I’m happy to report that my plan to get to bed early last night worked! I got plenty of sleep, so when 4am rolled around, I was awake and ready to roll. After rounding up our last minute things and loading up the trunk with our friends’ luggage, we were on the road well before the 5am planned kick-off.
First stop was Dunkin Donuts on the turnpike for breakfast and coffee.
I tried the turkey sausage and egg muffin. It was pretty good and didn’t mess with my stomach, which was nice. I’m trying to make this a healthy vacation. I’ll indulge a bit, but I’m avoiding soda, since I drank some this past week and it didn’t agree with me.
For this trip, we were pretty conscious of breaks, partially because our friends are smokers, but mostly because I didn’t want my legs to stiffen up like they tend to do. We made it a point to stop at least every couple of hours at a rest stop or somewhere to get gas. The first couple rest stops were pretty uneventful, but we hit one in Illinois that yielded two geocaches. Jon found the first one. I would say he cheated because he was already heading toward it when I came back from the restroom, but it involved a hill that I wasn’t up to climbing, so it’s legit.
The second one was on the other side of the rest area in the woods. Our friends joined us for that one. It was a little more challenging, but I finally spotted it. We left our trackable and picked up a new one, which means we have to find a cache somewhere in Indy during our stay (the trackable is specifically heading east…we don’t want to make it backtrack).
Later, we stopped in Casey, Illinois for a stretch stop and from lunch. As we were leaving the parking lot, E noticed a sign that something along the lines of “Since you’re already in Casey, why don’t you go see the world’s largest wind chime?” Since we’d made good time all day and had nothing major planned for the evening other than hotel room chilling, we decided to head that way. I love making side trips part of these experiences and was happy our trip mates were up to it too.
Sure enough, Casey boasts a huge wind chime that you can ring and everything.
There was a sign at this site that told us that Casey also has the world’s largest golf tee, so we went and found that too. It was set in a country club, so we didn’t get up close and personal, but we did snap a shot from the car.
Since we were in the area anyway, we found another geocache, this one near a roadside veteran’s memorial. The container was small and signal was low there, so we decided to see if we could get the trackable further east. We signed the log, though, and then headed back out on the road to Indy.
We arrived 11 hours after we left. It sounds like a long drive, and it was long, but it was a good one. I love road tripping. I like driving. There was good conversation, but there was also a point where everyone else was asleep and it was just me and the highway, hanging together, being awesome.
Rolling into Indy was great. Jon and I love it anyway, but being with other people who are experiencing it for the first time was a blast. We dropped our friends off at their hotel downtown then made it to our own hotel a little ways out. This is the same place we stayed last year and our first year, and we find that this works out the best. The room is comfy, and the front desk girl remembered us. The people here are super friendly, and it’s been relatively worry free every year we’ve stayed here (the internet isn’t the greatest though).
The rest of tonight will be spent in the hotel room relaxing and having pizza for dinner. We get to sleep in a little bit tomorrow, but we have to be up at a decent time so we can pick up our tickets and badges, hit The Ram for lunch, and then visit the Indianapolis Museum of Art. Gen Con doesn’t officially start until Thursday, though tomorrow night we’re going to go down to Georgia Street and hit a few pre-con events.
I should probably note that while I’m still going to try to update every night, I make no guarantees. We have some late nights and early mornings planned. I’m going to try to at least get some quickies out via the phone, but pics and stuff might be forthcoming after we get home.
So excited to be here and can’t wait for Gen Con to get underway!
A.
The Romance Factor 