The Nish Family: homeward bound

Well today is day six of our trip and we're finally almost home. We had a last minute change of plans when the weather turned on Thursday morning. We went from a warm and comfortable 80 degrees to a brisk 40 degrees overnight. Not only that, but a huge wind storm came into Amarillo and it seemed like we couldn't drive out of it. The strong gusts followed us all the way from Cadillac Ranch to Winslow, Arizona were we pulled off to "stand on a corner." When we went to hop back onto the I-40 it looked like a train a hundred miles long had parked itself on the freeway. We've never seen so many semi's on the road at one time. The freeway had been closed due to a bad wind/sand storm and was backed up for as far as the eye could see.

Wanting to avoid further bad weather, we scrambled to find an alternative route. After a few phone calls and about an hour of deliberation, we found a small highway that took us away from the dusty desert plains of Arizona and into a lush national forest of beautiful pine trees and shimmering blue lakes. What seemed like a long trip out of our way, turned into a fortunate and beautiful detour. Once we arrived in Flagstaff however, our luck changed. We hit a nasty snow storm as we rolled into town and having no heater or functioning windshield wipers, it was definitely not a pleasant experience. We decided that instead of heading north from Flagstaff and up through Kanab, we would go to Vegas and stay with Rob's sister to ensure better weather.

Today we drove to St. George to stay with my grandma since Fillmore got 4 inches of snow and Beaver and Nephi looked to have the same fate. Tomorrow we go home. We decided to take advantage of the red rock backdrop while we are here, and took the car up to the golf course to get some sunset shots. We couldn't get a good vantage point as there were cars parked in the ideal location, overlooking the golf course and red cliffs of Hurricane. So, with little convincing, we got the club house workers to allow us to park our Chevelle on the golf cart path right on the green. It's amazing the benefits you get with a car like this.

My grandma couldn't resist getting behind the wheel

We've seen 7 states in 7 days, made LOTS of new friends on the highway, and taken advantage of many great photo ops. It's been an incredible adventure but I'd be lying if I said we weren't a little anxious to finally be home.

Here are some more shots from our amazing trip: