babble mix

NYC to California – Day 02, Friday

Day 2 Destination: Kung saan maabutan ng dilim (8PM)
States: Illinois, Iowa
Highlights: Downtown Chicago, pretty roadside landscaping and Iowa’s US-44 “scenic route”.

We set off for the 2nd day of our journey a few minutes before noon, after over 8 hours of sleep and having late breakfast with Judy and her Papi. We didn’t exactly consider the whole morning in Chicago “wasted”, because we got to hang with our friend and REST, which was very important to us because we had 4 more days to go.

Plus, we wanted to go at a comfortable pace. Comfortable enough for us to take our time and stop over at one of Iowa’s outlet centers. Nakapag-shopping pa kami (shirt lang naman binili ko)!

We also went a bit off from our I-80 route and decided to take the “scenic route” indicated on our USA road map (US-44 daw). Eto yung “scene”. Scenic daw? Hehehe. Sige na nga.

By the time the sun was ready to set, we’ve been driving for 8 hours, almost reaching the border between Iowa and Nebraska, so we decided to look for lodging where we can spend the night. I was driving then, so Nino was looking out for the next “Lodging” sign on the highway. Unang nakita namin, exit kaagad kami. Big mistake.

The motor lodge looked like a setting for a movie where a killer murders everyone in the entire lodge. Despite the other trucks and cars parked there, it looked abandoned with just one gas station and a small Subway store. We decided against parking or going down to inquire (a stupid thing to do, seeing that there was a big, bald man by one door with his whole back covered with tatoo) and went back to the freeway.

The next lodging sign we found had about 2 lodging choices and 5 or 6 places to eat, with a couple gas stations. We checked it out and saw that it was THE lodging we had in mind. The price for a night was reasonable, and there were a number of choices for dinner.

Lesson learned: when looking for lodging signs, look for those that show at least 2 in one exit, with at least 4 choices to eat and 2 gas stations. Then you won’t have to deal with the stress of a potential real-life horror movie.

posted by meL @ 7:07 PM