Vacation: Day 9

Our vacation is almost over!  Very sad to leave but it will be nice to get back home.  Dad, Mom and Mike left earlier than the rest of us, they were planning on driving the entire way home, roughly 14 hours.  Joy and Barb were planning on driving all the way to Ankeny which is not quite as far.  Joy was planning on staying at Barb's that night and heading home to Dubuque on Sunday hopefully after seeing Jim, Mandy and Charlotte.  We had made a hotel reservation in Lincoln Nebraska, roughly halfway home.  After talking it about it weeks before our vacation we had decided that it would be in our best interest to NOT drive the entire way home in one day.  It was a good choice. 

We took off from Estes Park around 7:20am.  Jackson had had his usual chocolate milk that morning.  Between the chocolate milk and the winding road thru Big Thompson Canyon I think it made his tummy upset.  A few miles before Loveland he threw up.  And then he threw up again.  Karsten tried his best to use Jackson's blanket and a towel we had to clean it up before we could stop.  We finally found a gas station outside of Loveland and stopped to change his clothes.  Karsten cleaned up his car seat the best he could with some antibacterial wipes we had.  We then took off again.  A short while down the road Jackson complained that his tummy hurt again.  I thought maybe he had to poop, he often says his tummy hurts before he poops.  We found another gas station to stop at and he and Karsten went inside to go to the bathroom.  When they came back out Jackson didn't have a shirt on....while waiting in line he had vomited again.  Luckily, Karsten managed to contain it in Jackson's shirt.  Jackson got another clean shirt and we were on our way once again.  We were very hesitant to give him anything to eat or drink while we were in the car.  He finally fell asleep for an hour or so and when he woke up he said he felt better.  We stopped at a Wendy's for lunch and intentionally took a table as close to the bathroom as possible since we were still not sure about Jackson's stomach.  He ate lunch fine and had no more troubles.  Thank goodness!  I was imagining a car ride home with a 3 year old with stomach flu.  No thank you!

We did stop in Kearney Nebraska again on our way to our hotel in Lincoln.  There is an Archway Monument there that we thought might be fun.  It was pretty interesting.  There was also a maze that we went thru.  It was a good stop during our car ride to get some exercise.

  The Archway Monument actually goes over the interstate.

An old wagon outside of the monument.

You get timed as you go thru the maze, then get a "prize".  Jackson picked out a foam airplane.

After our stop the the Archway Monument we only had a couple hours left until we got to our hotel in Lincoln.  We arrived at our hotel around 6:30pm, but we did lose an hour in western Nebraska due to the time change from mountain to central.  We got settled a bit, stretched our legs and then found some supper.  The boys tore around the hotel room, we got baths done, pajamas on, watched a little TV, then lights off at 9:00pm.