We officially moved out of the Cornelia apartment on October 3 and spent the night at Brian's Dad's place. Although not until ideal circumstances - moving company stress + morning sickness - Brian and I were able to get to know Iryna quite a bit before moving across the country. I think both Brian and I would have liked to have the chance to do a bit more "Chicago things" before leaving, but at the time, we were just so overwhelmed and tired.
Sunday October 10th at 3:30am, our alarm went off and we were able to get on the road at 4am, to Brian's delight, totally on schedule. Brian got us smoothly through Illinois, Iowa and into Nebraska and even made an exception to the no-sleeping rule, and let me take a hour long nap. I relieved Brian for about 3 hours in Nebraska, where the speed limit is 75, incidentally, and Brian finished the day by taking us into Colorado, where we stopped for the night at a lovely pet friendly Best Western. The dogs were surprisingly quiet and cooperative the whole drive to Colorado, but they were happy to stretch their legs and run around the hotel room. We went to sleep so early, and slept in until 6am. We didn't want to get into Las Vegas too early, since we weren't (supposed) getting our furniture until the next morning, so we weren't going to have much to do in our apartment yet.
The next morning, Casper (the White Honda Insight) struggled up the Rockies, but throroughly enjoyed the downhills. We were able to take in the spectacular views driving through the second half of Colorado. Utah is equally as breathtaking, but so desolate that it gets a bit spooky to drive by exit after exit with signs indicating "No Services", and having no cell phone reception.
A quick drive through Arizona (more canyons!), we were disappointed not to see the Luxor's beam of light, but we made it to Las Vegas around 8pm.
Unfortunately, we didn't get to spend our vacation week unpacking and getting to know our new city, since we didn't have any furniture, had limited amounts of clothing, and were in generally low spirits (sleeping on air mattresses for 5 nights will do that to you).
We did manage to take a quick trip to the Hoover Dam, though.
Sunday, our furniture finally arrived! At least we were able to sleep on our bed the night before we were both to report to work for our first days. Too bad this is what we have to come home to:
