New Mexico.

According to my better half, New Mexico has it all. 

It never rains. A guy at the tire shop told us it hadn't really rained in 10 years.

It's hot, but there is absolutely no humidity so it doesn't really feel hot.

It was 11am, and as I walked from my shower to the truck I thought to myself, "Wow, this is a really refreshing morning! It must only be 65 degrees!"

WRONG.

It was 90 degrees. And I can honestly say, it felt amazing. 90 degrees never felt so good.

There are mountains. Spectacular mountains.

The only thing New Mexico lacked, other than an over abundance of greenery, was lines on the road.

It was like a massive game of connect the dots. 

We liked New Mexico a lot. Except maybe that onion farm where we picked up the load we have now. You couldn't go outside without tearing up. I don't know how the workers managed. Oh, and that 5 mile stretch of dairy farm right by the interstate. No pastures, cus there isn't enough green stuff for the poor cows to eat. Just fenced in dirt lots, covered with you know what that smelled like you know what too. 

For 5 miles. And there were houses nestled in there in that 5 miles. It was bad enough just driving by, can you imagine living right beside it? 

Shew.

And yes, we have an entire flatbed load FULL of onions. Lots of onions. Literally, tons of onions. I feel like Oprah. 

"YOU get an onion. YOU get an onion. YOU get an onion. EVERYONE GETS AN ONION!"

stone faces.

It was raining. The wind was blowing. The lady where we were loading the trailer told us her firefighter husband had been on tornado watch, and they were "keeping an eye on some funnels." 

Cus really all funnels are is some rowdy kids that need someone to keep an eye on them.

But I had been praying all day that we would have time and the weather would allow us to visit Mt. Rushmore. We were picking up our load in Hill City, South Dakota, a mere 10  miles from the park, and there was no way I was going to miss it.

I think I would have braved a funnel to get there, quite honestly.

From the lumberyard, we were supposed to be able to see the back of the mountain, but it was too foggy. 

Still, I insisted. I was confident that God would clear the sky.

Jesse unhooked the trailer in the rain, sweet man that he is.

He may have questioned my sanity for venturing out in a funnel swirling foggy rain storm to take a hike in the mountains, but he sweetly and with minimal complaining fulfilled my requests.

We were halfway to the monument when the fog disappeared, and the sun came out. It was still raining, but the monument was visible, and I'm not afraid of melting.

I wrapped my camera up in a crock pot baggie, and we were off.

Honest Abe may have been crying, but then again so was I. The rain'll do that to ya.

The lighting was good enough for me. The rain didn't affect my pictures. The fog lifted so the faces were visible. 

My prayers were answered!

All you need is a little faith.

We didn't risk it with Crazy Horse though. We got out of there before the funnel could do that for us.

We did agree that there would be a "next time" and we would visit Crazy Horse then, because apparently he is pretty amazing too.

FYI: if any of you happen to be driving through South Dakota in a semi and decide to stop at Mt. Rushmore, please know that there's a hefty fine for even trying to get a trailer into the park. And there's no way around it. If you don't know beforehand that trailers are not allowed, you don't find out until you pull up to the gate to pay to enter, and at that point, the only way out is to go through to gate and out the exit. For a whopping fine of $250, we were very thankful that we called ahead!

someone goofed.

Oopsville, Louisiana.

beautiful weeds

We were at a random rest area, I don't remember which state. Somewhere between Pineville, Louisiana and Miller, South Dakota. Jesse was working on his logs and I took a walk, limited though it was. I took my camera with me and these purple thistles (painful thistles I might add) caught my eye.

All things in life are precious and beautiful! 

Take a moment to stop and find the beauty in the "thistles" of life.

Atchafalaya Basin Bridge

The Atchafalaya Basin Bridge is one of my favorite things we've seen in our travels so far. We've been over it twice, but I haven't posted about it until today.

The bridge is a mere 18.2 miles long, and as the name suggests, crosses over the Atchafalaya Basin. You can read more about the basin at the link, but it is the largest swamp/wetlands in the US and it's pretty awesome to drive across. Read more about the bridge here.

These 2 pictures are from the first time we crossed:

The next two are from the second crossing:

And this one has a weird color, and some bug splatters because I took it through the windshield.

It really is an amazing bridge! Not one I would recommend trying to hold your breath while crossing though...

absence: explained.

Lately, as I am sure you have noticed, there has been little (ok, NO) activity on this blog. That is easily explained. 

I started this blog to share our adventures on the long haul, and since the last post, nothing of interest has happened. We've been staying in the Eastern time zone for the most part, and the scenery there is nothing special to share. Either it's flat with no points of interest, or it's mountains with trees and no points of interest.

And, nothing interesting has happened to us personally either. No crazy truckers doing noteworthy things, no funky incidents or run-ins at the truck stops...in fact, let me spell out the past 2 months or so for you:

Jesse: drives, eats, sleeps.

Natalie: rides, sleeps, reads, sleeps, watches Netflix, sleeps, eats, sleeps.

Occasional bathroom break. Occasional tire changing.

That's it.

Super exciting. 

We haven't even had the crock pot with us, because it got replaced by a printer/scanner, and I haven't figured out where to put it now.

So, no fun meals either.

So we ride. And we thank God for keeping us safe through each week.Without His grace we would not have made it this far. Thanks to our dear friend Ashley, we have a constant prayer traveling along with us!

Jesse can't really read while driving, so thank goodness for technology because I do not like to read out loud, which is what I would have to do without our audio Bible-radio hookup.

Thank you everyone for your prayers as we travel along!