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Roadgeeking with Kids: The first day trip with both kids

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Around 10 am this morning, my wife says to me,"How about going to the Richmond Children's Museum today?"

Me: "Sure, Why Not?"  (Hey that's not a bad idea to name a blog!)

So at about 11:30 - we started the trek from Raleigh to Richmond.  Of course after a stop at Sonic in Zebulon to get lunch and also change Nash, we were officially on our way.

Of course that's if we don't have to make any stops.  Which we will of course need to make.  This trip was spur of the moment so we need to get gas on the way etc.

Colton is a very good traveler and he is at that age where you can go I spy or use road signs to help him recognize letters and what not.  Nash obviously at two months is/will be more difficult.

This trip we are kinda planning as we drive, and we hope to go to the museum and also the Silver Diner and possibly a good ice cream place.

I'm typing this real time so obviously any changes I'll write as we go - so if a train of thought gets interrupted - I apologize.

Speaking of train of thoughts being interrupted- our plan was to stop at the Virginia Welcome Center to feed Nash and have Colt go potty.  Well, Nash at about Mile 169 on 95 North decided he was hungry.  We decided to exit now at Exit 173 in Roanoke Rapids and stop at Chick-Fil-A.  We can feed Nash and Colton can play.

Now we have been back and forth on 95 from PA and NC so many times we know pretty much where every Chick-if-a / McDonalds are etc. - if they have a play place or not.  Well on this Saturday afternoon - so did everyone else it seemed.


Yes, that's the line at the Roanoke Rapids Chick-fil-a.  Now I am sure many of you would say just walk out - but there's an infant to feed and I don't think there is a toddler that would wait patiently during that.  Fortunately, we already ate so as Maggie fed Nash his bottle, Colton played in the play area.  Anyways by the time we left and then survived a storm riddled traffic jam on 95 our eta changed to

 
As you can see the rain and traffic would cause us to detour onto US 301 (hey roadgeeking!) and believe it or not - we did pass the moving truck that was in front of us on 95 along 301.  So yes, Waze did work!  More rain pushed us not getting there until 3:20.  Now yes I will admit, there were moments where I thought "well this will be a disaster."  But we made it!


And we had a great time! We did make it to the Silver Diner and also to a great gelato shop called Gelati Celesti! 

And you know that it was a worthwhile day trip when there are two boys sleeping in your backseat on the way home!  Also makes for a quicker trip home!  No stops!


My wife drove the whole trip.  We split driving duties a lot and it allowed me to take a few road related photos - again thank goodness for cell phone cameras!

I'll update Nash's county map (I'll post about that soon) and also did get new roads on the trip.  

The best part of having your kids and family take part of this or any hobby where a trip is involved is to tell them we are going on a mystery adventure and need their help in solving it.  When we arrived at the children's museum, Colton kept saying, "this is the mystery museum mommy and daddy - the mystery museum!" He was extremely excited and really loved the trip.

All in all our first adventure as a family of four wasn't so bad.  It's harder to just get up and go - but we did it - and we are going to seriously add another one-two hours on trips - though there are some remedies to that.


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