It is July 7th today and we have covered a lot of ground in two days. We left our campsite in Guelph at about 5:30 am on Saturday. As I walked to the truck there was the reminder of Alisha staring at me. It was like a little goodbye to Nana and Gramps. This will be on our truck until we get it cleaned when we arrive in California. I had to share this photo! We crossed into New York State at Niagara Falls. People say that the US side of the falls is just a nice as the Canadian side, but I think they are lying. The horseshoe shaped falls on the Canadian side is spectacular, even if we only saw it from the bridge! We had been there quite a few years ago on a trip to Ontario, and had not planned to visit it again this trip. But I can say that it still looks the same as it did years ago!
We followed Highway 90 through the northern part of New York, going through the outskirts of Buffalo. From the highway Buffalo appears to be a steel driven town and is spread out for miles. It appears to be quite run down and dirty. Many of the very old buildings or factories are in disrepair and look as though they are crumbling down under their own weight. After New York City, Buffalo is the most populous city in the State with a population of approximately 300,000 We ran into the first of many tolls on this particular highway in New York. This toll was only $2.75
Continuing along Highway I-90 we left New York State and entered Pennsylvania which is lush this time of year with green rolling hills. It didn't take long to get through this State as we were in the most northernly part following along Lake Erie. It was a beautiful sunny morning and a great day for a drive. Then we entered Ohio which was the real beginning of the tolls. They call the I-90 the Ohio Turnpike and I suppose we could have taken a secondary highway but we always want to take the "fastest" route! The Ohio turnpike tolls I would think are to provide monies for the upkeep of the highway, but really it is not a great highway at all for being an Interstate highway!!! I hope all the money they took from us, is put to good use!!! As there are Starbucks at all of the Service Plazas, which are totally different than a Rest Stop. They offer restaurants and gift shops as well as information booths and washroom facilities. While I love to see Starbucks on the highways, I think that is where our money is going??? Okay, I will not complain! A bit of frivolous information on the Ohio Turnpike. It is a 241 mile long toll highway. The official name for the highway is the James W. Shocknessy Ohio Turnpike. Mr Shocknessy was a delegate to the Democratic National Convention from Ohio in 1956 & 1960. He was also the first chairman of the Ohio Turnpike Commission. The turnpike was built between 1949 and 1955. The turnpike not only runs on the I-90 but also on the I-76 and I-80. So if you are travelling in Ohio and don't want to pay the exorbitant tolls, you best find another way to cross Ohio! I-90 through Indiana also is a toll highway. Our total amount of tolls we paid in the two days of driving was $98.75 (I bet you can imagine what Ray had to say about it all!!!!) We went through Cleveland which is huge! The city itself has a population of about 390,000 but if you add in the surrounding area the population is closer to 800,000. Traffic was great though as it was Saturday morning and still quite early and everyone was probably still celebrating the July 4th holiday! Continuing west we saw a Harley dealer sign along the "turnpike" so pulled off the road into a town called Avon. This town has a motto. "We make Duct Tape, Respect the Nest!" Avon Ohio is apparently the Duct tape capital of the world and is the home of "Duck" band duct tape. They have an annual Duct Tape Festival every year. Boy Red Green would sure love this town!
Next State is Indiana (more highway tolls). We were going to camp for the night in a tiny place called Howe. They had a great campsite and it was the biggest one that I have seen yet. It looked like they tried to squeeze as many campers into this site that they could. You literally would not have been able to "swing a cat by the tail" between one site and the next one. There were kids everywhere! You could barely drive through the site without the possibility of driving into someone and whoever was out walking took no notice of the trucks driving on the narrow roadways. The girl in the office had told us to find our spot and phone her with our credit card number (yup that was how big it was!). But after driving past the few sites available and seeing how crowded they were, we got outta of there!!! We drove up the road and crossed into Michigan and camped in a quiet campsite in Sturgis Michigan. When we left in the morning we crossed back into Indiana and continued on our westerly way.
Anyone who owns an RV or has been to an RV show may know that most of the RV's are made in northern Indiana. Ours is a Rockwood which is made by Forest River. The Forest River Plant is in Goshen Indiana. We were half an hour from Goshen. Ray really really wanted to go by there and see if we could have a tour of their plant. Is that a guy thing????? Would have been great but it was Sunday morning! In Elkhart which is close to Goshen, there is an RV and Motorhome museum! Again, it was Sunday and it was closed. Mind you I think I would have been bored out of my skull in that museum
Chicago Illinois - as we were driving closer to Chicago we turned on the news and heard that there had been 5 police related shootings over the long weekend and a Gary Police Office had been killed. And we think that we are busy in Abbotsford on a long weekend? Nothing compares to this. I guess things got out of hand with the July 4th celebrations! In 1833 the primary industry in Chicago was fur trading. In the 1850's and 1860's pork and beef where high on the economic scale. In the late 19th century Chicago was home to the Western Wheel Company which manufactured bicycles. In the 1930's radios were manufactured here (Motorola, Walkie-talkies and Handie Talkies for the army). Today Chicago is home to Boeing, McDonald's, Motorola and United Airlines. You can see this large metropolitan city has boomed from the early years onward.
After leaving Ohio we went through the southern part of Wisconsin and into southern Minnesota. Minnesota has acres and acres of corn fields We kind of wondered why there seemed to be nothing else growing in the southern part of the State and then we came through a fairly small town called Blue River. It is apparently the home of the Jolly Green Giant and have a huge statue of the said green guy visible from the highway. The Vally of the Jolly Green Giant refers to the Minnesota River valley. The Minnesota Valley Canning Company was the original name of the Green Giant Company. This local plant cans both peas and corn. So I guess that explains the acres of corn we saw. Ray was quite impressed with the acres and acres of wind farms!! Another crazy thing in Minnesota is the SPAM museum in Dexter. The museum is in honour of the "food" product called SPAM. If you want to call that food! Imagine having a museum for SPAM!
On crossing the State line into South Dakota we started seeing giant billboards advertising "Wall Drugs". These signs varied in size and information on the signs. But what was odd was the first sign said to be sure and visit Wall Drugs which was 355 miles away. Apparently the old highway went through the city of Wall, which brought many tourists to the small town. When the highway went in the owners of Wall Drugs decided they needed to do some serious advertising to get people to come and visit their town and to support the tourist economy. Our friend Barb Flett had told us to be sure and stop in and visit Wall Drugs. So we did. It is quite a small town but the Wall Drug store is massive! It takes up the entire city block. There is everything imaginable in there from souvenirs made in China to local art and pottery made by the local native Indian tribes. You could buy boots, clothing, jewellery, books and even lunch. If you are ever in the area, it is well worth stopping in and have a free ice water or a 5 cent cup of coffee (just don't expect Starbucks coffee).
Rapid City South Dakota. I think I could live here. It is in what is called the Black Hills, and has rolling green fields with pine trees scattered all over. The hills themselves are covered in pine trees. Everything is lush and green. And of course they even have a huge Harley Davidson Dealer which has the largest parking lot that I have ever seen, and they are apparently expanding it. Ray said that when they were in Sturgis last summer the parking lot was full of thousands of motorcycles. Not ones for sale but ones that had been ridden into the area for the yearly rally.
We camped the night in and RV just south of Sturgis. This place was great, you could buy a bottle of wine for $4.50…mind you that bottle of wine was only one glass!! How sad was I?
In the morning we packed and drove into Sturgis. We parked on the side of the road across from the Harley dealership and walked the town. There really is not much to Sturgis other than t-shirt shops and bars. It was pretty quiet unlike when the motorcycle rally is on. Kind of reminded me of Mayberry RFD, and I expected to see Sheriff Andy Taylor and Deputy Barney Fife walking the beat. After walking through town and dropping a bundle of cash in the Harley store we headed to Deadwood. Now Deadwood is an old cowboy town where apparently Wild Bill Hickok was shot in the back playing cards. This town is literally full of casinos and bars (and a Harley shop,,,,did I say that I am all Harley shopped out?) . It was way to early for a beer and we did look for somewhere to have breakfast but we were too late for that. Oh well! There was a very cool shop called Bling & Beer. They have a bar set up in the shop where the husband can have a beer while the wife shops for all things bling. Just about everything in the store had bling on it, including the cutest pair of leopard cowboy boots! They had a bling strap around the ankle! OMG cute or what! I tried a pair on and was going to buy them, but the bling straps didn't come with them. You had to buy them separately for an extra $25 so Ray asked if they would give us a deal on the straps and they said no. So we left the boots with them and walked out. It was the principle of it. So no, Lori did not get the leopard boots.
MT Rushmore is as amazing as it looks in photos. It really is amazing the vision that Gutzon Borglum had when he saw this mountain and proceeded to blast out the beginnings of the Presidents faces. Washington, Jefferson, Roosevelt and of course the most famous one of all Lincoln. Two miles east of the mountain is a town called Keystone. We pulled into Keystone before heading to the monument. This tiny town reminded me a bit of Skagway as it looked like an old western town (even had a shoot out on the street). But instead of being brown buildings they were all stark white with red trim. Very different. There were so many people in the streets, but we did manage to have a bite to eat and also took in the Borglum museum. It was pretty interesting. After leaving Keystone we rounded a curve in the road that had a pull out, and got our first glimpse of Mt Rushmore. It was high above us with Washington facing our way. This particular photo was taken from just below the mountain.
Well this morning we arose about 5;45. Ray was up first and put on the coffee. Dan Dorling,,,good thing we didn't borrow your GPS as when Ray was building the coffee he knocked our GPS into the sink full of water!! Looks like we will be buying a new one somewhere along the line, as this one will turn on, but will not let you do anything.
We left The BJ Campground in Lusk Wyoming at 6:30. We stopped at a gas station to fill the beast (which by the way we are getting between 7.5 to 10 miles per gallon). I decided to grab a coffee. I should know better than to buy coffee from a service station. It was disgusting!!!!! The elevation of Lusk is about 5000 feet and Ray asked how I was feeling. I was not bad really. Around 1030 we stopped at a McDonald's on the highway. I went in to buy a coffee and use the facilities. By the time I got back to the truck my heart was racing and I just felt exhausted! No need to worry though, I plugged in my oxygen concentrator into the truck and away we went. It really did help me! I guess when you are at 6700 feet or more and are just sitting in the truck, of course you will feel fine, until you get up and walk a short distance.
We crossed into Utah this afternoon and I fell in love with the scenery! We went from boring rolling dry plains in Wyoming to beautiful mountains. Made me kind of home sick!
Tonight we are parked in Fillmore Utah. Tomorrow we head to Bryce Canyon and then Zion. We are really looking forward to seeing the beautiful colours!!! I will try to post again tomorrow night, but it all depends on wifi.
Lori and Ray
No comments:
Post a Comment