Dickinson, ND - Lewistown, MT 8/28 - 8/30/08

Geography has been the theme of these 3 days. We have moved from the prairie to the great plains.
Within the plains we enjoyed the badlands of the T.R. National Park. While seeking to take his picture, Judy annoyed a large bull buffalo who stomped his feet and made threatening noises - we left quickly.

Thursday night we found the famous Medora musical to be in desperate need of a script. Interestingly the headliner was Avner the Eccentric, surely one of the last living remnants of Yiddish vaudeville. The ampitheater does have a spectacular setting.

Today we drove through the "Big Open" of Montana - 90 miles with no sevices - miles and miles of grassland. The weather has been wonderful, warm and dry. Last night's campground was much in need of rural renewal - the first disappointing campground. Bill enjoyed the freight trains going through on the half hour but Judy had to use her earplugs.
The Adventures of Super Grandpa: The largest Holstein cow in the world wandered into our campground in North Dakota. Grandpa decided to milk her. Manga (Grandma) was proud of his milking ability and made butter and ice cream for the whole campground.

Crossing North Dakota - 8/26-8/27/08

We just spent our first night in a motel due to a cold rain. The night before was very windy so we had very little sleep. Now it is supposed to return to dry, hot weather, and we will return to the tent. The natives are used to these extreme weather fluctuations.
Our sightseeing has focused on Indian and Lewis and Clark sites. We had a wonderful Hunkpapa Sioux guide to Custer's house at Ft. Abraham Lincoln in Mandan. The ND Heritage Center had good exhibits on dinosaurs, many of which have been found in the western part of the state, and immigrants - Norwegians were the largest single group. The population of the state is little changed in the last hundred years. Bill's fifth National Park stamp was from the site where Sakakawea lived when Lewis and Clark first met her.

The Adventures of Super Grandpa: Birding is a popular activity around here so Grandpa decided to try his hand at it. He came back with the world's largest sandhill crane. Manga (Grandma) was proud of his bird catching ability but released the crane and gently explained that birders watch birds, they do not catch them.

August 25 - Our 46th Anniversary

This day we journeyed from Birchdale, MN to Jamestown, ND. We left the woods and entered the prairie, golden wheat fields for miles. We looked for flood damage in Grand Forks but few traces of the flood remain. We spent the evening in Paradise (one of a chain of Mexican restaurants named Paradiso). We went from chilly weather to very warm and windy weather.
The Adventures of Super Grandpa: Since it was our wedding anniversary, Grandpa decided to provide buffalo steak for supper. He caught the largest buffalo in the world. Grandma was very proud of his hunting ability, but she released the buffalo because we did not have room in the cooler for all that meat.


This picture records the halfway point of our journey to Seattle.

Birchdale, MN 8/22 - 8/24/08

The weekend has been a time for family and food. Friday we had a good visit with Bill's brother Tom, where, in addition to catching up on family and the life of the newly retired (Tom did so in April), we compared travel notes. Tom and Barb had been to Greece and were just back from California with Nathan's family.

Friday afternoon we hit only our second rain of the trip as we came to Birchdale, to the farm home of Judy's parents Phyllis and Albert Henrickson, who are looking well and maintaining a beautiful lawn. We ate fresh raspberries at every opportunity and even went out to the garden to pick them off the bushes. We also had a chance to catch up with Dave and Jan, Bill's brother and Judy's sister who also look well and are keeping a huge garden and beautiful lawn. All visits involved much good food.

The Adventures of Super Grandpa:

Grandpa went fishing on the Lake of the Woods and brought back the largest walleyed pike ever caught in Minnesota. Grandma was so proud that she had the fish stuffed and mounted and named it Willie the Walleye in Grandpa's honor.

Editorial Comment - August 21

We are staying in a wonderful municipal campground without WiFi; our neighbors are a Mennonite family who sang their morning devotions - quite a contrast to the drunken balladeer of the night before. Tomorrow we head to Birchdale, MN which may mean that it will be the 25th before we are back on line.
That is our 46th Wedding Anniversary. This trip has been an interesting experiment in married life. Mr. Toss-it-in-a-Pile is trying to cope with Mrs. Everything-Has-its-Place, and vice versa! We are having a very good time: combining Bill's "Zip-through-all the -Sights " approach with Judy's "Let's -Savor- this- Place" approach. As in all of life negotiation is fruitful.
We have enjoyed your comments. Maybe next week we will figure out how to respond to them along with determining how to place our pictures where we really want them to go.

Munising, MI to Bayfield, WI August 19-21

Waterfalls, lakeshores, minerals and a trip down memory lane have been the theme of these past few days. Other than a very chilly (low forties) night in Munising, we have been blessed with gorgeous weather. Judy was, nonetheless, very grateful for a night in a motel. She vegged out while Bill tracked down the sites connected to the Keweenaw Historical Park.

The priest is Father Baraga, a Slovenian who ministered extensively among the Chippewa and created a dictionary of their language.

Judy is standing in front of the dorm she lived in at Northland College in 1961-62.

Today we spent three plus hours on a boat ride amongst the Apostle Islands; they are beautiful, but three hours is borrrrrrrring.

Traverse City to Munising, MI 8/17-8/18

Sunday, after an outdoor service on Great Traverse Bay, we drove to Munising in the Upper Peninsula of Michigan. Before crossing the bridge, we visited Fort Michilimackinac, a nicely restored fort built by the French in the early 1700's. They should give free passes to anyone who can say the name. It has a Piquet house,which may actually be what Peggar (Judy's grandmother's name) started out as in France.

Judy loved the trip over the beautiful bridge but it was a little too high for Bill. The trip through the Upper Peninsula was incredibly boring. Lots of scrubby trees and not even a curve in the road for many miles. However, since we had left the cherry growing region, we started eating Mackinaw City fudge.

This morning we took a boat trip to see Picture Rocks National Lakeshore. This is Bill's second national park site on the trip. It was pretty but not too exciting. Lake Superior was quite rough and chilly. After a very warm day yesterday, the weather has turned cooler but is still very dry. We love hearing everyone's comments. It makes us feel less out of circulation.

Lapeer to Traverse City, MI August 15-16

The highlight of this day came after an uneventful crossing of Michigan (with a pleasant stop in Midland to visit their fine museum, a gift of Dow Chemical - it is interesting to see how they address napalm and Agent Orange). When we set up our tent in a campground near Traverse City, it was so dry it took a hammer to drive the tent pegs. After a simple supper we headed into town to the Traverse City Pie Company where we each had a piece of cherry pie of the "best I've ever eaten" variety. Our neighbors kept feeding their fire all night, which was very unhelpful for Judy's asthma.

Today we started the day with Grandpa shooing off the huge bear whose picture is attached. Grandma thought Grandpa was very brave, and took the bear's picture so that you can see how big he was.

We drove through wonderful orchard country - eating fresh cherries much of the way - to the Cherry Hut in Beulah where we had roast turkey and cherry pie (for the second time, if you are counting). We then proceeded to our first National Park site, the Sleeping Bear National Lakeshore, a place of great beauty and lots of sand, on Lake Michigan.

Niagara to Lapeer, MI August 13-14

We enjoyed our ride on the Maid of the Mist; the view is most impressive (even if quite wet). We also walked to the brink of the Falls and drove to the Whirlpool overlook. The weather was very fine until a shower at 2:00 in the afternoon turned our muddy campground into a mire. But the tent was dry, and we slept comfortably except for the freight trains that ran through the tent frequently and for the commotion caused by Bill when trying to exit the tent for one of his several nightly trips.

On Thursday we think we found the Dryden homestead south of Combridge, Ontario where Judy's great-grandmother was born. A very pleasant day was made less so by a two hour wait at customs in Port Huron. Having our passports made our stop at the booth a twenty second one. Our Lapeer campground turned out to be by a lovely lake (and another busy freight line plus trucks on Interstate 69!), but we slept well. Sadly their WiFi was off due to cable construction work.

Niagara Falls - The Trip Begins

We are under way. The only stop on our first day of driving was at Hill Cumorah - the site where the angel Moroni gave the tablets containing the Book of Mormon to Joseph Smith. We were there with a dozen young men in black suits that looked like they were getting ready to go on their missionary year. We were definitely underdressed. No one tried to convert us.

The weather has been great so far. Judy survived the first night of camping.

We had a beautiful walk in front of the Falls last night. Today we go on the Maid of the Mist.

Visit to Polish Fair

Joe and Bonnie Connolly joined us Sunday, August 3rd for a visit to a local Polish Parish fair in Easthampton. Bonnie took many pictures.