On To Michigan

Continuing to try and finish up blogging about our cross-country trip...I have a lot more appreciation now for bloggers. It's a lot of work!

We made it to Mitchell, SD on the evening of August 14^th and stayed at the Kelly Inn. We booked the inn solely on the basis of having coin laundry, so it was a nice surprise that it was more than just your cookie-cutter lodging. The look was rustic, with carved wooden bears on the exterior of the building and a country-style lobby complete with mounted deer head (NOT a weird cow skull, and thus did not creep anyone out).

 The Lobby

 Cute bear sculptures outside

It was dinnertime when we arrived. We noticed that there was a restaurant across the street, and asked the desk clerk about it. “Culver’s?” she replied, “It’s very popular. Would you like a takeout menu?” Yes please! Turns out Culver’s is a Wisconsin-based fast food restaurant, specializing in “butterburgers” (regular burgers, as far as I could tell) and fried cheese curds. There was a reason why it was so popular; the food was tasty and a definite cut above McDonald’s. We liked it so much we ate at another Culver’s location the next evening. We decided that we had to try the cheese curds.

 Dan displaying a cheese curd.

The cheese curds were OK. Kinda like mozzarella sticks but smaller and with cheddar cheese.

We had our first and only four-state day on the 16^th: We started up in Wisconsin, went through Illinois and Indiana, and finished in Michigan. We hadn’t stopped anywhere interesting the day before, so we decided to try and find somewhere to explore once we got into Michigan. After perusing the AAA Tourbook, I picked out the Warren Dunes State Park. It was on the shore of Lake Michigan, not too far from the Indiana state line. It looked like a nice place to do some light hiking around the dunes.

I was wrong.

The bad news was, we never found any hiking or any dunes. The good news was, apparently Warren Dunes is THE place to go swimming in the area, and it was a beautiful day to go swimming in Lake Michigan. The sun was hot and the water temperature was perfect, so EVERYBODY was there.

Dan and Charlie in the water. Charlie has his hands up to his head and Dan is to the left.

Alice busy with some kind of plan involving a water bottle.

We arrived at my Dad’s house in Chelsea, MI on the evening of the 16^th, and stayed until the morning of the 19^th. It was really nice to relax in a house for the first time in over a week. We spent the time regrouping and going out to dinner with my Dad, my sister, and my brother and his girlfriend. 

At Smokehouse 52 in Chelsea. Their BBQ is fantastic! Some of the best I’ve had.

It was really nice to catch up and get to know my brother’s girlfriend, who we hadn’t met before this visit. It usually takes me a while to warm up to new people, but I instantly liked her (it helped that we had already connected on Facebook) and am looking forward to her and my brother visiting us in SLO next year. Unfortunately my sister's fiance wasn't able to join us, but hopefully they can get out to visit us sometime too.

I also visited my Mom at the nursing home (she has advanced Alzheimer’s). Amazingly, she seems improved over the last time I visited a couple years ago, and seems quite happy. I’m sure it is in large part due to the fact that my Dad visits her at least once a day, usually twice. The facility is nice too. Mom seemed to especially enjoy the garden and koi pond in one of the courtyards.

We all really enjoyed hanging out with my Dad, who is a gracious host and didn’t seem to mind listening to Charlie talk about Minecraft in excruciating detail.

 Dad and Dan inspecting the Triumph Stag

 The kids with Grandpa

 We departed on the morning of the 19th, which happened to be our 20th wedding anniversary, for the last leg of our trip. Almost there!

 

 

South Dakota

Outside Wall Drug in Wall, South Dakota

I’ve been pretty busy with work so not much time to post, but I’m still  trying to finish up the posts about the remainder of our cross-country trip. When we last left our intrepid family, they were experiencing varied adventures in and around Yellowstone National Park. From The Buffalo In The Road, to Where The Heck Is Our Cabin, to The Cow Skull Of Doom, it was quite the couple of days.

The creek right outside our Yellowstone cabin

We were sad to leave Yellowstone with so much left to see, but were happy to get on the road again. We had already been on the road for 11 days and were only in Wyoming! Time to get moving.

So on the morning of August 13^th we bade farewell to my Aunt and Uncle and headed out for points east. We made it to Rapid City, South Dakota after a long day on the road. Our route took us through Bighorn National Forest, which had some beautiful scenery.

At Bighorn National Forest. 

A while after getting on highway 90, we detoured off to see the Devil’s Tower, which is of course mandatory for any self-respecting fan of Close Encounters of The Third Kind. We didn’t make it all the way there, but got close enough for a scenic view:

 At the scenic overlook

With Charlie photobomb

We stayed in Rapid City SD that night. The next morning, the 14^th, we visited Mt. Rushmore. 

Heading to the colonnade

The carvings are incredibly impressive, and the visitor’s center was very nicely done. I particularly enjoyed learning how they carved the monument. The sculptor, Gutzon Borglum, made scale models which the workers used to figure out the location of the finished surface in order to calculate where to dynamite. This method was so successful that 90% of the carving was done by dynamite. We also took a walk for a closer view, although it was pretty hot out.

A closer look

The Nostril Viewpoint. No, that's not an official name or anything. :)

Apparently Thomas Jefferson was big on ice cream, so of course we had to have some while we were there:

Tasty!

Ice Cream = Thomas Jefferson

After Mount Rushmore, we headed to Wall Drug for some lunch and homemade donuts. I had no idea what to expect from Wall Drug – all I knew was that everybody said not to miss it so I expected something epic.

I was not disappointed.

Wall Drug is basically an Old West tourist trap on steroids, but with enough character and originality to make the kitchy-ness seem appealing and not overwhelming. We ate lunch in the Western Art Gallery room, where every wall was covered with Western paintings. We of course took advantage of the Free Ice Water and 5 Cent Coffee (well, I was the only one who had coffee).

FREE ICE WATER!!!11!!!1

After lunch we did some souvenir shopping, tried the shooting gallery, and admired the giant Jackalope statue. Outside there was also a water play area with water fountains shooting up out of the ground. Alice thought this was the best thing ever and played there for about 30 minutes. No surprise to anyone who follows me on facebook - my kids (especially Alice) are notorious for getting soaking wet whenever they possibly can.

She got soaked and was deliriously happy.

On the Jackalope

Sadly, we didn’t get to explore all of Wall Drug but we had a lot of ground yet to cover that day, so we bade farewell to the Jackalope, bought some housemade doughnuts to eat in the car, and headed out. That pretty much ended our Western adventures – we sped through the rest of South Dakota, Minnesota, Wisconsin and Illinois en route to my Dad’s house in Michigan. Partly because we were getting a bit tired of being on the road, and partly because there was not a whole lot to do along our route in those states.