This is your invitation to follow along with us as we travel. This is an exciting trip for us! Riah can't wait to see Superman, longhorn cows, the UFO museum, cowboys and alligators. Wayne wants a beignet in New Orleans, authentic Mexican food, and I am guessing a huge Texas sized steak. I look forward to the scenic photo ops, the Dr.Pepper museum, National Parks, hot peppers and the Tabasco sauce day. And of course... we all can hardly wait, "to see a cactus!" A number of years ago, Wayne and I went to Arizona when he had a contract with Nabisco. We loved seeing the big Saguaro cacti. We bought a bunch of books, for our nieces and nephews to read when they were visiting our house. Well, along came a little Zechariah and found those books on the shelf awhile back. Our favorite is "Cactus Hotel." So, when we were searching for some inspriration of what to name the trip web page, we looked no further than the basic inspriration for our excursion into Arizona. Hence, we picked the TOSEEACACTUS name. We have been traveling with Riah since he was born, and he is an excellent co-pilot. (Daddy is pilot, Mommy is navigator) After this trip, my checklist for visiting the lower 48 states will be complete. Wayne has to somehow make his way up to Vermont and then down to Florida to finish his lower 48! Maybe next trip. Riah has a little catch up to do, but he's not far behind! We love teaching Riah about different areas and cultures, and showing him our great country. So, sit back, relax, and let us do the driving. Check in each day for updates, but don't be alarmed if we miss a day here and there. We will update as often as we can. We aren't 100% sure about where we will have internet connections, although at this point, most of our hotels should. If nothing else, we'll find a Starbucks ;) Within each days commentary, click the links to see our daily pictures. (This may seem obvious, but last year a friend said, "Your site was nice but some more pictures would have been cool." They never clicked on the links to see the huge volume of pictures!) So, make sure to follow the links to the picture pages, after all, it's all about the pictures, right?!!! We're calling this trip, TOSEEACACTUS, and we hope you will follow along a see a few too!

We decided to get a bit of a jump start! We left a little early. This will allow us more time to enjoy Kentucky & Metropolis, Illinois tomorrow. We left after Wayne got off work Friday afternoon. We didn't have anything major planned for this stretch of road, since we've done the biggest part of it many times before. We pulled out at about 1:30. Wayne had to work today, but he worked like crazy to finish his stuff by 12:30. Riah got to spend time with Grammy and Pappy this morning. We feel a little odd leaving this time of day, but it will help tomorrow to break up the day a bit. We are driving right now on the same route we take to Grandma Faulkner’s house, so there’s not a lot new to see! We do plan to take US 22 from Zanesville to Cincinnati, just for a change of pace. I like smaller towns, getting off the Interstate. We had originally planned to go through Columbus, and had a stop planned there, but since we re-routed to go on route 22, we don’t really have any plans for today. It’s kind of different for us, six hours in a car with no real planned stops, but it’s fun to just get off the beaten path and explore. Odd Sign Of The Day Riah has been going through his backpack, singing and playing road games. He will be glad when we hit Cambridge, Ohio, because we are going to stop at a Cracker Barrel there. He needs a drink, and their bathrooms are usually fairly clean. We also thought about checking their books on cd section, to see if there is anything the whole family might enjoy. Well, I am now typing in the hotel, getting ready to shrink today's pictures so you all can follow along with images. We did stop at Cracker Barrel and Riah got a three hour long Magic Tree House book. He really enjoyed it, and it helped him pass the time going across Ohio in the rain. We figured in keeping with tradition on our big trips, we'd get our nasty weather out of the way at the beginning! We drove through a rather nasty storm near Circleville, Ohio. I did however, get an awesome lightening photo, but we are glad the rain and thunder stopped when it did. We stopped for a quick supper at Burger King, and we have now arrived at our hotel. We are staying tonight at the Country Inns and Suites, in Cincinnati, Ohio. Tomorrow... the BIG adventure begins! But for tonight, we'll rest our little heads on fluffy pillows, and dream of the roads that lie ahead!