Roadtrip- Part II

It was an early morning at my cousin's house on Friday morning. Even though she kept telling us we were welcome to sleep in, my sister and I had a long day of driving ahead of us. So I reluctantly crawled out of bed at 6am to take a hot shower. Afterwards, we enjoyed homemade banana bread for breakfast and chatted with my cousin, her two boys and her husband. Then we were out the door by 7am to begin the second part of our roadtrip.
We didn't go far before our first stop. It was about 5 minutes. My sister and I had long decided that Starbucks would be our new best friend on this trip. Once we had our grande, non-fat, sugar-free Vanilla Lattes we were driving out of Little Rock and east towards Memphis. Of course, we were soon stopping for the first of many restroom breaks and to fill up the truck with gas. It was at this particular stop that we saw the marquee sign at KFC that just perpetuates the backwards stereotype of Arkansas: WANTED FUTARE LEADERS. Classic.
By late morning we were crossing into state #3- Tenessee. As we drove towards Memphis, sitting there along the Mississippi River I wish we could have exited to sightsee. But sadly, we did not have time to visit the birthplace of Elvis. We pressed on towards Nashville, planning to stop there for lunch.
We reached Nashville just after 1pm. We began to look for a place to eat just off the highway. For some reason, I had it in my mind to find a little diner where we could stop for lunch. I just pictured us in some cute little diner with walls covered with pictures of famous Nashville people. As we drove farther away from the highway and closer to downtown Nashville, we saw no such diners. Eventually we got back on the highway, watched Nashville grow smaller and smaller. Finally we stopped at some burger place. At least we chose one that we don't have in Texas or New York. Still, there were no pictures of famous people.
Not long after out lunch stop we crossed our next state line- Kentucky, state #4. Our plan of photographing each state line had long been abandoned. Instead, I drove and my sister slept. Overall, Kentucky was unimpressive. Sure, the rolling hills were quaint. One thing we did notice was all the XXX, Adult Bookstores and Videostores. Luckily they were balanced out by all the "Jesus Loves You" signs.
Navigating our way around Lexington we pressed on to West Viriginia, state #5, and our destination for the night. We finally drove into Charleston around 8:30pm (Eastern Time). We were officially at 12 hours of roadtrip fun. It was time to stop. My sister and I had long been planning a relaxing evening of sitting in a hotel room enjoying beer and pizza to unwind after a long day of driving cross-country. We drove past Charleston planning to find a hotel on the other side of the city so we could avoid traffic in the morning. Soon we were driving into darkness towards what appeared to be nothing. This wasn't good. The next big town was 115 miles away and there was no way we were going to backtrack. So we decided we would keep driving. If we saw a hotel and were tired we would stop. Otherwise we would just keep going. After about 15 mintues, we saw an exit with a sign for a hotel- and a Pizza Hut. We took it as our sign to stop. So we got off the highway, stopped at the gas station for 2 beers. Then stopped by Pizza Hut to order our dinner. We checked into the hotel and enjoyed being out of the truck.
It was a successful day of driving. 5 states down, 3 more to go.