Northward Ho! - Episode 1

What a start! Mark was out late cleaning the house, so we got a late start Thursday morning. Despite having directions, I took a couple wrong turns on our way to drop off the keys at our rental agency (what is with San Antonio and not having street signs identifying the streets???). We went to turn on the walkie talkies and discovered that the batteries were dead. Mark bought some new ones, but they were the wrong size. Then, after buying the right batteries, we finally got headed in the right direction only to quickly discover that the car's passenger side window would not roll up. Hmmm. We either had to stop the operation and get it fixed or continue with a broken window. Keep with the time schedule or stop at hotels with an open windown and drive through freezing temps with an open windown. We decided it had to be fixed. Mark stayed behind to get it fixed (they put us at the front of the line!), and the kids and I headed north. About an hour into our drive and Sarah threw up all over herself. It was disgusting, but at least she didn't choke or trash her car seat. I wouldn't want to smell that for the next 4+ days. We only went 250 miles before stopping at 6:00. Mark caught up with us just as we were looking for a hotel, so that worked out very well. The four packs of batteries we bought earlier in the day went unused all day. Ironic. It would have been nice to have two cell phones today, but everything turned out just fine.