This post feels like a book, but this trip has felt like a movie! The absolute trip of a lifetime! Started yesterday at 2:20am, after all our pick ups we were on the road, and besides restroom stops we did pretty good for time.
AND THEN, 15 miles outside our destination, the new vacuum pump goes out, snapping the belt on one of our buses (New Jersey Highway with NO BRAKES or POWER STEERING)!
We were not going to let that stop our trip. We abandoned ship (bus), put everyone on another bus and kept on going! We parked, walked a mile to the subway & had our own subway car & escort from New Jersey into NYC! Once we got there we had the best pizza I’ve ever had in my life! Walked to the peer & got on the cruise to see the Statue of Liberty (it was cold)! After that we boarded our own private double decker bus (P.S.) you have to sit down those low bridges will take your head off! Then going downtown to Time Square we walked through a movie being shot, became part of a steeet performance on the way to Rockefeller Center and made it back to the bus!
After boarding the subway back we headed to Dave & Busters for food & fun until midnight! Needless to say when we finally made it back to the hotel we had no problems with getting kids to sleep! We woke in the morning, ate and headed back (in a snow storm)!
Sometime before Christmas I’ll have to take another ride up to retrieve our buses but this is a trip I know these kids as well as myself, will never forget!
Thank you Moyer Brothers for your shuttle bus & $5k sponsorship, Seth Stace for sponsoring 10 kids with $1k, Walt Surratt & the Historic Andrew Jackson School Museum for sponsoring 5 kids a piece at $500, the New York- VA Club for sponsoring 3 kids at $375, Taylor Alger, Duane Painter, Jerry Dofflemyer, Jake Judy, Courtney Cubbage, for sponsoring 2 kids a piece at $250 & everyone who sponsored a youth at $125, Kathy Frye Veney, Sibbie Jeffries, Sonja Bailey, Barbie S. Jenkins, Chris Hurlbert, Deidra Mae, Donna Courtney Singh, Julie Jones, Melissa M Farrar, Christine Seckel, Audrey Tutt Smith, Michael Arrington, Frankie Coleman, Andy Caviness, Daniel Jones, Denise Wales, Laura Kresse, Stevie Allen & JT Excavating! And to every volunteer, it could not have been done without you, thank you!!!
Audre