Tuesday : Zoo and Raleigh Temple
Madalyn is home this semester and we have a huge bucket list of things to do with her. We want to show her our favorite camp site and hikes. I want to take the little boys on an overnight hike and have her babysit. I want to spend a few days at my sister’s house and have her babysit. I want to take the 5 little kids somewhere over night so that she and Thomas can have some bonding time. We also want to go tour SVU. And lastly, Madalyn wanted to see all of our favorite sites when we lived in Eastern North Carolina.
Lots of things on our list! So all of September I’ve been anxious to start doing them but we kept getting days of rain in a row or company or other things come up. Finally when our power came back on on Monday night I looked at the weather and saw it was a great week for travelling! Since our campground is closed from Helene, we decided to go see the sites Maddie wanted to see.
We packed quickly Tuesday morning and headed off across North Carolina from west to east, from the mountains to the sea.
We ate our sack lunch in the car to save time when we got there. First stop was the NC Zoo. When we lived in NC we got one free trip a year as homeschoolers. Now that we live a few miles over the Virginia line, we can’t. But I found out that a pass to the bird zoo is only $79, cheaper than tickets for 7 of us. Plus it gets you into the NC Zoo too! So I got it and we were able to go to both on this trip.
First motel stay
It was a dumpy Motel 6 with a cockroach in the bathroom, a broken towel rack, only one lightbulb out of 3 working in the vanity and things like that. No breakfast, pool, or nice fitness center. But hey, it had 3 beds! That’s why we got it. And it was the only thing we could find in our price range on the way to Kinston.
I put the 3 little kids in a bed sideways so they’d sleep better, and we made it work just fine. In the morning after packing the van we ran and tried out the exercise equipment and it was actually a lot of fun!
Wednesday: Kinston Science Center, New Bern, Aurora Ferry
Wednesday we packed several field trips that we used to spend a day at for each one, into one day. It was awesome seeing them again!
First stop: Kinston Science and Nature Center
We ate our lunch and played on the playground first. Then explored the science center and the animals.
Here’s a picture from 2015 with 9 kids. And the one from this trip with 6: Madalyn and the 5 little kids.
Second stop: New Bern
New Bern is the only “big” town we were going through today so even though it was only 3:00 I decided to stop for dinner. I didn’t know if we’d find another place to warm up our pumpkin chili I’d brought and I knew we’d get to our motel past 9:00 again. So I found a ritzy Hilton by the park and asked to warm up our chili in their microwave. Then we ate it at the park and fed the ducks and pigeons. Then got back on the road again!
Third stop: Aurora fossil dig and ferry
Kids loved digging for shark’s teeth before we got on the car ferry and rode over to Bath, North Carolina’s oldest city.
Fourth stop: Bath, NC
Bath is North Carolina’s oldest city. We spent a week there every summer performing in a pageant with dear friends. So as soon as we got there we visited a gas station/restaurant that we would eat at with cast members. Madalyn treated us to ice cream cones! So I’m really glad we had already eaten dinner. They were delicious and I don’t like ice cream much. But these were great. After eating the kids played with a goose while I called for motels and we watched the sun set. It was a magical evening.
Thursday: To the Outer Banks!
First stop: Fort Raleigh
We visited Ft. Raleigh in 2014 and took a picture of the kids sitting on a branch of this tree, so it was fun to recreate it. We actually re-created lots of pictures on this trip, but I won’t post them here. Maybe someday I’ll make a re-creation post.
Next stop: Bodie Island Lighthouse
lighthouse was going to be our one paying adventure for this trip but we failed to get tickets ahead of time (I was hoping to use our national parks pass to at least get reduced admission) so we only go 1 ticket and sent Kaitlyn up it. Only 8 people can go at a time and it would have been a long wait until there were another 7 openings for us. So Kait went up and took some pictures for us.
Next stop: Wright Brothers Memorial
I was really excited for the 3 younger kids to see where the Wright Brothers first flew their airplane.
Next stop: the beach!
We checked into our motel at 4pm, changed into swimsuits and walked to the beach. Unfortunately Hurricane Leslie was out at sea and made the trip currens too dangerous for swimming. So that was a bummer. But the kids didn’t complain and just jumped the waves and made sand castles. It was still great to be at the beach. It wasn’t crowded, and the weather was beautiful.
Then we ate macaroni and cheese and chili in our room and later had popcorn when the little kids went to bed. A great night! (Except Maddie’s phone got wet and wouldn’t turn on. And Samuel realized he left his favorite stuffed animal at a previous motel. So we were sad about those things.)
Friday: Edenton, Bird Zoo, Amtrak
We got up at 6:45 and went out to the beach to see the sunrise. It was beautiful.
We finally got a good breakfast. (Well, I don’t think any hotel breakfasts are good and I bring my own food, but the kids were happy to see hot food and enjoy the experience of a hotel breakfast that they’ve heard about.) We got packed up and on our way for our last day of our fun road trip.
First stop: Edenton, NC
We love Edenton because it’s a cute colonial town. It was the capital of the North Carolina colony. It has the very first church built in NC in 1702: St. Paul’s. That building was too small and was torn down, with a new (and current) building being built in 1736. It is still being used today, making it the oldest church building still in regular use. The church graveyard is where 3 governors are buried and many other historical figures. The St. Paul congregation signed a Declaration of Independence from England in June 1776 which angered the Church of England and they no longer sent St. Paul’s church money.
Edenton has lots of other 1700’s buildings but I forgot to take pictures of them. One we always go to is Penelope Barker’s house. She was a lady who organized a boycott of 51 women who boycotted the British tea. This was in October 1774, before the Boston Tea Party.
We ate lunch at the park like we always do then went out on the dock for pictures. Last time we were here was in 2015.
Here are pictures from our trip to Edenton in 2015 with 9 kids.
Next stop: Sylvan Heights Bird Park
The children have always loved the bird zoo. It’s been since 2013 (11 years) since we’ve been, so it was awesome to be back. Everything looked the same and felt like home. We were about the only ones there, which was fun.
Last stop: Amtrak train station!
Madalyn took an overnight train to Orlando to visit Spencer for his birthday. Since the train station is in Raleigh, it wasn’t much further to see all these sites the days before her departure and to stop at the station on the way back. So it worked out perfectly!
Looks like she’ll be getting a hurricane during her visit, which will be exciting. I’m glad she has grandparents and aunts and uncles to stay with who are very knowledgeable about hurricanes. It was fun seeing her off on the train. We already miss her, but she’ll only be gone a week or two.
It was a great week! I had debated going on the trip because I was afraid of breaking down. I also worried it was too frivolous when we don’t have money to travel right now. But I’ve been wanting to go to these sites since we moved here and if I ever go I’d like to take one of the older kids with me who remembers the places. All of the 4 oldest want to go back and since one is here right now (and who knows when we’ll have the opportunity to go with the others), I decided to just go. The weather was perfect, we needed to go halfway to the train station anyway, and you never regret road trips with your kids. We had a marvelous time and I’m so glad we went. The whole time I couldn’t believe we’re back at places we haven’t been to in 10+ years, our favorite places and memories of this beautiful state.
Cost of the Trip
- Gas: $50.41 + $30= $80.41
- Hotels: $78.94 + $85.51 + $134.88=$299.33 (Keep in mind we had to find dumpy rooms with 3 beds to accommodate us and still put 1 kid on the floor or squish 3 to a bed.)
- Annual zoo pass: $79 (Worked at both zoos and now we get to go back for free for a year!)
- Lighthouse tour for Kaitlyn: $10
- Groceries: ~$100 (I threw away my receipt but it was just over $100 for 7 of us for meals for 4 days. We bought bread, meat, cheese, fruit, lettuce, tomatoes, carrots, and macaroni & cheese cups for a hotel dinner. One dinner we ate sandwiches and the other we ate pumpkin chili I had made at home and brought.
Total: $468 for me to take a 4 day road trip with 6 kids.
This doesn’t include groceries since we have food stamps. My mom graciously sent $300 to help. On the phone with her Monday night, I expressed my doubts about it being too frivolous to take a trip when I can’t afford my mortgage each month. She encouraged me to go, being a fan of road trips, family bonding times, and a super sweet, supportive mom. I’m so glad we went! It was the best!