Since my last update in Monument Valley some months ago my whole world has changed, but in the best possible way. I never got around to closing off from this blog because, well, it was too personal to write about at the time.
Lea and I drove straight across the country and cut our roadtrip three days short to spend our last weekend in Graceland with Stephen. He met us there and that weekend my whole life changed. I knew after Stephen had left us in Sedona that I needed him in my life, but I wasn't aware to what magnitude. In our ventures across the country Lea and I had many hours to talk and when I finally told her that I was in love with Stephen she said that she already knew, but Stephen was the first to tell me. We were inside a heart shaped pool alone, and I felt my body temperature rising in that cold water. My legs were wrapped around his torso from him walking us around the pool and in that moment I forgot where I was, it didn't feel like the hotel anymore. It felt like somewhere else, where only we existed. It still feels like that with him every night that I fall asleep next to him. He is the most amazing human I have ever come to know. We live together now, and have for a few months. After last night, I was feeling so many emotions and decided to write all of this before I forget, but the truth is I don't think I will ever forget. Of course time will dull memories, and replace and recycle, but I will make sure that I remember that weekend forever. <3
I was absolutely wrong about the last thing I wrote in my blog before leaving Sedona, in a way at least. It is different, but not the way I thought it would be. It is more deep and rich of a connect than I could have ever imagined with anyone. I am so fortunate to have met such a caring individual and to have him love me in the same capacity that I feel for him.
Sunday, September 25, 2016
Wednesday, June 22, 2016
Day 14-16: Nevada, Colorado, Monument Vallley
When I left you last I was in goldfield, NV camping next to hotsprings and it was possibly one of the craziest places I have ever camped before. The wild donkeys that were around our tent were up all night making so much noise and then I realized that there were also wild boar and horses outside our tent as well. The horses were pretty magical.
The next day we woke up rather early because we were on a dirt road and wanted to be construction before they blocked us in. So we woke up early and packed up camp, we were out of there before 7:30 and the construction crew had started early, so we had to wait forever for two separate pilot cars to get us through the construction and it added an hour to our already super long drive across Nevada. We ended up getting to our hotel outside of Moab around 6 pm and this was the most interesting hotel Lea and I have ever stayed in. We pull in and we are one of three cars in the parking lot, now mind you, this wasn't a ritsy place by any means, but when we got our room key and walked into the main hotel building I couldn't believe this place was up to code. Parts of the carpet were missing and half of the building was abandoned. It felt like we were walking around a haunted hotel. All the creepiness aside it had a bed and shower and that's all we really cared about, so we got drunk and called it a nightmare.
The next morning we woke up and went into Moab/Arches, it was the most brutal weather I had dealt with so far on the trip. Even harsher than the day Stephen and I went hiking in the red rocks. It was 109 at the top of the traverses that I had to climb to see the delicate arch and by the time I got up I realized I was all alone. Everyone else had turned back from heat exhaustion and I found out later that someone had actually passed out on the trail. I waited at the top under a boulder for shade just thinking to myself that I might pass out on the hike back down because I was feeling pretty woozy and my brain was baking. Then an older wizard looking dude named Rob showed up and started causally talking to me and we decided to walk back down together. He said "I'll follow you down incase you pass out I can catch you and vice versa." So I was all about it. Then when we got to the bottom of the hike he said "do you want some trail mix for your ventures today?" And I responded with "no thanks, I just ate." -plus we had a huge bag of trail mix in the car. And he said "no, it's good trail mix." So I said "right on, I'm in the challenger." 🤘🏼🙃
Then after we left Moab it was about a three hour drive to telluride and I was so excited to see Paul, even though he had lunch with me in Indy about a month and a half ago, Paul is like one of my bestfriends and I was stoked to finally see his home. When I got to telluride I was completely floored with how fast I fell in love. I told Paul that I felt at peace when I got into town and he said that the Ute Indians believe the floor of Telluride is sacred and that the Cogi tribe believes that Telluride is the gate way to heaven. We went up on the gondola and I got the see the actual mountain range on the coors light bottles, and then he took me to some hotsprings about 30 miles outside of Telluride. It was so much fun going down to them because we were basically "rock climbing." There was rope for the super steep parts, but I went barefoot and basically just stepped on all the exposed rocks the way down. I met a girl there named Charlie and she and I took fireball shots all night and became great friends. Then I come to find that her uncle owns a bunch of funeral homes in the surrounding areas. She said she could get me a job no problem, so currently I have my heart set on moving to Colorado. On the way back from the hot springs Paul took me by trout lake and in the moon light it seriously took my breath away. We pulled over his truck and we just stared there at it for about 15 minutes and I almost started crying, but started laughing uncontrollably instead and just said "you know Paul, so many people in their lives will never see a sight this beautiful. I sat there memorizing all 9 of the peaks and how the moon was hitting the water and which mountains had snow on them. Probably the most beautiful thing/place I have ever seen.
When I woke up this morning I was mildly hungover, but Lea and I got on the road anyways and set out for monument Valley, which is currently where I am camping. We are looking at all the rock towers in the moon light together, enjoying a beer of course and just living the dream. This will be the last camping night of our trip so it's a little sad, but it's also maybe the coolest stop. All of the sand in monument valley is bright red and the entire area is so beautiful. I love that it's on a Navajo reservation as well. Today I made great friends with a horse named spirit and he was probably the highlight of my day. Good night all, talk to you later.
The next day we woke up rather early because we were on a dirt road and wanted to be construction before they blocked us in. So we woke up early and packed up camp, we were out of there before 7:30 and the construction crew had started early, so we had to wait forever for two separate pilot cars to get us through the construction and it added an hour to our already super long drive across Nevada. We ended up getting to our hotel outside of Moab around 6 pm and this was the most interesting hotel Lea and I have ever stayed in. We pull in and we are one of three cars in the parking lot, now mind you, this wasn't a ritsy place by any means, but when we got our room key and walked into the main hotel building I couldn't believe this place was up to code. Parts of the carpet were missing and half of the building was abandoned. It felt like we were walking around a haunted hotel. All the creepiness aside it had a bed and shower and that's all we really cared about, so we got drunk and called it a nightmare.
The next morning we woke up and went into Moab/Arches, it was the most brutal weather I had dealt with so far on the trip. Even harsher than the day Stephen and I went hiking in the red rocks. It was 109 at the top of the traverses that I had to climb to see the delicate arch and by the time I got up I realized I was all alone. Everyone else had turned back from heat exhaustion and I found out later that someone had actually passed out on the trail. I waited at the top under a boulder for shade just thinking to myself that I might pass out on the hike back down because I was feeling pretty woozy and my brain was baking. Then an older wizard looking dude named Rob showed up and started causally talking to me and we decided to walk back down together. He said "I'll follow you down incase you pass out I can catch you and vice versa." So I was all about it. Then when we got to the bottom of the hike he said "do you want some trail mix for your ventures today?" And I responded with "no thanks, I just ate." -plus we had a huge bag of trail mix in the car. And he said "no, it's good trail mix." So I said "right on, I'm in the challenger." 🤘🏼🙃
Then after we left Moab it was about a three hour drive to telluride and I was so excited to see Paul, even though he had lunch with me in Indy about a month and a half ago, Paul is like one of my bestfriends and I was stoked to finally see his home. When I got to telluride I was completely floored with how fast I fell in love. I told Paul that I felt at peace when I got into town and he said that the Ute Indians believe the floor of Telluride is sacred and that the Cogi tribe believes that Telluride is the gate way to heaven. We went up on the gondola and I got the see the actual mountain range on the coors light bottles, and then he took me to some hotsprings about 30 miles outside of Telluride. It was so much fun going down to them because we were basically "rock climbing." There was rope for the super steep parts, but I went barefoot and basically just stepped on all the exposed rocks the way down. I met a girl there named Charlie and she and I took fireball shots all night and became great friends. Then I come to find that her uncle owns a bunch of funeral homes in the surrounding areas. She said she could get me a job no problem, so currently I have my heart set on moving to Colorado. On the way back from the hot springs Paul took me by trout lake and in the moon light it seriously took my breath away. We pulled over his truck and we just stared there at it for about 15 minutes and I almost started crying, but started laughing uncontrollably instead and just said "you know Paul, so many people in their lives will never see a sight this beautiful. I sat there memorizing all 9 of the peaks and how the moon was hitting the water and which mountains had snow on them. Probably the most beautiful thing/place I have ever seen.
When I woke up this morning I was mildly hungover, but Lea and I got on the road anyways and set out for monument Valley, which is currently where I am camping. We are looking at all the rock towers in the moon light together, enjoying a beer of course and just living the dream. This will be the last camping night of our trip so it's a little sad, but it's also maybe the coolest stop. All of the sand in monument valley is bright red and the entire area is so beautiful. I love that it's on a Navajo reservation as well. Today I made great friends with a horse named spirit and he was probably the highlight of my day. Good night all, talk to you later.
Sunday, June 19, 2016
Day 11-13 San Fran, Yosemite, and goldfield, NV
It's been a wild past few days and I've been in an out of service, so I'll try my best to fill you in on the happenings. While in Santa Cruz right off the board walk I decided to walk through the high tide and this woman came up to me and said "you aren't from here, I can tell, but your aura is glowing and I can tell that you are a pure person. You belong somewhere better than where you have been." I told her that the whole purpose of coming out west was to find my future forever home and it just solidified my emotions that I've been feeling. After leaving the board walk Lea and I drove up to lol galos and ate in a little coastal town, we just went to some random Mexican restaurant. It was sooo delicious. It reminded me of food that would have been in sun valley. After that we drove a little north to the Winchester mystery house and it was probably the coolest house I've ever been in, architecturally and historically. I love haunted homes and I love all things antique so it was a match made, also the house is what inspired murder house on ahs. After that we headed up to San Fran. We went to hang out at my friend Anthony's bar because we were going to stay the night w him after he got off work, but after he gave us a few free drinks we decided we should shower before he got there. So he gave me his house keys and we drove around his house for 45 minutes looking for parking and finally gave up. It was such a buzzkill and he had given me some thc blueberries, it was all a waste. I was so bummed out. We ended up taking him his keys back and got a hotel room close to the redwoods, so in the morning we went to see them and drove to Yosemite.
Yosemite was so epic and I'm really glad that we got the chance to spend two days there. The park itself to drive through takes about 6 hours so it was necessary. The north and east side of the park are my favorite, they're less congested with tourists and in my opinion are the most beautiful. We reached our highest altitude on the entire trip within the park with topped out a little over 9000 feet. The drive out was crazy since we were so high up there was snow all over the ground and it was only 61 degrees and after driving 20 minutes out of the park in was in the 90s. I went from being happy that I was in yoga pants up being upset that I wasn't in shorts. My favorite part of Yosemite was the glacier lakes and waterfalls, they were insanely beautiful.
Then we made our drive out to goldfield, NV which is apparently a ghost town and was on the travel channel as one of the most haunted places in America. Currently were in the middle of nowhere camping about 7 miles north of goldfield because we decided to venture out and find some random hotsprings. It's the first time I've ever "swam" naked and it was kind of liberating. Lea and I even stayed in our underwear while we were setting up camp and cooking over the fire. We're the only ones out here now and we can hear wild donkeys and bullfrogs around our tent. It's pretty wild, but I the morning were heading back to goldfield to check out the little town and see if there's anything legit about the ghost sitings and goldfield hotel. Good night, world.
Yosemite was so epic and I'm really glad that we got the chance to spend two days there. The park itself to drive through takes about 6 hours so it was necessary. The north and east side of the park are my favorite, they're less congested with tourists and in my opinion are the most beautiful. We reached our highest altitude on the entire trip within the park with topped out a little over 9000 feet. The drive out was crazy since we were so high up there was snow all over the ground and it was only 61 degrees and after driving 20 minutes out of the park in was in the 90s. I went from being happy that I was in yoga pants up being upset that I wasn't in shorts. My favorite part of Yosemite was the glacier lakes and waterfalls, they were insanely beautiful.
Then we made our drive out to goldfield, NV which is apparently a ghost town and was on the travel channel as one of the most haunted places in America. Currently were in the middle of nowhere camping about 7 miles north of goldfield because we decided to venture out and find some random hotsprings. It's the first time I've ever "swam" naked and it was kind of liberating. Lea and I even stayed in our underwear while we were setting up camp and cooking over the fire. We're the only ones out here now and we can hear wild donkeys and bullfrogs around our tent. It's pretty wild, but I the morning were heading back to goldfield to check out the little town and see if there's anything legit about the ghost sitings and goldfield hotel. Good night, world.
Thursday, June 16, 2016
Day 9&10: Hollywood&Santa Cruz
From where I left off the night before last Lea and I were star gazing and it was so unreal. We ended up seeing a satellite, which I haven't actually seen since I was living in Kentucky around elementary school. Anyways, we got a great nights sleep since we were in the desert and it cools down a lot at night, there was a gentle summer breeze and the moon was SO bright it illuminated everything around us, but we were still able to sleep.
The next morning when we woke up we decided to pack up camp so that we could eat breakfast, go hiking and then head straight out toward LA. As we had just finished packing up the car Lea noticed we had left our camping pass hooked on the site, so she runs to grab it since we have been keeping all of our receipts for a future scrapbook project. As she's coming back to the car I heard a crazy noise and then looked up to see a look of sheer terror on Lea's face and I knew it was a rattlesnake. So I jumped into the passenger seat to close the open car door, told her to come around and jump in the drivers seat and so we could leave bc there was no way she could walk past it. It was just really fortunate that we had everything packed up. So we continued on our ventures of Joshua tree and pull up to the cactus garden, where there was a "warning bees ahead" sign. At that moment that I notice the sign our car is swarmed, again-- to our luck the windows were up. Anyways, we decided to drive up a ways in the garden where we thought there were no bees and we had seen a man taking pictures of the cacti. So we get out of the car and immediately are swarmed again, except this time several got into the car and we had to speed away with them angrily swarming around our heads. These weren't honey bees, they were desert devil bees. I ended up killing three and two flew out the car. It was horrifying. We decided against the hike because at that point we figured Joshua tree was trying to kill us and we headed for Newport Beach. While at the beach we got went to my favorite fresh fish market, bear flag. I got salmon poke and my whole day was better. Then went straight to the Museum of Death, which was literally the origin of this entire trip. This place was insanely cool, right up my alley. It had a whole room dedicated to embalming, shrunken heads, cannibalism, Manson/domer, crazy coroner photos, the death theater (videos of people, well dying) a room full of taxidermy and animals preserved in jars. Maybe he coolest place I've ever been. After we left there we went to my angel Maggie's house and she cooked us dinner. I haven't seen her in about 2 years so it was really nice to catch up. She, Lea, and myself all slept in her bed last night and it was pretty cozy.
This morning Lea and I woke up super early, Shags (Maggie) made us breakfast and we went to universal studios RIGHT when they opened. Lea and I only had to wait like 30 minutes to get on new simulated ride through Hogwarts. We actually got to ride everything we wanted, we even rode the mummy ride twice because it was soooo much cooler than we even thought it was going to be and we were done by 2:30 so we headed up the coast to Santa Cruz- we grabbed some In n Out again for lunch along the way, of course and currently that's where we are for yhe night. We're going to hit up the pier in the morning, but now it's time for some much needed sleep after our 6 hour drive today.
The next morning when we woke up we decided to pack up camp so that we could eat breakfast, go hiking and then head straight out toward LA. As we had just finished packing up the car Lea noticed we had left our camping pass hooked on the site, so she runs to grab it since we have been keeping all of our receipts for a future scrapbook project. As she's coming back to the car I heard a crazy noise and then looked up to see a look of sheer terror on Lea's face and I knew it was a rattlesnake. So I jumped into the passenger seat to close the open car door, told her to come around and jump in the drivers seat and so we could leave bc there was no way she could walk past it. It was just really fortunate that we had everything packed up. So we continued on our ventures of Joshua tree and pull up to the cactus garden, where there was a "warning bees ahead" sign. At that moment that I notice the sign our car is swarmed, again-- to our luck the windows were up. Anyways, we decided to drive up a ways in the garden where we thought there were no bees and we had seen a man taking pictures of the cacti. So we get out of the car and immediately are swarmed again, except this time several got into the car and we had to speed away with them angrily swarming around our heads. These weren't honey bees, they were desert devil bees. I ended up killing three and two flew out the car. It was horrifying. We decided against the hike because at that point we figured Joshua tree was trying to kill us and we headed for Newport Beach. While at the beach we got went to my favorite fresh fish market, bear flag. I got salmon poke and my whole day was better. Then went straight to the Museum of Death, which was literally the origin of this entire trip. This place was insanely cool, right up my alley. It had a whole room dedicated to embalming, shrunken heads, cannibalism, Manson/domer, crazy coroner photos, the death theater (videos of people, well dying) a room full of taxidermy and animals preserved in jars. Maybe he coolest place I've ever been. After we left there we went to my angel Maggie's house and she cooked us dinner. I haven't seen her in about 2 years so it was really nice to catch up. She, Lea, and myself all slept in her bed last night and it was pretty cozy.
This morning Lea and I woke up super early, Shags (Maggie) made us breakfast and we went to universal studios RIGHT when they opened. Lea and I only had to wait like 30 minutes to get on new simulated ride through Hogwarts. We actually got to ride everything we wanted, we even rode the mummy ride twice because it was soooo much cooler than we even thought it was going to be and we were done by 2:30 so we headed up the coast to Santa Cruz- we grabbed some In n Out again for lunch along the way, of course and currently that's where we are for yhe night. We're going to hit up the pier in the morning, but now it's time for some much needed sleep after our 6 hour drive today.
Wednesday, June 15, 2016
Day 8: Joshua tree
This is technically a day late because I haven't had service for about 15 hours, but I wrote this in my tent last night.
When we woke up this morning it was a bittersweet feeling because I knew that our last stop on Route 66 was today. I didn't ever want this part of our roadtrip to end because it's been my dream as a little girl to go down Route 66, but I feel like this has been the happiest I've been in a long time and I haven't been disappointed at all. I'm happy that I went in with zero expectations, it's allowed me to experience everything and take it in for what it is. Today I saw a picture of myself that Lea took of me under the Joshua tree sign and I said "I look so happy." And her response was "you've looked like that all week." Our first stop of the day was in n out. I can't eve explain to you how excited I was, I had to grab Lea's hand as we were pulling into the parking lot. After that we drove for a few hours to the Route 66 diner and ordered malts for our last stop, then another few hours for my favorite place in the whole entire world-- Joshua tree national park. When we got here it was about 6:30 and the sun set at 7:55, so we had to pick our camp site, eat dinner, change, and get ready to hop in the tent in about an hour, because sundown is when the scorpions and rattlesnakes come out to hunt. Needless to say we killed it, set up camp in about 15 minutes. I feel like it's muscle memory at this point. Currently I am sitting in the tent typing this drinking a Grand Canyon ale. Life is really great.
Edit:
This morning we woke up and tried going for a hike, but Lea almost walked straight into a baby rattlesnake in our camp site and then on the way to the cactus garden we got attacked by about 30 bees and 5 of them got into the car. I'm never one to kill bees, but two of them were still in the car with us when we drove away with out knowing and started swarming around us in the car. Pretty sure we both have ptsd from this morning.
When we woke up this morning it was a bittersweet feeling because I knew that our last stop on Route 66 was today. I didn't ever want this part of our roadtrip to end because it's been my dream as a little girl to go down Route 66, but I feel like this has been the happiest I've been in a long time and I haven't been disappointed at all. I'm happy that I went in with zero expectations, it's allowed me to experience everything and take it in for what it is. Today I saw a picture of myself that Lea took of me under the Joshua tree sign and I said "I look so happy." And her response was "you've looked like that all week." Our first stop of the day was in n out. I can't eve explain to you how excited I was, I had to grab Lea's hand as we were pulling into the parking lot. After that we drove for a few hours to the Route 66 diner and ordered malts for our last stop, then another few hours for my favorite place in the whole entire world-- Joshua tree national park. When we got here it was about 6:30 and the sun set at 7:55, so we had to pick our camp site, eat dinner, change, and get ready to hop in the tent in about an hour, because sundown is when the scorpions and rattlesnakes come out to hunt. Needless to say we killed it, set up camp in about 15 minutes. I feel like it's muscle memory at this point. Currently I am sitting in the tent typing this drinking a Grand Canyon ale. Life is really great.
Edit:
This morning we woke up and tried going for a hike, but Lea almost walked straight into a baby rattlesnake in our camp site and then on the way to the cactus garden we got attacked by about 30 bees and 5 of them got into the car. I'm never one to kill bees, but two of them were still in the car with us when we drove away with out knowing and started swarming around us in the car. Pretty sure we both have ptsd from this morning.
Monday, June 13, 2016
Day 7: Las Vegas
This feels strange to actually be blogging in the day time and not as I'm ready to pass out, but we were woken up by 93 degree heat at 8:30 am. So we decided to go for a dip in lake mead, then packed up camp, and headed to the Hoover Dam. We didn't stay long bc it was sweltering hot. Then we made the short drive to Vegas and had an early check in to our hotel. Hopefully I will update this entry later, but I'm getting ready to go have a cocktail by the pool and it's certainly not going to be my last tonight.
Edit:
So last I didn't get around to updating my Vegas entry. Lea and I had too much going on in the evening, first we decided to go to old Vegas/ Fremont street and grab some food, walk around, and site see. It's such a different experience than the Vegas strip. It's almost got a comforting feel to it. I did my gambling in old Vegas and thankfully didn't loose any money, actually I won enough money to pay for my steak/lobster tail dinner and parking ticket. Then we decided to head for the strip, it was still super crowded for Monday evening, but it was bearable. The strip just isn't my thing I guess. I feel like it was mostly creepy guys hitting on Lea and I. We walked around the bellagio looking at all the art and smelling the flowers then we decided to go watch the fountain. It was really awesome because Frank Sinatra was the first song that came on, it was meant to be for Lea and I. We got a super decent amount of sleep, we slept all the way up until our check out and I haven't done that since I was in highschool.
Edit:
So last I didn't get around to updating my Vegas entry. Lea and I had too much going on in the evening, first we decided to go to old Vegas/ Fremont street and grab some food, walk around, and site see. It's such a different experience than the Vegas strip. It's almost got a comforting feel to it. I did my gambling in old Vegas and thankfully didn't loose any money, actually I won enough money to pay for my steak/lobster tail dinner and parking ticket. Then we decided to head for the strip, it was still super crowded for Monday evening, but it was bearable. The strip just isn't my thing I guess. I feel like it was mostly creepy guys hitting on Lea and I. We walked around the bellagio looking at all the art and smelling the flowers then we decided to go watch the fountain. It was really awesome because Frank Sinatra was the first song that came on, it was meant to be for Lea and I. We got a super decent amount of sleep, we slept all the way up until our check out and I haven't done that since I was in highschool.
Sunday, June 12, 2016
Day 6: ghost towns/ Lake Mead
Today was a lot of traveling, riding around in baby for about 6 hours total. I didn't mind though because along the way Lea and I had so many amazing funny things happen to us. The first thing was when we were driving out of Sedona I was at a stop light blaring eodm and this guy was staring at us as he was walking across the street and ran straight into a sign. I thought that kind of stuff only happened in movies. Then when we were switching interstates we decided to get off at target to get some bottles water and Chapstick and our cashier kept rhyming to us both as we were checking out. She said she was Channing Dr. Seuss. Then on the way to our camp site we stopped off at a few ghost towns to get the Wild West feel and at a general store just past Valentjne, AZ there was an old man working and I was going to buy a new cowgirl hat, but the power had just gone out. I asked him how many people lived around and he said "oh there's about 13 of us, but about 100 in the hills. You can't see them, but they're there. " yeah, not like the hills have eyes or anything. Not even creepy at all. But THE BEST part of our day was all of the Burma-shave ads on old historic Route 66. Burma shave is an old shaving cream company that advertised on small highways by posting multiple whitty signs in a row along the drive. My favorite read: -if daisies are your favorite flower - then keep on pushing up -those miles per hour. On the drive today my left arm got sunburnt from hanging out the window and Lea and I both wore super cute rompers, finally feeling a little femme. We got to lake mead around 6:30 tonight and set up camp then went down to the lake to explore, can't wait to go for a morning dip. Currently we are both in the tent star-gazing and I have seen two shooting stars so far. We are also under the constellation Virgo. Really feeling myself right now.
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