Audrey revised

Audrey Hepburn

Long week...

I had a few gigs out of state last week.  So I took my girlfriend along with me for a fun roadtrip

Monday morning we took off from Pittsburgh and to drive to Des Moines Iowa.  It was a good twelve hour drive and finally arrived in town around dinner time.  With the time change it was a bit easier to deal with the unpacking since it was still light out.  The Hotel had an indoor pool and hot tub.  Our room was on the second floor around those.  It felt like a steamroom walking around back and forth to the car.   I had three gigs in Des Moines.  One Tuesday in Ankeny (fifteen minutes from downtown) one Wednesday in downtown Des Moines and one Thurs morning in Newton (45 minutes East of the city).  

Once I was done with the gig in Newton we took off for Eau Claire, Wisconsin.  It was a five hour drive though the Wisconsin scenery, which was beautiful.  This was the first GPS glitch.  Not sure why, but the GPS basically told us to drive in the river.  So when we finally figured out where to go it was fine until we got into Eau Claire.  The hotel we stayed in was off the map.  Even though clearly by the state of the hotel it had been around for quite a while.  The other was the goofy directions it took us to get to my gig in the area on Friday night.

I didn't spend a great deal of time in Eau Claire itself because I was in my hotel working on a small free lance job.  But the time I spent in the city was quite nice.   My girlfriend spent some time at a local mall while I worked in the area and thought it was pretty nice.

On Saturday morning we drove to St. Paul Minnesota.  It was less then two hours and a nice straight shot.  What a great city.  We spent most of the day there, and met up with a fellow Caricaturist for lunch at the Mall of America.  This place was a monster, to say the least.  About a half mile long and four floors tall.  Inside it had a mini Amusement Park with rollercoasters and water rides.  By the time we left we were beat.  

We got the hotel and there was the California Republican Delegation staying at our hotel.  For some reason the all dressed up in Hawaiian shirts.  Sat night I had a late gig and it went pretty well it was shortened due to the late job on the campus and not as many people showed up as expected.  We spent a bit more time in St. Paul on Sunday.  We had a return or two at the mall and it was extremely hard to even find the stores to return them.  Afterwards we had a nice lunch at an award winning greasy spoon called "The Nook.  "  They had a cheeseburger with the cheese stuffed in the center which is known in St. Paul called a "Juicy Lucy".  Great burger, neat little place.  

We decided to drive the fifteen hours back, all in one night.  We drove through Chicago around 10pm and found the skyline breathtaking.   We drove through the night and got back in Pittsburgh around 8am on Monday.  We were beat.  Next time I think I'll book a hotel somewhere between Chicago and Toledo and give an easy five hour drive the next day.  But it was a great time overall and we are glad to be home, I'll upload some pics when I get a chance.