Day 5 of Traveling

Thursday, July 30, 2009
Last night Walker requested to be woken up early so he could swim “early in the morning”. Although his joy of swimming is strong, there was no waking him at 0800. He continued to snooze. Once up and dressed, suitcases packed and ready to go, then he decides to swim. A promise of swimming tonight in the next hotel was enough to suffice him. The Continental breakfast produced nice hot waffles with Bosenberry syrup. Most importantly, the coffee was good – hot, not bitter, not too strong, half-n-half – very good.! My 0730 walk this morning brought no exciting scenary – just the businesses and mall stores in the area. The sun was bright and warm and thankfully a nice breeze. The remainder of the day brought 300+ miles and a lot of it was in the middle of nowhere. Lots of desert mountains and cattle ranches. An interesting stop was in the small town or spot, I should say, called Kimberly. The store was part of someone’s home and the clerk served dual purpose of postmaster and cashier. This was the only store for miles and the only building in the “town”. The boys enjoyed the buffalo, elk, and deer that were mounted on the walls. The lunch/snack was limited to corn chips and bean dip. Ymm! Hunter has never had a “chili pie”, so some evening at home I’ll have to introduce him to this delightfully fattening dish – corn chips (preferably plain) topped with chili and then cheese. I like a few jalapenos on mine, but some prefer Texas Pete or even Picante sauce.. Sounds gross to some, but on a cold night, it hits the spot!
Our adventure today was a hike up to see the fossil hills. The scenary and the 97 degree weather at the peak of the day reminded me of Texas. Tim enjoyed and probably appreciated the “green” areas noted on the side of the mountains. We of course did not see nor find any fossils, but we gained a better understanding of what occurs. We then visited an interactive museum and saw Paleontologist working.
The rest of afternoon was seeing the countryside – however, the drive was slow due to all the curves and winds in the road. At times it seemed car queeziness was inevitable. Reading and writing were impossible, so thankfully Walker had much to say about nothing, but kept us occupied and filled the hours.