Florida Roatrip - Days 1 and 2

This is a post about the Florida roadtrip from almost two months ago.  I'm a little behind but there's been a lot going on.  Now that I'm sick *cough hacccck* I figured I can work on this before I grow old and forget it even happened.  Here's the first two days.

Day 1: The Journey -Take 1 (July 28, 2012)
Steph and I set off in King Arthur (her new car of awesome) a little after 9am and made pitstops at our home Speedway and Walmart.  We were going through rain until we got off of 301 and onto 71.  We made a stop in Dayton at a bar/restaurant named 'Frickers' Home of the Frickin' Chicken.  I believe as usual, Steph and I split an order of nachos which is absolutely a must when we eat anywhere that offers nachos, especially Denny's.  We met up with her LuRe friends that I finally had the chance to meet.  Such amazing women!  After hanging out there for about 2.5 hours we made a stop at a Big Lots nearby to buy a speaker contraption so we could listen to our iPods in the car.  We weren't exactly thinking and didn't realize the contraption would need batteries...which led to another pitstop at a Big Lots in Richmond, KY after buying gas.  Note to self:  if ever travelling on I-75 this far again, stop in Richmond, they have a TONNN of places, including "Kelly's Fruit Stand" that was established my birth year.  I so should have went in there to see if I could get some free fruit.

        A ways down the highway we finally enter Tennessee, which I was particularly excited about because I had never been.  I also saw my first mountains!  Like mountain, mountains, not hilly mountains though they were hilly.  Stop crushing my dreams, gawd.  Anywhoo, we were travelling through Tenn and it gets to be past our dinner time with the nachos wearing off.  We decide our next stop will be a place that has Fazoli's.  So where do we end up?  CLEVELAND!  We traveled 7 hours just to end up back in Cleveland.  Ha!  Kidding.  It was clearly Cleveland, Tennessee.  We had some Fazoli's while talking on the phone with our mothers about our adventures so far.  I mostly talked about the amazingly epic pop machines that you could get basically any soda you ever wanted, even flavored Sprite!  I had raspberry and peach Fanta.  That Fazoli's also served their food on actual plates with real silverware.  Apparently this is a thing all Fazoli's are going to start doing.  Either to help save the environment or cut down costs of constantly buying disposable dishes and cutlery.  After getting our noms on in Cleveland, we head out during an epic sunset and stop at the scenic overlook right on the highway.  Perfect timing for the sunset too!  Following this mini pitstop we enter Georgia, another state that I'm excited about because I had never been.  That was two states crossed off the never been to list in one day!  Our destination was Marietta, GA to stay with Trevor who lives just a half an hour north of Atlanta.  We arrived a little after 10 pm which was great timing.  We chatted with Trevor and prepared to crash for the rest of the journey and arrival to Inverness the next day.

Day 2: Mini Journey and the Crash in Inverness (July 29, 2012)

  Before jumping back on the roads of America, Steph, Trevor, and I ate at a Waffle House.  I had NEVER eaten at a Waffle House until this day.  The place is cute, small, and has very yummy waffles.  HUGE yummy waffles.  After breakfast noms we hopped back on I-75 and went through Atlanta.  Now, Cleveland/Pittsburgh/Detroit are the largest cities I've ever seen.  They are pretty tiny (especially Cleveland) compared to Atlanta.  So now Atlanta is the largest city I've ever seen (until Chicago which came 2 weeks later....that's another blog story).  About halfway through Georgia we see a sign for Georgia peaches.  We decide to be adventurous and stop for peaches at a little stand quite a few other people have stopped at.  It was pretty epic to eat Georgia peaches in freaking Georgia.  Damn good peaches, people.  Eventually we cross the border into Florida!!  Now I have been to Florida before but it's always been flying into Orlando by plane and living in Walt Disney World for a week.  I haven't seen much of the Sunshine State.  Shortly after entering we stop at the visitors center, receive grapefruit and orange juice and admire a HUGE poster advertising the Wizarding World of Harry Potter (which we will get to, I promise!).  Continuing through Florida it rains.  Which I learned is just something Florida does.  Welcome to the Sunshine State!!  *rain*  It should be called The Washout State, that would be a lot less misleading.  So we're going and finally end up at the Wildwood/Inverness exit!  We're almost there!  Upon entering Inverness we stop at McDonald's to see if Dillon is working.  Apparently there was a power outage and he was sent home.  So we continue to Ashy's (our residence for the week).  We arrive and unload and chill.  We finally don't have much more driving to do until Tuesday!  After a few hours of chilling we head over to the Applebee's of Inverness and meet up with Alex and his brother which was somewhat awkward.  It was weird actually meeting these people I've heard Steph talk about.  So we ate then stopped over at their place for a little bit where there was one of those little lizardy critters on the sliding door and a sperm looking branch on a table.  Yeah, I remember the random things about places.  We then head back home and crash for some sleep after finally getting a shower.