Jennifer writes:
After 5 days of driving, we’re now here in my sister Alice’s apartment in Santa Monica. Our journey was not without car drama, of course. Second day on our road trip the little Aveo started having trouble climbing uphill in the mountains of Colorado. We had to pull into a small mountain town in the middle of nowhere, and Mark had to stand in the cold rain checking the car. Not a high point of the trip.
Because it was Memorial Day, nothing was open. We had to stay one night in this charming ski town, Frisco, so we could take the car to the mechanic the next day. By God’s grace, it was not the worst place on earth to get stuck with car trouble. We stayed in a charming, European style B&B. The next morning when the mechanic was checking on the car we sat by a beautiful marsh, visiting with a black cat and many beautiful birds, enjoying God’s amazing creation around us. The town was surrounded by magnificent snow capped mountains. I actually had a good time on our little detour.
Here are some other highlights on our trip. You may be wondering what in the world No Name is.
It’s a town in Colorado where we camped at halfway through our trip. So who was being funny when they came up with the name of the town? Anyway, our campsite was surrounded by mountains and right by the Colorado River. Mark and I walked about 2 miles trying to gather some wood for making a fire. It was pretty humorous when we walked across the interstate on an overpass carrying tree branches. Sleeping on rocks was not so funny though.
The next state we visited was Utah. The landscape was significantly different than that of Colorado. What welcomed us into Utah was hundreds of miles of barrenness. There was actually a sign that says no services for the next 116 miles! I’m very glad that the car behaved well on this leg of the trip! That night we camped at Zion National Park.
As soon as we entered Zion we were struck by the incredibly wonderful and magnificent mountains (see our Flickr pictures). The Creator is indeed amazing. The next morning we took the park shuttle visiting different scenic points, doing a little bit of hiking, and just enjoying God’s wonderful creation.
The driving that followed the amazement at Zion was not so impressive. Here’s a tip for you: driving through Utah, Arizona and Nevada in a black car without air conditioning is not the most pleasant thing to do. But we made it to Santa Monica last night. It was very good to finally see my sister’s little bump! Today we went to Google to have lunch with Lukas, my brother-in-law. I think he has the sweetest job on earth. They have a game room, a hammock on the deck, cool office decoration, great food at the cafeteria, and endless snacks. 
Thanks for checking in, friends! Please enjoy some of the pictures we took on our road trip.
The Traveling Stams 