Studio711.com – Ben Martens

This year we headed back to Indiana for Christmas. The weather forecast looked cool but pretty dry. The weather forecast was wrong.

The trip out was relatively smooth until we hit carnage at Midway. My parents had kindly made the ~2 hour drive (each way!) to pick us up and the traffic was so bad it took them 30-45 minutes to get from the cell phone lot to us. Thankfully we had them pick us up at Arrivals instead of Departures and that saved the wait from being even longer.

We awoke Christmas Eve morning to snow. A white Christmas was in order, but not just a white Christmas, but we had fresh snow every single day until we left! They also set a record for the coldest two weeks in history. Temps were in the single digits during the day. It was frigid but we still had fun playing in the snow and it never kept us completely snowed in.

Given the weather and the temps, we mostly hung around the house, but we got outside for sledding, exploring in the woods, a tour of the South Bend Chocolate Factory tour and church services among other things. It was very nice to relax and watch Elijah interact with Mom, Dad, Luke, Rachel and David.

Our trip to the airport for the flight back was interesting as well. Bad snow was predicted around the time we’d normally be driving to the airport, so instead, we got to the airport 5 hours early so that Dad and Mom could drive back before it got dark. It turned out to be a very good move because, while the trip there was easy, the trip back for them was quite treacherous. Thankfully they made it safely.

A huge thanks goes out to my parents for hosting us again and for all the driving!

Fort Peck, Montana. It’s not the first thing that comes to mind when you think about a summer vacation, but nonetheless, that’s where we were last weekend. Tyla’s family on her Dad’s side had planned a big family reunion. It was probably the biggest family gathering since her grandpa died in 1999.

Getting to Fort Peck is not small feat of traveling. Your options are:

1. Fly to Great Falls, MT and then drive ~5 hours to Fort Peck or fly into Glasgow, MT and drive 30 minutes to Fort Peck. Both are not cheap options and then you have to rent a car.
2. The Empire Builder line from Amtrak happens to go from our area to Glasgow. That takes 16-24 hours but it’s not cheap either and oh yeah, you have to rent a car when you get there.
3. Drive 915 miles.

After much debate, we decided to drive.

Don (Tyla’s Dad) made the trip a few times when his kids were younger. He would leave super early in the morning, drive until the car got wild, and then stop at a hotel with the pool to let the kids burn off energy. Then day 2 would just be whatever was left of the ~15 hour drive.

We planned to follow his advice so at 4:15 am on Thursday, the car was totally packed and I had just put my sleepy 4 year old son in the back seat. I hit the button to start the car and… nothing. Huh?! Thinking it was a dead battery, I put the car in neutral and pushed it out to the driveway so it would be easy to jump start it with the truck. After some finagling, I realized it wasn’t just a dead battery. It was some crazy electrical gremlin. Stuff was flickering on and off, the car wasn’t always recognizing our keyless key fob thingy, and if I did succeed in getting the car ignition turned on (just the fan, AC, lights, etc), I couldn’t get it turned off. At 4:15 in the morning, it was totally confusing.

After about 5 or 10 minutes I decided to give up and take the truck. But wait, the car is sitting in the driveway with the windows rolled down. I can’t leave it there. But at this point, I couldn’t even get it turned on enough to put it back into neutral! I searched around on the internet trying to find the override switch to put it into neutral, but failed. After much prayer and random guesses, I finally got it back into neutral. But… I wasn’t strong enough to push it up the hill into the garage! With Tyla’s help we were just barely able to get it back into the garage.

We transferred everything over to the truck (pulling stuff out through the back seat because we couldn’t get the electronic rear hatch open) and left the house 1.5 hours later than planned. What a start to a very long trip! I tried to stay calm though and just realize that there was some reason that God didn’t want us to take that car or wanted us to leave later or something. I didn’t know why He wanted it this way, but I knew that somehow it was for the best.

Elijah was obviously fully awake at this point, but he ended up getting some sleep around lunchtime. He was an incredible traveler! It exceeded our wildest expectations. Our only stops were for gas and super quick bathroom breaks. We made it out there and back in pretty much the same amount of travel time as Don, Logan and Megan who were in the other vehicle. I never would have guessed that going into this.

The truck ended up being nice to have on the trip. We had a lot more room inside and it was very easy to pack stuff in the back. I also appreciated the extra horsepower. Interstate speed limits in Montana top out at 80 and the two lane highways are 70. It was awesome being able to punch the accelerator at 70mph and easily jump up to 90 or so to pass someone on those two lane roads. I’m not sure the 1.4L EcoBoost Escape would have handled that as well. We got 19.3 mpg on the trip out and 18.7 on the way back. I’m assuming that we had a tail wind on the way out and a head wind on the way back. It’s a little lower than the published highway ratings due largely to the high speed limits and speed up/slow down style of 2 lane roads. We averaged over 65 mph including stops! I normally plan for a 50mph average when I’m traveling long distances with other people.

We made it to Great Falls, MT on the first night and stayed in a hotel with a nice pool and waterslide. It took about 10 hours to get to that point and then we only had 5 hours of driving left the next day.

Don’s twin brother (Dean) and his wife were very kind to let us stay in their beautiful home overlooking the Fort Peck Dam. We thoroughly enjoyed our time with them. Elijah’s favorite part was Dean’s ATV. There were a few miles of dirt roads behind his house and we took the ATV out every day for a ride. Tyla took some rides with me too.

The family reunion was on Saturday and we had over 80 people at the park. The total population of Fort Peck is 233 (as of 2010) so we made a noticeable bump on the population chart that day! Nearly all of the relatives were there. I was lost in a sea of names but found some great people to chart with. Tyla was positively giddy with all the people she got to reconnect with. And Elijah was in heaven with all the kids that were running around. He especially latched onto Dean’s granddaughters who were 8 and 10.

Aside from the family stuff, we also got to do a little exploring. On Saturday, Don took us out to show us the two farms that his family had owned and worked. We spent over an hour driving around dirt roads to check them out. Don’t tell Don you grew up in the middle of nowhere because he’ll just laugh at you. You’ve got nothing on him!

On Sunday he and Dean showed us the spillway for the dam and led us on a 4WD adventure up to the top of “TV Tower Hill”. It’s the highest hill in the area so it has a great view (and lots of communications antennas.)

The drive back started at sunrise on Monday morning. We made it back to Post Falls, ID the first night and then drove the 5 hours home on Tuesday. Our stop there was at the Red Lion hotel. They win the award for best free hotel breakfast ever! The buffet was delicious and we had an incredible view overlooking the Spokane River. At both hotel stops on the way out and the way back, we were able to have dinner with Logan, Megan and Don who stopped in the same town.

So we drove 1830 miles (plus the miles driving around while we were there) in 6 days with 2 days of visiting in the middle. It was a LOT but man that drive is so beautiful. I like the Seattle area but I would LOVE to live further away from the hustle and bustle. Those endless miles with no other cars around were very addicting.

A huge thank you goes out to Dean and Aileen for opening up their house to us and another one goes to Tyla for all the prep work she did to entertain Elijah on the trip. He was definitely done by the last day of travel, but all in all, he gets an A+. Our success now has me thinking about a family road trip to visit some of the national parks down in Utah…

P.S. This post is already crazy long so I’ll save the pictures for another day. It will take me a while to sort through them and edit them.

During our caboose vacation, we went kayaking each day using the kayaks provided by the owners. Elijah fit pretty well in front of me, and aside from having to do a bit of an awkward paddling stroke, it worked well. Our longest trip was only about a half hour but he never got bored or complained.

We played around with the GoPro a bit. The comments from him were unprompted. As we were paddling along on this trip, Tyla noticed a big tugboat and barge coming up the sound. I didn’t know how big the waves were going to be, and with a three year old on my lap, I wasn’t keen to find out while sitting on the water. We hustled back to the bay and then watched it go by.

Tyla came across a caboose on the southern end of Puget Sound that you could rent as a vacation home. It was available on her birthday weekend, it was in an area that we haven’t visited much, and Elijah loves trains so it seemed like the perfect fit. We headed down there last weekend and had a wonderful time.

The caboose has been nicely remodeled inside. They doubled the width of it so that you actually have a little room to stretch out. The main body of the caboose has the entry area, two sets of bunk beds, and a living room with a TV. The extended area has the kitchen, queen bed and a bathroom. The only interior door is to the bathroom so it’s a cozy setting.

The property overlooks the South Basin of Puget Sound and there are stairs leading down to the water so you can explore the shore and use the provided kayaks. We took advantage of the kayaks for short trips each day. Elijah was able to sit on my lap while I paddled.

I know that tides have been around for a while, but we were still amazed at how much water was moving in and out twice a day. The little cove by the caboose was probably 6-8 feet deep but it completely drained out with each low tide.

These rental properties often include a book where guests can leave a comment. They’re usually pretty generic, but it’s such a great opportunity to leave a funny/awkward message. Here are a couple that I thought about using:

• Thanks for letting me poop in your house.
• We came here to celebrate my beautiful wife’s birthday. My ugly wife doesn’t get birthday trips.

This concludes a busy month of vacations and adventures for us. There’s still more fun on the calendar, but I think we’re looking forward to a little time at home too.

Elijah is a farm boy born in a subdivision. He LOVES tractors. He’s in heaven when we go back to Indiana because Dad and Mom have three tractors at their house. They have two John Deere lawn mowers and one Alis Chalmers WD 45 which Elijah has named Otis.

Elijah was already enjoying riding those around the property and even driving one of the John Deere tractors by himself. Then we met up with my high school buddy Scott. When I was in high school, his family owned a Deere dealership. Since then they sold it but they still own/manage the dealership and they have a bigger/newer shop. They sell everything from lawnmowers and blowers to top of the line combines, tractors, seeders and sprayers. Scott is the resident expert on their GPS equipment which is fun because that’s what I did in my internship at John Deere. It has changed a LOT since then.

We chatted with Scott and his dad for a while and then headed outside. Scott tossed me the key and told me to take Elijah for a drive in anything he wanted! Our first pick was a fairly new 8245R. Back in high school I used to help Scott’s family on the farm a little bit but it has been a very long time since I’ve driven anything like that. Thankfully he gave me a quick tutorial on all the buttons and switches and we were off on a quick tour of the parking lot. After that we climbed around in a combine (complete with refrigerator) and then took a 5000 series tractor with a bucket out for a longer drive. Elijah loves the smaller tractors with a bucket and no cab. Scott asked if there was anything else we wanted to drive and for some reason, Elijah wasn’t interested in any of the other huge equipment they had (bummer!) but he loves Gators. Scott found one of their brand new, high end models and let me take Elijah and Tyla for a ride. Those things FLY! He said a guy in their shop had it up over 50 but I kept it under 40 with a three year old sitting on my lap.

It was a fantastic outing. At the end of the day I asked Elijah for his favorite part of the day. He said, “Mr. Scott is so nice! He let us drive TRACTORS!” Thanks Scott and Ken! We loved it!