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After our quick stop in Seattle, we took a short 3 hour drive down to Portland, Oregon where we visited my Aunt Sandra and my cousin Julian. They live just outside of Portland, in Gresham. Sandra recently bought her beautiful home there on a large lot last year. The lot has enough acreage that she can keep horses – she has three. These, however, are no ordinary horses – they are MINIATURE horses. They are probably half the height of your average horse and their backs only came up to my waist. In addition to these three funny horses, they also have two “Russian” chickens that have a really interesting hairdo, and finally one wild cat that goes by Toy Yoda. Yoda loves to hang out with the other animals and feels right at home amongst the horses and chickens and they don’t seem to mind either. The horses had just gotten groomed and one of them had some funny blunt-cut bangs, while the other one had a high-and-tight military cut.
When we first arrived to my aunt’s house at 7:30am we noticed a large trampoline set up right next to their garage. It didn’t take very long for Jessica to leap out of the front seat of the car and climb up on the trampoline. In a split-second, Jessica was transformed into a 9 year old all over again – the pictures are proof enough.
After Jessica got her trampoline fix, Sandra welcomed us inside and cooked up a really yummy home-made breakfast. And then, it was my turn and Julian’s to show off our mad trampoline skills. Again, the pictures speak for themselves.
[pictures soon]
Yesterday, we drove from Yellowstone all the way to Coure d’Alene, Idaho in one fell swoop. We traversed 3 states in the process – Wyoming, Montana, and Idaho. One of the coolest small towns we drove through was the old gold and silver mining town of Wallace, Idaho. The town was tightly nestled in a steep valley covered in dense, tall evergreens – Jessica really loved the sight of it. Apparently, it is still an active mining town and you can hear the blast from the mines under the city on a daily basis.
Our destination in Idaho was Coure d’Alene where Jessica’s parents’ close friends have their lake house. We finally got to the house around 9:30 pm (after missing our exit and driving 10 miles out of the way to the next exit) – just in time to catch one of the most beautiful views we’ve seen thus far on our trip. The 16 mile byway that leads up to the Ellison’s home from I-90 took us right along the lake and down near water level, giving us some great views of the lake and a great reflection of the dusky sky. I wish we could have had a camera good enough to capture the beauty of it all.
It was really great to spent time with our close friends the Ellisons at their lake house and be greeted by familiar faces after 2,600 miles of driving thus far. This was also our first night back in a real bed after spending the last three nights either in the car or the hard ground of our tent. Judy and Dennis make great hosts. They were just winding down from a huge family week that filled their beautiful house to the brim. The last members of their family were leaving this morning and we were the last ones out the door after one last leeching of their WiFi.
I love the open flat areas with plenty of visibility where you can really open it up.
We’ll hit the Pacific Ocean in no time at all. 
We’re in Sundance! No, not Robert Redford’s Sundance. Sundance Kid’s Sundance …in Wyoming!
We just started our day after camping out at the Mountain View Campground. Jessica found us a $29 tent at Target a few weeks ago that I’ve been thoroughly impress with – as much as one could be thoroughly impressed by a $29 tent I guess. We got into the campground late last night around 10:30p after a nutritious meal a Applebee’s. The camp was almost full and completely silent, dark, and super windy – you can imagine what a pleasure it was to set up the tent in those conditions. Fortunately, Jess and I managed to get the tent up in record time without reading the instructions (eventhough it was our first time setting it up.) We did, however, spend most of the night wondering if the wind was going to blow our tent away or even worse knock over the tree that was hovering directly above us.
This morning, I think Jessica had the highlight of her trip when she actually got to take a shower at the camp. I think she spent the last 1,300 miles talking about how she really wanted to shower.
Next up this morning is Devils Tower National Monument. We’ll feed you some pics momentarily. But for those with no patience, expect to see a large rock formation jutting out of the ground like a, well, tower.
For now, we’ll get back our breakfast and free Wifi!
Update:
Here are a few a pic from Devils Tower…
Apparently Devils Tower is iconic and synonymous enough with Wyoming that it appears on their license plates.
If you’re my buddy Jerome, you’ll never think of Mt. Rushmore in the same way ever again. He’s spent the last couple of weeks working on a new campaign for the US Mint and their new $1 Dollar coin. (As a side note, I did the color on their spots). His challenge in one of the spots was to make the founding fathers engraved into the face of Mt. Rushmore SMILE. Yes, make them smile. If you’ve ever seen a photo of Mt. Rushmore, you’ll know that they are not portrayed in the most cheerful way to begin with. They all look expressionless and like they are ready to take on some serious business – like founding their own country. Well, as you can imagine making them smile was not the easiest thing to do. Disappointedly, I spent every moment I was at Mt. Rushmore, waiting for them to smile – it never happened. The good news is that I did bring back Jerome a little souvenir that he’ll get a kick out of and I’ll let him guess what that is.
Notice that in the pic of the viewer/telescope that it takes 2 quarters to use the device. What the US Mint is proposing is that a single $1 coin would make it much easier…wait a second does that mean that the price of these this is going up? Doubling in fact! Are vending machines next? Is it fair to assume that we’ll start seeing the cost of these things rounded up to the nearest dollar? Damn. My $0.02.
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.
We just crossed into Wisconsin after a long, congested, and toll infested drive around the Chicago area. The sun is setting here and there is a light drizzle starting to pick up with a beautiful sunset to the west. As you can see Jessica is now at the helm – maybe I can get some sleep now after driving the last 8 hours.
The obligatory mirror shot:
We’re right outside of Chicago… On a TOLL expressway apparently. Eighty cents or a buck every few miles? Not to be rude, but what’s the point of a toll road in the middle of the country? It’s not like we’re crossing a bridge, taking a tunnel or a ferry or something. Hmmmm… Well, I guess the worst part about it isn’t the eighty cents, it’s the starting and stopping that is messing with my precious MPGs. 
So, after some last minute errands, we are on our way – finally! What exactly took us this long to get out of town? Well, let’s see. We had to stop by the Secretary of State (DMV) to take care of some car registration issues, AAA to get our maps, a stop at the bank to deposit the check from the title company, another stop at the post office to mail some goodies to Mr. Calvin Jewett, swing by the house one last time to pick up a forgotten item, and…. at 1:15pm WE’RE OFF!
Mile 0…definitely the hardest so far.
Today’s Journey:
