Quist World Tour

One of the best things about driving rather than flying across the country is watching the land change. In Michigan, we drove through forest and farmland, and we knew that not so very far away was the Lake Michigan shoreline that we know and love. When you get past Chicago, eventually the land opens up to the farmland (corn and wind, as far as I can tell) of Iowa and Nebraska. Northeast Colorado brings you through what is usually dry ranchland, but this year the heavy rains have turned Colorado green as far as the eye can see. It’s startling if you are expecting yellow grasses to cover the hills. As we got closer to Estes Park this week, we noticed first a lot of cows roaming the land, and then between Sterling and Greeley we saw more of what might be the factory farms—enormous numbers of cows in small fenced-in areas. Those farms you can smell before you see them. Today we drove from Estes Park to Arroyo Seco, a small town near Taos NM. Along the way we passed the Rocky Mountai...

Last night my whole neighborhood was lined with carrier-topped minivans and SUVs, while people loaded them with golf clubs and beach chairs. Must be the beginning of spring break in Grand Rapids. Most of those people looked to be heading south, to Gulf Shores or sunny Florida. But not the Quists, no. We took a different path, to a place that is likely to be almost as wet and cold as home! We are driving to New York. At least I (Kristy) and my three offspring are. Brian will be joining us later via air. Still, though it’s not any sunnier so far than home, we can already tell we’ve left the Midwest behind—we’ve been driving through the hilly east side of Ohio and southwest Pennsylvania. I might be the only one who has noticed the hills, actually, since we long ago made a swap, giving up group sightseeing in exchange for quieter, happier family members. Our kids spend their time in the car gaming together. This may be a breach of the sentimental version of singing travelling son...

Doing what they do best: electronics of any form. A seven hour drive from Paris to Singen , Germany made up the most of our day. I can’t tell you much about the first hour or so, since I slept through that part of the drive. I can, however, tell you more about our rest area experiences. When I started this blog, I had no idea that it would turn into a serial harangue on public restrooms in Europe . After all, I’ve been to Europe before, I know the public bathrooms are not plentiful or free, and I’m over it. But driving gives it a whole new dimension. So when we started in France a few days earlier, I mentioned the porcelain pit toilet that we encountered. I said it was possibly worse than the automatic flushing toilet for those toilet-training children. I had no idea it could be even worse. On the way out of France , we stopped again. This time, we were looking for a picnic table and were happy to find one with a bathroom nearby. Little did we know. Again, the modern pit toil...

This morning we packed up our bags and headed north. We were headed to the Italian version of the French Riviera, the Cinque Terre. This is an area of 5 beach towns that are old and beautiful, and I couldn’t wait to snap some pictures with dramatic views.  We're not so original...  First we stopped off in Pisa , to see the leaning tower. This was mostly because the tower is something that our children have heard of and were interested in seeing. Brian and I were feeling sort of sheepish, stopping at such an obvious tourist attraction. The guidebook suggested parking at a bus parking lot, where you could park for free, then getting on the bus (which cost all of 2 Euro for the 5 of us) for a round trip ride to the tower area. We were the only ones on the bus, and the kids stood in the “joint” between the two connected bus lengths, so that when the bus turned a corner, they spun back and forth with the connector. We got off when the bus stopped and the driver said “This is it.”...

Last night and this morning, the girls have been on a mission to finish the bulk of their schoolwork. And they’ve done it. There is great rejoicing in the land. Poor Andrew. We said goodbye to Isabela, who so warmly wished to make everything perfect for us. We also said goodbye to the wonderful “apartment” we had in her old farmhouse, which is so equipped with everything you might ever need that it is hard to find a place to put your own stuff. Our biggest concern was that we would not be able to tell if we left anything there! And then, saddest of all for at least 2 of us, was saying goodbye to the crazy galoot of a dog, Tata. Lots of hugs for her before we departed. Today I turned 43 years old. I can’t think of a better way to celebrate than the itinerary for the day: Drive through Tuscany , stop off at a chocolate festival in Perugia , and end the day with our arrival at the rooms we are renting near Rome . There was one minor flaw in the plan—the drive through Tuscany . It’s brea...

It is sort of a helpless feeling to be in the passenger seat, next to someone who has to drive for 7 hours, knowing that no matter how sick and/or tired of driving Brian is, there is nothing I can do about it (I have to forgo all apostrophes because I am using an Italian keyboard and cannot find one on it). So I hand him snacks, and Coca Cola Light, and talk his ear off, and find the podcast that he wants to listen to. The drive of today was long, but not too bad. Trees and hills and lakes marked the stretch through Croatia, some portions reminding us of the Smoky Mountains. Then we got to Slovenia, which really was not too different from Croatia in the few kilometers we saw. Then we got into Italy. The biggest change we could see from the highway is that the gas station bathrooms took a significant turn for the worse. In Croatia, the highway must have been built in the last 10 years--the roads are much nicer than in Michigan, the trucks avoid it because it is a toll road, and ...