Mississippi, Florida, Nashville, Niagara Falls and Canada!

It has been almost four weeks since we last updated the blog, and of course, a lot has happened since then, The highlights are Disney World, the Niagara Falls and Toronto! Toronto might not look that convincing at first glance, but there is really a lot going on. A lot of people in the streets, small fashion and design stores, a lot of restaurants..... And there is a lot of construction work, mostly apartments. I guess we have always believed that we would visit Vancouver if we ever were to visit Canada, so we are kind of surprised about being here. But definitely convinced!

It has been a long drive, from Mississippi through Florida before going North. After almost two weeks in Columbia, Mississippi, we drove to Orlando and Disney World!

Anna and Elsa

Alice

We spent a couple of days in Orlando and visited the Magic Kingdom. We spent the entire day in the park, and saw a lot of the characters including Elsa and Anna, Alice, Ariel, Winnie the Pooh and the Pirates of the Caribbean. Emi was not to sure about that last ride, but she decided to do it, and loved it:)

Emi loved the Magic Kingdom

We then headed for Nashville. We drove for two days and spent the nights and mornings in Savannah and Atlanta.

A pit stop at Daytona Beach

Savannah

 In Nashville we spent time with friends and family.

The front porch view

After about a week, we had to decide were to go next. We have booked hotel and the flight back home from New York, but we have driven from Nashville to New York through Virginia a few years back. We therefore decided to add a couple of destinations and headed towards Ohio and Canada.

Cincinnati

Farm land

Cleveland

The boarder!

One of our main destinations was of course Niagara Falls on the border of Canada and the US and the Great Lakes. We saw the falls from the Canadian side of the boarder.

I know, it's amazing:)

Toronto

We spent one night in the city of Niagara Falls. If you ever come, try to avoid the extremely touristy cities on both sides of the boarder. Go directly to the falls, and then head for Toronto:) And we are not leaving Canada yet! We have decided to go through Montreal before crossing the boarder again and then go through Boston on our way to NYC.

Dallas and Houston

From Albuquerque, we drove to Amarillo and then south to Dallas. We didn't really spend a lot of time in either Albuquerque or Amarillo, and we did a lot of driving! So far, we have driven from California, through Nevada, the Southwest of Utah, Arizona, New Mexico, and Texas.

Dallas
On the left is the Texas Schoolbook Depository. John F Kennedy was shot from
the second window from the top right. Dealy Plaza is the park in the foreground.

Design District

We spent most of our time on playgrounds though

We spent a couple of nights in Dallas before continuing to Houston.

We spent three nights in Houston, visiting the city and NASA's Johnson Space Center

Houston Space Center

Driving out of Houston, we were thinking about going south to Galveston. But we changed our minds, and went east to Mississippi to visit Granny and Poppy.

Fam playing on Granny and Poppys living room floor

Flagstaff, Show Low, the Petrified Forrest, and Albuquerque

We have actually learned how to spell Albuquerque, and are quite pleased about that.

From the Grand Canyon, we drove to Flagstaff and spent a night there.

The day after, we went to Show Low to visit Joel.

Show Low is south of Holbrook which is another Route 66 city.

Wigwam hotel in Holbrook

Train

Close to Holbrook, Route 66 passes through the Petrified Forest. The Petrified Forest is located in Navajo and Apache counties in Northeastern Arizona, and includes 200 million year old wood that has become petrified...

... and badlands!

We then drove to Albuquerque and spent one night before moving on to Amarillo.

Texas

Our next goal is Dallas!

 

A lot of driving ahead of us! This is between Holbrook and Show Low 

The Grand Canyon

The North rim was closed during the winter, so we drove in from the south. We drove around it first, though!

Kaibab National Forest

We stopped for lunch. The roads used to be steeper, and early 1900s, the roads were so steep that the gas did not run through to the engine. They solved it by going backwards up the mountains.

The Kaibab National Forest borders both the Grand Canyon rims.

This is not the Grand Canyon...

But we are definitely getting closer:)

After about a hundred pictures and a never ending fear of running out of battery on the camera before we actually reach the Grand Canyon, we were there!

Las Vegas, Zion, and the West

From Yosemite, we drove to Las Vegas and spent a couple of nights in the city. Emi loved the fairytale hotel and the m&m store. We had decided to drive to Grand Canyon from the north, but we took the wrong turn somewhere, and ended up driving through Zion National Park. We drove north on I15 through St George and Hurricane. The park is in the southern part of Utah in the junction between the Colorado plateau, the Great Basin and the Mojave desert.

Zion National Park

After visiting Zion, we drove through Kanab towards the Grand Canyon.  The drive through the Mojave desert and around the Grand Canyon through the Kaibab National Forrest turned out to be amazing! There are endless stretches of semi dessert steppe and grassland plains.

Mojave dessert

We did not drive the old route 66, but we drove a similar route from Flagstaff to Amarillo following the I40, though Arizona, New Mexico and entering Texas.

We have passed through several of the route 66 cities including Barstow, Flagstaff, Holbrook and Albuquerque.

Barstow

Driving from Las Vegas to Kanab