Jack's Journey Continues...

Well, we have not had quite the regular internet access that I am used to, but we have survived. Sorry I have not been able to update my blog daily. Let's see, after our stay in Grand Island, Nebraska, we headed out on Wednesday around 8 am. We drove through the rest of Nebraska, and on to Iowa. Then we went through Illinois. Nebraska and Iowa grow LOTS of corn, and there is some in Illinois, too. Illinois is not quite as clean and pretty as Nebraska and Iowa. We hit Chicago outskirts around rush hour, but missed most of the traffic. Then we were on to Indiana, and I realized that there actually was something in South Bend, Indiana-Notre Dame. It is kind of like Texas A&M University, a pretty campus that is quite secluded and basically in the middle of nowhere. Notre Dame was a gorgeous campus, there are a lot of neat old buildings, some with gargoyles, and there are also some newer buildings. They have tons of green lawn! We saw the stadium and other playing fields, too. Wednesday we ate continental breakfast, subway for lunch (for those of you that don't know, I am really not a big fan of fast food), and Fazoli's for dinner. We kept driving after we left Notre Dame after 8 pm, and arrived in Ohio after 10 pm. We stayed the night at our third Holiday Inn Express for the trip! It was fine. After a decent night's sleep, I got up for a morning run on the country roads of this podunk town in Ohio. Just after starting my run, I had 2 dogs run up to me from this trailer home...aaaah, I love dogs, but am immediately thinking, they are going to attack, I am going to get rabies. One backed off when I approached the train tracks. The other just kept following me. He stayed with me for my 4 mile run. It didn't even cross my mind that he was a stray. He was quite obedient, listened, and I had to keep him out of the road from on coming traffic, cause I didn't want someone's dog killed. It was fun running with a dog, and on my way back to the hotel, I asked some kid about the dog, he said it was a stray and that the neighbors had called the pound on him the day before. I asked my mom if we could keep him, and she said no. Haha, well, at least he got a friend for 4 miles. After continental breakfast, we headed out and drove through Ohio, saw the city of Cleveland, etc. Then we got off at Kirtland, Ohio. We hadn't really planned that stop, but my mom and I are both glad that we did. We saw all of the really neat Church historic sites where the early members of the Church gathered before getting kicked out and moved all over the country. There is an incredible spirit there. We saw the Kirtland Temple, grabbed frozen custard cones across the street and headed on. We passed through part of Pennsylvania and then on to northern New York. Our next stop was Palmyra. We arrived last night. On our way in, we stopped to see the Hill Cumorah and see the Visitors Center located there. We checked into our little hotel, the Palymra Inn. The city is very quaint. This morning, Friday, I woke up and went on a run past the chapel and the temple and the other historic sites, it was so peaceful. There are so many trees and everything is so green. We are going to see the other historic sites this morning and then be on our way to finish our trip to Boston. Hope all is well...we are having a great time! I will post pictures when I have better internet in Boston. Love y'all!