We are home! As I sit down amid the boxes to write this article, it is truly hard to believe that an entire year has passed since we pulled out of Charbonneau on a sunny afternoon, June 3, 2000.

Just to give you a statistical wrap up of the trip - we drove over 36,000 miles in our 54 weeks on the road, visited all 48 of the contiguous states, saw 29 of the state capitols, and explored 43 National Parks with our National Parks Pass (as well as over 40 National Park Monuments, Seashores, etc).

We ate over 500 restaurant meals, had 61 days it rained some part of the day, stayed in over 250 motels, and drove 359 miles on our longest driving day. All of this with no traffic tickets and no fights between the two of us!

We paid as much as $2.35 a gallon for gas, and as little as $1.22. We were as high as 14,130 feet at Pikes Peak, and as low as -282 feet at Death Valley. The highest temperature was 114 in Palm Springs, and the low was 7 in Washington, DC.

Everyone asks us what our "favorite" place was. This is an impossible question to answer because there are so many wonderful places to see in the United States. A few of our most memorable places include The Black Hills area of South Dakota, Lexington, KY, Cape Cod, MA, Newport, RI, The Smithsonian, Charleston, SC, St. Augustine, FL, The Oklahoma City Memorial, Big Bend NP, Mesa Verde NP, Zion NP, and Yosemite NP. But our "favorite" place really is home!

We really tried to enjoy each day of the trip, but the closer we got to home, the harder that became. Since we were in the West this last month, we subconsciously knew we could easily get back to these areas anytime, and we were beginning to feel the weight of the self imposed "deadline" to be home by the middle of June.

Nonetheless, we kept to our plan to finish all the National Parks, and pick up other items of interest along the way. As we continued on through Colorado, we enjoyed Rocky Mountain NP and our newest National Park, The Black Canyon of the Gunnison. Each of them offered classic Colorado - high mountains and deep canyons with rugged hiking and fantastic views.

Southern Utah is a place like no other. This vast wilderness has created some of the most diverse and spectacular scenery in the entire country. Each day, we thought there could be nothing more breath taking than the day before - until we ventured to the next park. We managed time in each of the National Park wonders in a little over a week - Arches, Canyonlands, Capitol Reef, Bryce, N Rim - Grand Canyon, and Zion. You feel very insignificant after gazing at what nature has left us in this very special, not to be missed sculpture garden spanning several hundred miles in each direction.

After catching our breath with a golf outing in St. George, UT, we were off to meet one daughter and her family in Disneyland. But first we had a couple more treats in store for ourselves.

Death Valley NP is an eerie place, but it has the saving grace of the Furnace Creek Inn - truly an oasis is the desert. After exploring the Park, we nestled into a cozy room overlooking their restful palm garden. The water in their pool is so pure that it is untreated (and unheated at a comfortable 84 degrees) and you can really enjoy the water when the outside temperature in the low 100's!

The next day we struck out for Palm Springs via Joshua Tree NP in weather that was continually well over 100, and we were on some of the most desolate roads of the trip. You quickly become very thankful for the reliability of your vehicle! Joshua Tree in the late afternoon was really delightful and hopefully yielded some great pictures.

A quick couple days in our favorite Palm Springs gave us renewed energy for the grandchildren! We had never actually stayed in downtown Palm Springs, and were delighted with the quaint Estrella Inn, just a block off of Palm Canyon, within walking distance of everything wonderful there - restaurants, the weekly street fair, shopping, and the theatre.

After a couple days of the delighted squeals of children at Disneyland, and a quick visit with friends to the Warner Bros. VIP Studio Tour, we were off for the Channel Islands NP off the coast at Ventura. A boat drops you off with your water and food for several hours of self-exploration. We got in some good hiking and just lying in the sun enjoying the clear waters of Santa Barbara Sound. On the way back we were treated to a rare siting of Beluga Whales that played around the boat for 15-20 minutes before moving on.

The last two parks before heading home were Kings Canyon/Sequoia and Lassen Volcanic. We only had time for a brief taste of each as we toured through on the main roads, only stopping at the major attractions in each.

On our last night on the road, we decided we had to revisit the campground of our first night--the delightful River Park RV Resort in Grants Pass. We even got the same space we had that first night. We laughed at how much more skilled we were at hooking up, toasted our successful year, reminisced about our adventures, and went to bed early with anxious expectations of sleeping in our own bed, and having coffee in our own kitchen, dancing in our dreams.

Our mission has been accomplished, and our heads are full of memories to last a lifetime. History has come alive, the majesty of our National Parks is etched in our brains', and the vastness and variety of our country lives in our visions of the year; but most of all, we remember the people. Everywhere we went, we met interesting, helpful and fun people. Would we do it again? - you bet!