The McKenzie Family Trip

We decided to leave Bakersfield at 5 pm for our nice, easy 12 hr drive up to Eugene. The plan was to have Jacob watch DVDs on a portable player plugged into the cigarette lighter (power outlet). I would pump between movies and give fresh bottles to Jayda so we wouldn't have to pull over every 2hrs. Then when Jake went to sleep we were going to plug in the computer and listen to music saved on there. We were driving for about an hour when we went to put on a movie and the power outlet didn't work! After freaking for a little bit we pulled into a truck stop for about a half hour and bought some fuses and got the power outlet working (and I nursed Jayda). We were driving along and Billy was listening to the Laker game on the radio and after it was finished he said "I don't think we are on I5 anymore." We took the next exit and found a map and asked where we were and the kid said Castor Rock (or something). We looked it up and we were almost to Oakland! After we drove back to I5 and started our way north again we passed through Sacramento and Woodland and needed to stop for gas. We got some gas and in the station Billy heard dome people talking about a police officer that had been shot in the chest. He eaves dropped more to find out that I5 NB was closed just north of our exit! He hooked up with some guy who was from the area who agreed to lead us and another car to another northern on-ramp hoping to bypass the closure. Every time we turned to look for a road going NB we were stopped by roadblocks. The Police were not letting anyone travel north at all in the vicinity of the situation. There was a hostage negotiation and the FBI was involved and I think they were looking for someone because they were checking our IDs and looking in all the trunks.

Since we couldn't go north we went south to woodland and then north again on 99 up and then over to I5. I was driving and we decided to switch and let Billy drive at about 5 am, just as we were getting past the pass. About a half an hour later I woke up to Billy making an AHH sound and slamming on the brakes. The next thing I see is this deer going flying off the passenger side hood! He totally hit the back end of that deer and the thing went flying off to the side of the road, the poor deer looked like his back had been broken. After the shock wore off we started laughing an talking about how absurd this whole drive had been.

The pros: we made it safely to Eugene, gas was cheaper and cheaper as we drove north (we paid 4.45 in Bako before we left), there was no damage to the car from the deer, the baby took three bottles successfully, Jacob slept almost through the night and did not whine at all, we finally made it home.

The cons: shoot, besides the poor police officer and deer, and the fact that the 12 hr drive took us 16 hours to do in my opinion there were no cons. We made it safely and for the most part the drive was really pleasant! Thank God for small miracles.

BTW, we tried 5 hr energy and boy did it work for me, I only took a 30 minute cat nap before we killed the deer. Then I took a one hr nap when we arrived at my parent's house. I felt good for it being such a long trip.