ROADTRIP! (San Antonio - Omaha)

2 Days
989 Miles
17 Hours in the car
1 Baby
2 Dogs
2 Exhausted parents
Lots of pictures

We spent the last two days making our way from San Antonio to Omaha. Luckily this was not our baby's first road trip (he got to go on a 5 hour road trip on his third day alive) so we knew he would be pretty well behaved. Due to his feeding schedule, he woke up on the first day around 0530 so we fed him and got an early start on our trip.

This gave us a good chance to dodge morning rush hour in San Antonio and see a great Texas sunrise.

The signature part of any road trip in our house the the constant back seat driving courtesy of our dogs.

Our son was basically an angel for the entire first day of the trip. He would wake up and be fussy on a clockwork schedule of 3 hours. We would stop, Briana would feed him, I would gas up the cars, walk the dogs, and give them water. By the time we both used the restroom, the baby would be fed, calmed back down, and ready to nap for the next leg.

Crossing into Oklahoma, I missed the state sign because it was hidden in a few bushed, but I sure got the CASINOS sign. This really shows where the state's priorities are. But to be honest, I have seen ads for Oklahoma casinos in Austin, TX.

Some recent additions to the Oklahoma countryside that we hadn't seen before was a large wind farm. It made me happy to see what is basically the Natural Gas capital of the country also adopting clean/renewable energy in such a prominent way. Then again, maybe I should be angry they aren't using "clean, clean coal".

Not trip through Oklahoma would be complete without a stop at our favorite burger spot, S and B's Burger Joint. It was a gorgeous day and we got to sit outside with our dogs. The food did no disappoint, how we have missed these amazing burgers.

We finally had to stop in Salina, KS (755 miles into our trip) as our little one was reaching the limit of his calm. Kansas had been a fun part of the drive as the farmers where harvesting their wheat across almost the whole state. We pulled in around 1930 and had what really could only be described as a not-so-great night if sleep. Between dogs barking, baby crying, and the wife being sick, rest was not really on the agenda. Basically this was our evening...

Thanks to the Planet Money Podcast we got to see a very interesting site. We passed 5 of these trucks. I immediately knew that these were the trucks from the bees episode. These trucks are taking bees from one part of the country (in the podcast is was Louisiana I believe) and taking them to places like California that have a shortage of bees but still require pollination for their crops to grow. This was super cool to see in real life instead of just hearing about it on a podcast.

And like that we were into Nebraska. It was awesome to see the green fields being irrigated in the morning light. I had forgotten how green everything was up here. There is also this weird train park with some structure behind it that we have driven by for years. The big structure was always there but the train was an addition in recent years. Not sure what the structure is; perhaps part of an old grain elevator or perhaps something cooler. Some quick Googling did reveal a few details about the train.

A few hours and one stop later we were back in Omaha. It was fun to try to document the trip in pictures. In the future hopefully I can get better quality or have my co-pilot take them with the real camera.