If Driving Were Exercise, Today Was the Ironman

After not nearly enough sleep, I got up and loaded the car in the dark. I spent a fair amount of time loading my bike and my daughter's bike onto the rack we borrowed from a friend. I was a little worried about the straps, which were fully intact, but the webbing on them seemed brittle.
Once I had them strapped on, I had my husband check. He decided they needed to be cranked on more tightly and it wasn't until he'd been pulling a bit that I noticed he was bending the spoiler beneath my bumper on my car.

So apparently it was as tight as it was going to get.

We loaded a tired four-year-old into her car seat, which was the only open space in the car. I'd even filled the space below her feet with a suitcase. I did manage to leave enough room to see out the windows though, so I was quite pleased with my packing capabilities, especially considering we had crammed the following things into the car:

boogie board, with wetsuit, fins, and other gear
box of hand-me-downs for my niece
overdue and unfinished quilt for my sister (this was actually quite large)
bike gear (helmet, shoes, toolkit, etc)
my husband's 2 clothing bags
my clothing bag
my daughter's clothing bag
2 pillows (I'm picky)
variety of presents for my nephew and niece
2 laptop computers
"entertainment" bag for my daughter
cooler tote bag with food
snack food bag
box of craft supplies, books, and other entertainment for me
my giant mom purse
beach towels and toys

Items we left at home:
healthy food for the road trip, in the fridge.

Oops.

I pulled over for our first stop in Eugene, where I got coffee and we got gas.

My dad and I have driven this route a couple of times together now. On the first one, I remember pointing out a mountain and saying, "I love seeing Mt. Shasta because I feel like we're really on our way and have such a good chunk of the trip behind us." He immediately pointed out that it was not Mt. Shasta and we had a ways to go before seeing it.

On this trip, my husband pointed out to our daughter--at the same location--"Look, there's Mt. Shasta!" I was able to inform him that no, it's not Mt. Shasta, and we would have another good 45 minutes before we would even see Mt. Shasta.

I don't know how far into California we were, but all of a sudden, my husband says, "OH! I recognize this road now!"

Me (sarcastically): Really?

Him (missing the sarcasm): Yeah, with the orchards and stuff.

Me (more sarcasm): Just now?

Him: Yes. . . (finally detecting the sarcasm) . . . why are you looking at me like that?

Me: Because we're on I-5 and have been for the last 450 miles.

The rest of the trip was pretty uneventful. At one point, we did switch drivers--normally my husband doesn't like to drive because he so rarely drives a standard transmission that he is less than confident with it. I was simply too tired to safely continue. Unfortunately, just a few miles down the road, he realized he couldn't find his phone and we had a period of panic where we were trying to figure out if we had to go back to the last rest area and get it. Turns out it was still in the car.

We stopped at what I now consider the "usual" place for dinner: the Panda Express just north of the mountains north of LA--about 1.5 hours from my sister's place. It seemed like such a good idea, but unfortunately, I think there is only so much Panda Express my body can handle in a lifetime and I have crossed that threshold. The really nice thing about stopping in that area is it is a perfect "last stop" prior to getting to my sister's place.

We arrived at my sister's housing complex around 9:30 p.m. My brother-in-law met us at the gate to have the military police allow us in.

The cousins were SO excited to see each other that we decided to let my daughter sleep on the floor in her cousin's bedroom. After storytime, they both crashed.