our hike turned out to be just short of four miles. Not too intense as it was downhill the whole way – however, that has its challenges too… We rode the gondola back up after the hike and had some celebratory drinks on top of the Thunderhead. We then opted to take the gondola back down again versus another hike… After that we went out for some great Mexican food in the “downtown” area of Steamboat Springs. We also took the opportunity to check out some book stores. Jeff completed his Dan Brown collection (he’s hooked) and Amy found a librarian action figure (no, we’re not joking…) 🙂

We woke up this morning (Friday) and decided to head into Nebraska versus just stopping in Greeley, CO. We drove through Rabbit Ears Pass (Beautiful) and then began our approach to Rocky Mountain National Park. Rocky Mountain is an INCREDIBLE spot. However – it’s a lot like how we pictured Yellowstone was going to be. At the top of the mountain (12,000+ feet) it’s bumper-to-bumper with a lot of society’s less intelligent people driving when they shouldn’t be. Got some amazing views. We were well above the tree line and we really felt like we were standing on top of the world. Absolutely beautiful. It was funny seeing snow again because two hours later it was 102 degrees outside of Greeley. We first had to wind through “Wisconsin Dells West” (Estes Park – a beautiful area accompanied by go-cart tracks and mini-golf). We decided that we were ready to start heading back to Green Bay. We’re in North Platte now (home of the world’s largest freight rail yard) and hoping to make it to northeast Iowa or southwest Wisconsin by tomorrow night.

We might update tomorrow or we might just post our last note from home. Thanks to everyone for sitting through this blog these past few weeks. It’s been fun to do and it’s been a riot hearing from you guys via the site comments or by email.

Hello from the road! We’re just doing a quick update as we’re on a sketchy internet connection and we’re parked illegally.

We’re in Steamboat Springs, CO and getting ready to take the gondola up the mountain. We’ve got a 3 mile hike planned back down to the gondola base. 2000′ drop in elevation. (I know, we’re cheating by taking the gondola up…)

Had a BEAUTIFUL campsite in Utah Yesterday. The “Golden Spike” was everything Jeff dreamed of and more. Dinosaur National Monument was beautiful – Amy took another 100 pictures there…

We’ll try and post more from Greeley tomorrow night. We’re going to roam through Rabbit Ears Pass and Rocky Mountain National Park on the way there!

Love to all…

Jeff & Amy