Off We Go!

Yahoo!! Our honeymoon adventure has finally begun!

We began our day with waking up at 4:00 a.m. After getting the animals situated, we said our goodbyes to them, hopped into the car, and headed toward Missouri.

Our first rest stop was somewhere outside of Nashville. As we approached the gas station, an ominous stretch of clouds hung over us. Yes, we were a little scared, to say the least. We got out of the car just as a huge gust of wind blew in from the east and brought with it some angry thunderstorms and heavy rain.

After filling our tank, we got back in the car and proceeded to continue with our destination. We drove a good 300+ miles before passing through Kentucky. We ate our lunches we had packed for the trip and continued toward Illinois.

As we were welcomed by the wonderful "Welcome to Illinois" sign, we were also greeted by heavy rain and thunderstorms again. This time, the rain stayed with us and was very unforgiving. At one point, our extremely polite GPS instructed us to go toward a bridge that ended up being washed out by previous heavy rains. Needless to say, we had to find an alternate route.

Whoa! The alternate route actually took us through some areas devastated by flooding. Water levels were very high and many houses were surrounded by sandbags. With our hearts beating fast, we braved this route that put us at the same level as the waters that were continuing to rise. Whew! After what seemed like an eternity, we made it through Illinois and Mother Nature's wrath.

We continued on our journey. On the way through Missouri, we saw a camel, rabbits, cows, goats, and kangaroos! Yes, I said KANGAROOS, mate!

As we neared Zac's great uncle and great aunt's house in Warsaw, Missouri, the weather became absolutely beautiful. We finally arrived at Uncle Bob and Aunt Barbara's house safe, tired, and hungry.

We had a delicious dinner, consisting of ham salad sandwiches, cherry nut salad, some fresh fruit, and banana nut bread. Yummy!

We finally settled in and ended the night early. Off to dreamland......