You are currently browsing the daily archive for August 7th, 2008.
The Badlands were the first stretch of interesting topography we encountered cross country. We entered Badlands National Park in South Dakota, and were immediately confronted by a sign that nearly sent me directly back to the car! BEWARE OF RATTLE SNAKES. Oh goodness. Those of you who know my phobia, understand how much energy it took to keep walking. Yikes.
Luckily there were no Rattler sightings, just interesting “mountains.” The canyons looked like a miniature Grand caynon bleached a white/gray color. The mountains looked an aweful lot like someone had shrunk and dehydrated the mountains of Hawaii. Driving through the switchbacks felt like a Disneyland ride.
I didn’t get a sunburn, and it was really fun to see families out and active experiencing this interesting place together.
I’m not talking about the stuff you see on the side of the road, I’m taking about the delicious meals that have been slaughtered and cheerfully served to us at local roadside “restaurants”. Seems like all there ever is are McD’s, Panda Express (the official state fast food chain of Illinois apparently), more McD’s, Burger King, and gas station gummy worms, Red Bulls, Pepsi, and Pringles. I’m dying for a real meal already and we’ve only been on the road for less than 24 hours. If it weren’t for Lacy’s delicious pumpkin muffins (no not those muffins, Jerome), we would be horribly malnutritioned by now.
All these buffalo we keep seeing are making Jessica crave a [drumroll please...] buffalo burger.
Apparently there is another religious extremist movement right here in the backyards of our very own US of A. I’m not talking about some Islamic group you might hear about on Fox News…no… Instead I’m referring to a pilgrimage carried out by thousands of people belonging to the subculture that is fanatical about… Harley Davidsons. Yes, apparently those in the know, make their very own yearly pilgrimage to Sturgis, South Dakota and call it their very own Mecca. Who knew? We’re still a few hours away from Sturgis, but we’ll let you know how it goes – maybe we can trade in the car a pair of hogs and ride them cross-country, Easy Rider style (minus the mustaches with some extra SPF 80 sunscreen for Jessica).
Update:
Well you may have noticed a bit of radio silence here. We’ve been travelling in a pretty remote part of S Dakota that has very very slow data speeds so we’ve been having trouble with picture uploads taking forever to complete or not complete at all.
Here are a few stills from last night’s trip into Sturgis. The photos don’t do justice to the scale or LOUDNESS of the event. There were literally thousands upon thousands of bikes lined up on every street and side street of this small town. Down the main street, they had two rows of bikes lined up in the center of the street with two lanes of bike-only traffic travelling on opposite sides. We parked two blocks from the main street and walked around for a good half an hour and got a great fix of people watching. What we saw was your stereotypical characterization of biker people – leather, mustaches, tatoos, long hair, bandanas, you get the idea. It was everything we had hoped for and expected. We’re definitely coming back for the Sturgis Biker Rally 2009 – maybe we’ll even play along with an honorary mustache or a pair of leather chaps.
OK so I’ve never been through this state before, and I have to say I’m liking it.
They have super cool wind turbines to harvest wind, and really big silos to harvest crops.
After my long post I am now going to be concise.
It’s foggy, really foggy. I drove for 5.5hrs and we slept at a rest stop 5.5hrs. I was freezing. It is 56 degrees.
Adolfo is driving, and super excited that we just crossed the Mississippi from Wisconsin into Minnesota. He would also like me to mention that it is still nighttime, but the sky is starting to lighten and the sun is rising behind us.
(He also loves to point out silos and windmills. “Look Johnny! Horses.”)
Day Break:
