Katie does the desert Southwest

Most people have heard me ramble about this already, but I wanted to get my blog going in advance of the trip.

So my company gives its employees a month-long, paid sabbatical every five years of service. Well they've now discontinued this benefit, but luckily I'm the last person in the office, seniority-wise, that gets it. I reached my five years last December 16th, so I'm all set.

I thought for a long time about what I wanted to do with my month off. I thought about traveling abroad, but even though I could use SkyMiles on the flight, it would be way too expensive to spend a month anywhere, especially with the Euro kicking the Dollar's ass.

So I decided to spend it here in the good old US of A. Although I've traveled around the country quite a bit, I have never explored the interior of the country west of the Mississippi. I plotted all of the places I wanted to go on a Google map--yes, I know I'm a dork--and bingo, a lot of those places were clustered in the Four Corners area of the Southwest. And since I can't see everything I want to see within a month, I made a lot of cuts, and my decision was made.

Now, it's April, and I've started to get a little excited. I spent three hours yesterday creating a sample itinerary at The Road Trip wizard. That site may still be in beta, but it rocks!

Here are the places I plan to visit:
Carlsbad Caverns National Park, outside Carlsbad, NM--some of the most famous caves in the US, home to hundreds of thousands of bats
Roswell, NM--home of little green men; this is on the chopping block, if time is a problem
White Sands National Monument, near Alamagordo, NM--huge white gypsum sand dunes, where Trinity, the nuclear test site for the Manhattan Project is. It's currently a missile range, as well as a testing ground for experimental aircraft, for the military.
The Grand Canyon, north of Flagstaff, AZ--I don't think I need to describe this one:)
Hoover Dam, on the dividing line of AZ and NV--the second tallest dam in the US, with enough concrete to build a two-lane highway from NYC to San Francisco. Formed Lake Mead.
Zion National Park, near Springdale, UT--home of Zion Canyon and Angel's Landing, which is like a smaller El Capitan.
Bryce Canyon National Park, near Tropic, UT--thousands of hoodoos and petroglyphs...who could ask for more?
Capitol Reef National Park, near Torrey, UT--Huge fossilized sand dunes; this one is on the chopping block, if need be, but it's on the way to other stuff:)
Arches National Park, near Moab, UT--has over 2,000 natural sandstone arches, including one of the most famous, Delicate Arch. Not to mention the hoodoos (I love that word). The opening sequence of Indiana Jones and the Last Crusade was filmed here.
Moab, UT --Moab will be my home base for Canyonlands and Arches, and it's supposed to have a nice outdoorsy vibe. It's big for mountain biking. Too bad that hurts my butt:)
Canyonlands National Park, near Moab, UT--it has gorgeous rock arches, slot canyons and spires, to name a few.
Mesa Verde National Park, near Cortez, CO--it's the home of one of the largest and most famous ancient Pueblo Indian cliff dwellings in the nation
My dad's house in scenic Byhalia, MS
Lisaann's house in the Nashville, TN area

Here's the Google map.

It may be a little bit of a stretch to cover them all, so this may get trimmed a little more

I plan to leave May 3rd-ish and return May 27th-ish. I will be driving cross country, and I'm doing most or all of the trip alone. It's not by choice...it's a necessity. People either don't have the interest or the time...or they just don't like me (he, he). My mom may go for a week, but only because she is not in favor of this solo trip to begin with, and she thinks she can protect me from the world's rapists and murders. If anyone wants to go with me for a week or two, let me know. I will submit you to a laborious psychiatric screening process.:)

I plan to blog for the period I'm gone, and this time, I promise I'll remember the cord for my camera so I can upload pictures periodically. I'm already plotting some WiFi hotspots along the way--truck stations have them now...who knew?

I am really excited. I got a new Garmin GPS unit, and I did the first of many shopping trips today for supplies! Anyone who has tips on the trip as a whole, specific places or on how to keep my carful of stuff organized for a month, please pass them on.

Thanks to Matt and Beth for the loan of a RocketBox for a month!

Well, that's all I have for now. I'll update when anything exciting happens this month.