We finally managed to get to the USA! This short post will quickly recap the last three weeks and our crossing of 6 states.

We had tons of delay due to port troubles in Belgium (two weeks), from where our car left Europe, as well as coronavirus - we turned out positive during routine testing before the flight and had to delay the flight for another two weeks. Instead of arriving on 12th of March, as originally planeed, we touched down in New York on 7th of April. As it’d been over 6 weeks we hadn’t seen our van, we visited the Big Apple hastily after arriving and rushed to the port the next day to pick him up. We still managed to see some of the basics: Broadway, Times Square, a bit of Central Park, Empire State Building, the High Line.

We found our baby car safe and sound in the port, not a single scratch, nothing missing from inside.

Eager to go westward, we didn’t stay any longer in New York. We spend a first night camping at a state park northwest from the city and set out to cross Pennsylvania forests fast. In Pittsburgh, we attended a Penguins’ hokey match against Nashville Predators (Penguins won, and we saw Crosby). We spend some time in Ohio, visiting the capital Columbus and the aviation museum in Dayton, hometown of the Wright brothers.

In Indiana, we hang out in Indianapolis and checked out an impressive French fort in Lafayette.

We reached Chicago quite quickly, where Antoine got on a plane back to Paris to attend the funeral of his grandmother, Oma. I hanged out in the city a bit and spent the rest of the week while he was gone in Indiana Dunes National Park, at the southern shore of lake Michigan, doing little hikes whenever the weather allowed it (so not often :p).

After that week, I picked Antoine back at the O’Hare airport, where he got interrogated by the airport sheriff for like an hour due to his suspicious border crossing activities (he was scared they would take away his precious cheese he was smuggling). We jumped onto the Route 66, which starts in Chicago as simply highway I-55. We visited a couple of thematic attractions on the way through Illinois.

On the border between Illinois and Missouri states, we visited St. Louis, perceived as the gate to the West, from where the Lewis and Clark expedition has left after the Louisiana Purchase.

We crossed the Missouri state in the direction of Kansas, where the Great Plains unfold. Photos coming soon!