Mount Rushmore

We reached Rapid City, South Dakota today. Our first stop was the obligatory visit to Mount Rushmore to see the presidents carved into the side of the mountain. We drove up to the entrance to the parking area as if we knew what we were doing. We had no idea if they could accomodate a fifty foot rig consisting of a 36 foot motorhome with a car in tow. As we paid our fee the lady grabbed a walkie talkie and said, "I have a really long RV with a car in tow." Someone on the other end responded and she told us to take the left lane and somone would meet us in a golf cart. Sure enough as we pulled in right past the main entrance to the park a guy in a golf cart circled in front of us like those "Follow Me" trucks at airports for airplanes. He led us to a parking place and for a moment we were in a dilema as to which we to go. We relaxed for a few minutes with the generator running and the A/C on and prepared to depart on a long hike. As we stepped outside we looked behind us and there were the presidents on the mountain side. We then walked about a hundred yards under a covered parking area where we took an elevator up one level to find ourselves at the main entrance. The Mount Rushmore concession is really setup well as we only had to walk a short distance. We took our pictures including some pictures of a Canadian family who asked us to take a group shot with the sculptures in the background. They did the same for us. We returned to the camper where we relaxed some more and ate some sandwiches. We talked about how amazing it was to be in our own motorhome with Mount Rushmore right behind us.

Interior, SD

We slept last night with an electric blanket on, for Bob, and right now we are running the furnace to take the chill out. It is 51 degrees outside. What an amazing change for us.

Today we will continue our westward trek and hope to see Mt. Rushmore, the Crazy Horse Monument, and the Devils Tower. Remember "Close Encounters of the Third Kind?"

Badlands

We stopped for the night in the Badlands of South Dakota. The landscape is amazing. We talked about pushing on to Rapid City but are glad we stopped here. We are camped on the White River in the very heart of the Badlands. We are now in the Mountain Time Zone and are two hours earlier than Eastern Daylight Time. The small town that is closest to us is Interior, South Dakota. There are 69 residents in the town. Click on the thumbnails for a larger view.

Chill

There is a chill in the air this morning. It is in the 50s here in Sioux Falls. I was tempted to turn on the heat in the Mothership but I know that turning on lights and cooking breakfast will warm it up. I am going to make coffee and enjoy it outside on the picnic table at our site. Getting ready to be underway will be a breeze today in these cool temperatures. The hight is only suppose to be in the low 70s.

USGS Visit

Today I took a tour of the USGS EROS Data Center. It was an interesting tour and I saw many familiar tools and heard familiar terminology. In spite of my love of geography I did not get a pleasant feeling returning to that corporate environment of geography. This is not to belittle the magnificent tools and data processing that is done at this wonderful facility but rather an observation of my own journey away from that world. I am more comfortable being a customer now than being part of the world that processes and delivers these data. I have great admiration for those who carry on with this mission but I am no longer part of it.

Sea of Corn

Traveling in a motorhome for an extended distance is much like navigating a ship across the sea. Stopping in campgrounds is similar to docking a ship in a port. Both vehicles are independent when in motion and connect to shore power when stopped. Traveling, as we are, completely across the country requires some similar navigation as well. Tonight we are docked north of severe weather down south in Des Moines, Iowa due to a decision to turn north three or four days ago based on a weather forecast. We are now on the cooler side of a strong cold front that is generating tornado watches south of us. Some luck and some good processing of available data made this happen. The analogy could be carried further as pointed out by my cousin who used to live in Nebraska. He compared the rolling hills covered by corn and soy beans to waves on the sea. It is a good analogy.

USGS Data Center

As we often do, we drove around the local area as much as possible after setting up our campsite. Ten miles down the road from our campground we found the Holy Grail of geographic data. This was one of the organizations we often dealt with to obtain satellite or aerial imagery. Click here to visit their web site. A Google search on USGS Eros Data Center reveals a wealth of geographic data available from them. Click here for the results of that search.

We convinced a very professional guard to let us take some pictures. They have public tours and we are debating about taking one of the tours. Both of us are exhausted from staying up late last night talking to some Canadians about their country while doing laundry. We will have to see how we feel today. We may need a day of rest to catch up. It sounds appealing but since I am no longer working in the field and we are more interested in viewing landscapes than analyzing them we may just rest or make a short hop towards the west.

We went into Sioux Falls last night and looked up the brother of Daniel who runs the Mexican Restaurant near our home. Luis, his brother, was very hospitable and we got to meet the whole family who are also very nice. They have very beautiful kids including a one month old daughter. We had a wonderful visit with them talking about the restaurant, family and friends. What a small world. For those who do not know there is a Mexican Restaurant that is near our home that we love. We have gotten to know the owner Daniel rather well and discovered that he has a brother, Luis, who runs a restaurant here in Sioux Falls, South Dakota. On the off chance that we might come here we got his name and number. When we arrived at the Puerta Vallarta Restaurant here in Sioux Falls Luis was not working but he came in to meet with his and introduced us to his family. We had a delightful visit with them and, of course, a great meal.

Yogi

We are at the Yogi Bear Campground in Brandon, South Dakota near Sioux Falls. Here are some maps.

Position Update - Lunch Break

Iowa

Corn fields, soy bean fields. Corn fields, soy bean fields. Corn fields, soy bean fields. Corn fields, soy bean fields. Corn fields, soy bean fields. Corn fields, soy bean fields. Corn fields, soy bean fields. Corn fields, soy bean fields. Corn fields, soy bean fields. Corn fields, soy bean fields. Corn fields, soy bean fields. Corn fields, soy bean fields. Corn fields, soy bean fields. Corn fields, soy bean fields. Corn fields, soy bean fields. Corn fields, soy bean fields.












Wind generator at Stuart, Iowa.

Corn fields, soy bean fields. Corn fields, soy bean fields. Corn fields, soy bean fields. Corn fields, soy bean fields. Corn fields, soy bean fields. Corn fields, soy bean fields. Corn fields, soy bean fields. Corn fields, soy bean fields. Corn fields, soy bean fields. Corn fields, soy bean fields. Corn fields, soy bean fields. Corn fields, soy bean fields. Corn fields, soy bean fields. Corn fields, soy bean fields. Corn fields, soy bean fields. Corn fields, soy bean fields.

Power is Back

The power is back on. Our neighbor came over and gave us a "thumbs up." So, we are now cooling on shore power.

Heat

100 degrees. I think today was the first time I saw that on our car themometer. We stayed in Des Moines an extra day just to rest and run some errands. We drove downtown and explored the city but due to the heat we did not get out of our car except to shop. We are staying nice and cool in the Mothership but just a few minutes ago the power went off. We started out generator right away and are running it now to keep our A/C units going. The campground office reports that the power outage is for the entire area of Waukee, Iowa which is the small community we are in. They have no idea how long it will be but our generator is humming away happily. Glad I changed the fuel filters and checked it all out before we left.

Red Roads

We have been traveling the interstates for much of the trip. Blue roads on the map. We did take route 63 north from Columbia, Missouri to Des Moines, Iowa. A red road on the map. These roads offer a chance to drive through small towns and enjoy a more intimate view of the land. This sooner than planned turn to the north also started moving us away from the incredible heat that the area has been experiencing. It worked. Here are the temperatures yesterday of our departure point, Columbia, Missouri, and our destination Des Moines Iowa.

The area that we traveled consisted of rolling hills and beautifully maintained farms. We commented that we felt as though we were passing through an immaculately maintained park displaying farm life. Nothing was out of place. Everything was clean and meticulously maintained. There is a religious sect that live in the area of northern Missouri who, like the Amish, drive horse drawn carriges for transportation and we saw some of them traveling in the special lane reserved for them on highway 63. Click here for is the link to Wikipedia's overview of Missouri.

We departed from the planned route shown in the first graphic and took route 36 westward to pick up a part of the interstate leading into Des Moines since our destination campground was on the west side of the city. We had made reservations earlier using our cell phone. This slight change of plan was due to our first campground choice on the east side of the city being full. That one had 95 motorhomes coming in as a group which took all of the remaining sites.

We both needed to renew some prescription medicines and Missouri has no Walgreens but Iowa does. We called the prescriptions in on the cell phone and found the pharmacies to be unusually friendly and helpful. The store we called, the one closest to our campsite, didn't have all of the medicines that we needed and without asking they called the next closest store and coordinated getting the prescriptions filled for us.

Bob used his cellular connection and the laptop to locate the campground and the drug stores as well as directions to them. The trip went flawlessly and the pharmacies were extremely courteous and helpful. We have found this to be true of Walgreens no matter where we travel with one exception and that is the store closest to our home. We always have problems with that store and yet every other one we deal with on the road is an example of courtesy and helpfulness. We have talked a lot about that and think that it might be due to the very large customer load on that store.

We were both very tired and slept soundly here in Des Moines, Iowa. It is our first visit to Iowa and we will traverse it further today as we continue north. Click here for the Wikipedia link to Iowa. We were interested to read that western Iowa is an area of Loess hills that are hundreds of feet thick. What is Loess? Click here for the Wikipedia pages on that very interesting topic. Yes, wind does have something to do with it. That can be your assignment for today.

Northerly Course Change?

This map says it all. It is the forecasted high temperatures for the day. Our senior navigator, Bob, is considering a northerly course change to avoid the lighter colored areas which seem to be strung out along much of our route. We are also discussing the possibility of avoiding I-70 and Kansas City by taking an alternate route, 63, which is adjacent to our campground and leads to the north.

Africa Hot

Like a line in a movi e, "It is Africa hot." We left Perry, Missouri this morning and made the turn west at St. Louis onto Interstate 70. This entire area is suffering a severe heat wave. Traffic on I-70 was very heavy coming to a stop about three times. Rather than fight it we
decided to stop here at Columbia, Missouri. We needed a shopping stop anyway to replenish some of our food supplies and Bob needs to get a replacement for his nice Stanley pipe pliers that he accidentally left at the last campground.

Status Map

This is our progress so far. 1,990 miles to go. Today we hope to reach Columbia, Mo and after that make the big turn in Kansas City to the north. This is one big country. The true Great Plains do not really begin until one passes west of Kansas City so we will miss that as we turn north towards the Dakotas. The Great Plains that we will see will be up in Alberta, Canada.

Classic Diner

This morning we ate breakfast at the Classic Diner in Perryville, Missouri. The diner had been recommended by some campers at the campground as well as the campground manager. We were not disappointed. The setting was fun and the food was great. Here are some photos and if you look closely you can find Barbara in couple of them.

Perryville, Missouri

We left Red Bay, Alabama this morning at 8 am and started north. There are a surprisingly high number of new metal roofs in northern Alabama and western Tennesee. Large homes had them. Small homes had them. Huge commercial buildings had them and small commercial buildings had them. We debated the reasons this might be true but didn't come up with a satisfactory answer. My theory was that they were good protection against hail storms but that did not hold up either so we never really figured out why this was the case.

At noon we crossed the Mississippi River after traveling some astonishingly good roads out of Alabama and Tennesee. Crossing to the west the interstate, I-55, turned from a westerly course to a northerly one taking aim on St. Louis, Missouri. The land reflects its origins as river sediment and is as flat as the water surface that made it, the Mississippi. We traversed the river flood plain northward and after 580 miles called it a day.

We are now in Perryville, Missouri at a nice KOA campground. Bob tried to setup our satellite tv system but the elevation of the dish at this latitude is 45 degrees and while we have a clear shot from this campsite there are some trees about a hundred yards away whose tops seem to be causing us just enough loss of signal that we have no tv. That is really nothing important to us as we are both enjoying two or three books each. We just came in from outside where the sound of crickets and frogs is deafening. Bob even saw a firefly pass overhead. It is still opressively warm outside though so we didn't stay outside very long.

The next stretch of the trip takes us into the ever widening spaces of the great plains. St. Louis was the staging area for the great covered wagon trains that traveled westward when the west was still unpopulated. I suppose back then it was almost like Cape Canaveral is to our present day explorers as the west was an unexplored and dangerous place. The number of campgrounds seems to be dwindling. Kansas, Nebraska, and the Dakotas have few and they are very far apart. It is hard to look at a map and appreciate the vastness of this country. Just to get from our present location to the Dakotas is going to take us a few days if we drive only five hours a day. I might have to put in some more 500 mile days to get some distance covered.

We checked the weather in Banff, Alberta today and the high at 6pm their time was 72 degrees. That is quite a contrast to the temps here that are in the 90s with a heat index over 100. We are determined to continue north until the days cool down. That may take us a week or so and will take us across an area that sometimes has powerful thunderstorms. Fortunately, most of the tornado producing storms take place in the spring but the towering clouds can still contain hail and dangerous lightning. We will have a weather eye out at all times and will be using our cellular connection to check for storm warnings as we traverse that area.

West of The Mississippi

We crossed the Mississippi River at noon and are now traveling north towards St. Louis, Missouri. I-55 parallels the big river and is absolutely flat since it is on the floodplain. We are stopped for lunch at the Missouri Welcome Center which is about 3 miles from New Madrid, Missouri. That is where one of the greatest earthquakes in this country occurred. It was so powerful that it altered the course of the Mississippi River creating Reelfoot Lake. We hope the fault holds together until we get a little further down the road.

On The Road Again

Today we leave our new friends, Jim and Pat, Carol, and many others whose names we did not learn. We have heard stories about their travels and experiences. We also say goodbye to Kevin and Dwayne the two hard working young men who did our repairs. The windshield repairs were done under warranty with no questions asked and that amounted to almost seven hundred dollars. The support and service here at Tiffen Motorhomes is unbeatable. The camaradie in this campground is unlike any we have ever seen. Most likely it is because every motorhome in this location was made by Tiffen.

Yesterday, we drove over to Russelville, Alabama to visit the Super Walmart there. The drive was beautiful through rolling hills. We did our shopping and decided to eat lunch while there. We don't like the usual fast food establsihments but will use them if we have to. Yesterday, we were in luck. We spotted a place called "The Daily Bread Barbecue." That had to be it so we went inside and found Miss Emma Mae was a happy and friendly black lady and one look at the hamburgers on the grill and we knew we were in the right place. There are a lot of stereotypes about Alabama and racial problems but none of that existed here. Customers and employees were black and white and one felt instantly that it was a happy place. We ordered a couple of burgers and enjoyed them amidst the local lunch crowd. By crowd I mean about a dozen or so people. Barbara had boiled cabbage as a side dish and Bob had field peas. The crowd cleared out and as we finished our one slice of lemon ice box pie Miss Emma Mae started singing a gospel song quietly in a beautiful voice. As we paid we found she was seranading her grandson who was sitting next to the counter where the register is located. When we explained that we were from out of town and had driven all the way here to have one of her burgers, Miss Emma Mae explained that the young man sitting behind us was her grandson and that they had just come back from Florida where they had attended his graduation from college and where she had treated him with a trip to Disney World. We congratulated him and he thanked us. A most pleasant and courteous young man.

But, we must leave all of this and search for new adventures. I am typing this at 6AM and will begin breakfast while Barbara sleeps. If all goes well we will be on the road around 8 or 9 AM central time and I will have posted this by logging in on the office phone line. We are very grateful for having traveled far enough west to be in the Central Time Zone because we gained back that hour lost when the country insanely and blindly switched to Daylight Savings Time, a madness we have never subscribed to. Enough rambling. It is time to prepare the Mothership for another flight into unknown adventures as we travel north from Red Bay towards St. Louis, Missouri.