The long road ahead

Alicia's planned out our route for the trip. According to the google, it's a total of 2,940 miles and would take 45 hours to drive if we did it non-stop. We could knock an hour off by going through Canada but we're worried that we'd be seduced by free healthcare and something called Tim Horton's.

The distance is pretty daunting, although not as daunting as realising we're leaving in 11 days. To put it in perspective, it's almost twice the distance from London to Moscow. If it wasn't for the Atlantic Ocean getting in the way, a drive from Cardiff to St. John's in Newfoundland would be 700 miles shorter. Or you could pop to Nouakchott, the capital of Mauritania, on the eastern coast of Africa as it's a piffling 2,407 miles.

Of course we could fly the same distance in eight hours for $400 each, but that's out thanks to the whole four-dogs-and-two-cats situation.

Our route spans 11 states: California, Nevada, Utah, Colorado, Nebraska, Iowa, Illinois, Ohio, Indiana, Pennsylvania, New York and Vermont. An easier way of remembering that is sun, gambling, Mormons, mountains, meth, meth, meth, meth, meth, not NYC, and thank Christ we've made it. I'm hoping for a t-shirt, hoodie, fridge magnet or sticker from all or most of them. We're avoiding the South because it's off our route, but mostly because it's the South.

Notice how I say Alicia's planned the route. The entire three years of planning for this move are down to Alicia, and I'm extremely grateful for all the effort she's put in; if it was left to me we'd be lucky to move to a tent by the 405. Let's face it, if it was left to me we wouldn't be able to afford a tent by the 405. We'd have to slum it in a box under a bridge on the 22.

She's nailed the planning to the point where when I have what I think is a really, really good idea, she's already thought of it, budgeted/paid for it, made the phone calls and got the t-shirt. Recent conversations about the trip have gone much like this:

Me: "Hey, why don't we-"

Alicia: "It's done."

Or:

Me: "Do you think it would be a good idea-"

Alicia: "No."

I just have to carry stuff and stay out of the way. We did have a discussion about whether we should do eight hours' driving a day or 12, and we picked eight because that's what she'd already planned. Like I said, carry stuff and stay out of the way.

Our RV is booked, the movers are booked, our container pod is booked, the AirBnB in Vermont is booked, pretty much everything is booked and I've added a ton of books to my Kindle. We're still chucking stuff in boxes but feeling a lot better about the progress we're making, at least up until it hits us that we're going in ELEVEN DAYS.