We’ve been here almost a week now, and I’m just now getting time to sit down and write. We come up every year, and every year we think we’ll have plenty of time to do everything we want.  And every year we leave wishing we’d had a few more days.

This year is the second year we made the drive with the kids rather than flying. 22 hours plus change, depending on how long you spend at gas stations and getting food.  We had planned to leave at 4 am but I accidentally set the alarm for p.m. instead of a.m., so when I woke up naturally at 5 a.m. (thanks, running!), we jumped out of bed and hit the road.

The boy is never an issue on the drives.  He reads, plays his DS, and watches whatever movies we load onto his iPhone.  Piper, on the other hand, is a little more work – but not a terrible pain in the butt.  She vacillates between coloring her various coloring books and Color Wonder books, playing on the iPad and watching movies.  We try to stop every 4 hours or so, and she literally goes nuts running up and down the aisles of whatever roadside gas station we’re at.

They both sleep well, and we arrived safely around 3:30 am so were able to get a decent night’s sleep for the most part too.  It wasn’t bad at all.

What was bad about driving 22 hours north, out of the heat and humidity of Florida?

The heat.  I know it sounds trite, but we really look forward to cool morning runs and dry air.  Sleeping with the windows open.  And the entire week has been over 100 degrees, with “feels like” temps hitting 110 and higher.

That hasn’t stopped us, but it’s definitely been slowing us down.  We went to see Brave, spent a few days on the river, took quite a few naps and attempted to do a little sightseeing from within the car (unsuccessful).  We have been sweating a lot.

The highlight of the trip was, of course, the 4th of July, which was hot as ever.  Sitting in a park at 98 degrees, waiting for hours for the fireworks that don’t start until 10:00 pm … which is actually 11:00 pm EST … well, it was a recipe for disaster for any kids.  Our kids handled it like champs though.  They were excited, happy, pleasant – which is to say, they only whined a little bit about perfectly acceptable things.

I’ll write more about the details later, I’m sure.  I’m tired. We’ve been running every morning, did a great long hike (despite the 100-degree temps) and are planning our 8-miler tomorrow.   We met up with old friends today and have a big dinner and live music planned for tonight.  But first, naps.  Ahhhh naps.

It’s nice traveling to a place with built-in babysitting.  We got a night out, have been able to run together and still spend time with everyone.  We’ve had a little relief in the entertainment and care departments too (my mom actually woke up and dealt with a middle-of-the-night “accident” last night).  We don’t feel guilty about downtime since we’re in no hurry.  I’ve been able to do a little work which affords us the ability to travel as long as we need.   It truly is an amazing luxury that I will never take for granted.