Driving, driving, driving

We've certainly logged in our fair share of highway miles in the last few months!!  Not the least of which was our drive to WV.  Around 4000 round trip.  Add to that a couple back and forths to Idaho, and I'm sure we're well over 5000.  Anybody got any carbon credits for sale?! LOL!  

We had plenty of time for the drive home from WV, so decided to find something of interest to see on the way.  The timing/distance was right to stay in Peoria, Illinois, which happens to have a zoo and an arboretum.  We LOVED it!  It was in a beautiful big park downtown, 

and everything about it was lovely.  

The zoo was the perfect size for the amount of time we had, and the weather could not have been more perfect.

 

Willow looking at the giraffes.

This lioness has quite the view - of the zebras!

Hello Mr. Emu

Willow feeds the budgies in the "budgie barn".

Andy's on a bamboo kick.  And he finally found some at the zoo!

A moment of sibling friendliness in the Arboretum.

My favorite beauty, the Japanese Maple.

They even had a tropical conservatory.

Do we know anybody who lives in Peoria, so we can have an excuse to visit??

Ahh, yes.  Then back to the good ol' west and the landscape of Wyoming.  I was so enjoying the trees...

We got home from WV on a Wednesday evening.  Oh, which reminds me.  The drive from Billings to Lewistown always seems to be the most harrowing part of the trip.  We hit Billings just as a doozy of storm was hitting the area... and the area we were heading.  There were tornado, hail, and flood warnings and it looked nasty!  It was bad enough that we decided to kill a few minutes in Billings to wait it out.  We pushed the cart at Target for a while and then braved the black.  Clouds, that is.  Aside from an astounding lightening show, the trip was uneventful.  So, time wasted was well spent.

 When we pulled into our driveway, we could see that one of the enormous spruce trees in the front yard had fallen over in the storm.  We knew it must have been a doozy of a storm.  I was so glad to have not been there when that thing came crashing down.  I'm sure it would have done me in.

Hard to tell, but that big shadow on the ground at the left is a fallen tree.

 We spent the next two days packing up the rental and then it was back on the road!  With Uhaul in tow this time!  We said teary good-byes to our friends and home of the last 7 years.

Stopping for a little break in Wallace, Idaho, we found a little extra terrestrial activity:

 On our way out of Coeur d'Alene, we drove along side the biking portion of the local Iron Man race.  There were SO MANY bikers!  What a lot of fit people!  Go, them!

 We stayed the first night in a motel.  Then Monday morn, it was down to the closing.  After some dibbling and dabbling, we were finally able to get keys to our new abode, which I cheerfully call Eleven 11.  Of course it rained while we were unloading, but oh well.  Didn't hurt nothin'.

Finally.  The landing place we've been waiting for for over a year now!