How many hours does this day have?

I am nearing the end of my longest traveling day ever. I use the term “day” loosely because we have already been on the road for 28 hours and are still over an hour away. In addition, we have switched timezones twice and I have slept approximately 2 hours. We left Pagosa Springs, Colorado yesterday morning at 10:30 local time and should arrive in Grand Rapids, Michigan at about 5:00 local time this evening.

This certainly isn’t our only day of long travel. On Sunday we left Abilene, TX after church and got into Pagosa Springs at about 1 in the morning. That day we switched timezones once and we were also dealing with daylight savings time. I really don’t wear my watch much any more….I’m so confused. My watch and computer are on mountain time and my phone just switched to eastern. Meanwhile my body is on “What the heck is going on?” time.

I have always wanted to go to Colorado. I have friends originally from there and more friends that live there now. I have applied to jobs in Colorado, but I had never even driven through the state. Well, this trip was even better than I could have imagined! I saw some of the Rocky Mountains last year when we drove across the country at the end of the tour, but being in Colorado took my breath away…wait…no…maybe that was the altitude. Anyway, it was beautiful.

Since we got in really early on Monday morning, we all slept in then went out to lunch. After lunch the tech director, Jeff, lighting director, Jack, and video director, me, went to the high school to look at the venue. A trip we expected to take a few moments took about 2 hours. Since I had already wasted a lot of time in this state I was so excited to visit, I ignored my to do list for the day and hopped on the scooter with Jack to go exploring. Yes, I said scooter. Yes, I said with Jack. How many of you have ever seen the movie Dumb and Dumber? As you may recall Lloyd and Harry end up riding a scooter way too small for two adults into Aspen. I imagine that is exactly what Jack and I looked like. In fact, for the first half hour of our trip I couldn’t stop laughing because I knew how ridiculous we looked. To add to the ridiculousness of the moment, Jack was wearing a full face motorcycle helmet– we call that the “I take my scootering way to serious” helmet while I was wearing what appeared to be a black Tupperware bowl on my head- we call that the “Dumb and Dumber” helmet. Now the top speed on the scooter in 55. With 2 people, we got it up to 50 going downhill which means we spent a lot of time cruising along the shoulder of route 160 with traffic flying by. Knowing that I would be on the back of the scooter I wore my Silver Ring Thing jacket which features our logo right in the center of my back. We were famous by the end of the day.

We had intended to scoot all the way out to the mountains we saw in the distance, but when that proved to be too far we set off in search of the natural hot springs. We could smell them long before we found them, but while looking for them we found a trail up a hill that was calling our name. At points the hill was so steep that I jumped off and pushed the scooter while Jack had it at full throttle. We eventually made it to the summit and the view was majestic. Then we found the hot springs before crawling up the hill back to the hotel.

We set up and shopped the next day. They were forecasted to receive 8 inches of snow Tuesday night. The town received a dusting, but the surrounding mountains got a substantial bit more- that made it even more beautiful. It was also the first time in falling snow for some of our team members.

We did 2 school assemblies on Wednesday. They went really well and were a lot of fun. I think it also captured the attention of a lot of students and brought them back for the show because we packed the auditorium and had to do overflow seating that night.

Thursday morning we boarded for what may be the longest journey of the tour. Paco, Cortney, and I took the first shift in the truck and sang Christmas songs at the top of our lungs as we drove through the snow covered Wolf Creek Pass.

I hung out in the bus for about 10 hours after that before climbing in the truck with Chase for an all night drive. I watched a movie on my computer for awhile and after it was finished I asked him if I missed anything exciting and he said that he had seen a tree walk across the road. Hmmm. OK. Enough movies for now I think maybe I should talk to him for awhile to make sure he can get us not dead. After he had an energy drink and I had brushed my teeth we were both wide awake so we drove a few more hours. This time we both watched the movie. Yes mom, I know that seems unsafe, but I’d rather have him see a movie than hallucinate a walking tree. In all seriousness he’s a great driver, all of our drivers are and I appreciate them today more than ever!

Well, we’re still not to Grand Rapids. I hope we get there soon. I need a shower. I can smell myself.

Thanks for reading! Sorry if parts of this post don’t make sense. I think I may be more tired than I realize.