Home, sweet home!

Let's see, where did we leave off? I believe we were in Kansas City, after a horrible night in Denver. Things got better for the last part of the trip thankfully. We left Kansas City and headed across Missouri to St. Louis, where we headed straight to the Budweiser Brewery.

While I certainly don't consider my dear Bud to be my favorite brew by any means, I do enjoy any place that brews that much beer. We happened upon the brewery on NASCAR Busch Series day and saw a bunch of drivers, the only one of whom I recognized was Kenny Wallace, brother to Rusty. We headed out on a fantastic tour of the brewery with 100 of our closest friends, and then followed it up with....FREE BEER!



We did get a chance to see the Gateway Arch on the riverfront. Unfortunantly, the ride to the top was a little long considering we still had another four hour drive to Louisville. However, the walk around the Arch was great and the Museum beneath the Arch was pretty interesting.



When we made it to Louisville late that night, the worry set in that we'd have another hotel experience....well we had an expereience all right. The Louisville Marriott knows how to run a hotel. Beautiful. Modern. Clean. Incredible Service. And they even had Chocolates on the Pillow.

The next day we got to the Louisville Slugger museum before the crowds and got to see the entire factory. As we were there they were making Derek Jeter's bats. We even got to take home a piece of one of the bats. We also were able to pick up bats that were ordered by the Babe and Ty Cobb. I took a few swings with Jeter's bat in the cages, but didn't want to intimidate all the kids looking on.



Before we left for the last leg of the ride, we needed to see Churchill Downs, home of the Kentucky Derby. Again, we didn't have time (or money!) for the full, official tour, so we took the unofficial tour. This included driving through closed parking lots, and opening unmarked doors. What fun!



And then the ride home. WestVirginia, home of the our second traffic jam of the trip. Are you kidding me? Well, we travelled through WV into Maryland and back up into Delaware to complete the circle. We arrived home at 12:20 AM and unloaded the car and then fell asleep for hours and hours. All in all, we drove 8854.5 miles and averaged 26.4 miles per gallon along the trip. Not too shabby.

Thanks for reading. Be sure to check back in a few days for stats, best-of photos and Lisa's Best Bathrooms review!