Oh the Places We'll Go...day 4

Wow! We have just 3 more states until Washington!! We of course had continental breakfast, but considering the small hotel we stayed in, there wasn't a whole lot to choose from. The doughnut holes put out in tupperware containers weren't too bad...just strangely packaged. We woke up this morning early and set out by 6:30am. It was still dark and foggy! We crossed into Mountain Time near Pierre, SD.

Our first road sign that we actually got to stop on the road and take the picture! We only got to do this because I wasn't fast enough with the camera so we passed the sign...luckily there was an exit just up the road and along with it was a small road that ran alongside the highway all the way back to the sign! So we drove back, put the camera on the hood and snapped the picture...the dogs are getting used to these strange little adventures!

When we found an exit with a Wal-mart we pulled off to get our t-shirts! This statue was at a red light and Sanford did NOT like him! We thought it was pretty cool though! While we were walking the dogs at Wal-mart it started to SNOW!! That's an exciting occurence for a girl from NC :)

Even though it was snowing, it wasn't sticking. I'm sure this snow was from a previous snow fall, but still pretty!

We were impressed with the hills and valleys! Those look like snow clouds Mom! :)

Thanks to I90 being empty, we were able to stop at the actual road sign to take our picture! Sanford is at least getting the hang of looking at the truck :) Dad had to buy a beanie at the Wal-mart and I had to put my coat on!! I suppose if I had been really prepared I would have had some kind of sticker to put on the sign...I wonder what they said...I didn't notice them until I looked at the picture later.

Little Bighorn Battlefield National Monument: Memorial of the U.S. Army's 7th Cavalry and the Sioux and Cheyenne in one of the Indians last armed efforts to preserve their way of life. Here on June 25, 1876, 263 soldiers and attached personnel of the U.S. Army, including Lt. Col. George A. Custer, died fighting several thousand Lakota and Cheyenne warriors. (http://www.nps.gov/libi/index.htm)
These cliffs made me think of Mom! That's really what all of the mountains, hills, valleys, etc. made me think of...

We watched this plateau growing bigger and bigger as we came closer to it!

Whoa! So, if you return to the day 1 post you will notice quite a difference in size from the Appalachian Mtns. I know Mom, the Appalachians are older :)

This rainbow was just a big chunk coming out of the clouds and reaching down to the ground. These things were what made the trip exciting...weather, mountains, old houses (later on), etc.

See...the abandoned homesteads were really cool! All we could talk about was what happened to them, why they were empty. Of course the new and improved homestead in the distance could explain it. It's still neat to think about the history of these places!

Another very large mountain with SNOW! :)

Mom I posted this for you! The sun was beginning to go down so it was kind of hard to get a clear picture. This is a very large quarry in the side of the mountain...

This is what we assume they did with the reject from the quarry...just filled in the valley on the other side of the mountain! Crazy, huh?!

And one final mountain before it's too dark and the camera will only focus on headlights...

Our lunch today was in Montana, at a gas station :) There was an Arby's inside but the gas station had more to choose from, so Dad had a salad and I got a hot dog. The dogs were of course tied outside for a little bit while we ate in the cold! Something funny that we noticed, casinos everywhere! Inside the gas station!!

Much to Katie's dismay we did not stop in Butte, MT. We drove to Missoula and slept in a nice Broadway Inn and Suites (pet friendly!). We had McDonalds for dinner and were pretty tired after driving for over 800 miles today! I owe a lot to Dad, he did the majority of the driving! He claims it was so I could take pictures...hmm. It was definitely a long day but fun at the same time! Only one state between us and Washington!

Oh the Place We'll Go...day 3

Today we got up early, 7:30 am...still not as early as Dad would like I think. We enjoyed another continental breakfast and got on the road. We knew we would be crossing into Iowa early which also meant we would cross the Mississippi River!! After Iowa came Minnesota and then South Dakota. We had a good traveling day although we were definitely beginning to dread getting back in the car. At this point, we had opted to putting Browni in the crate, which sat behind the driver seat. We had also dug into the bag of Tootsie Roll candy that Aunt Jean got for us, this would prove to be a great solution to the long, boring roads in Iowa and Minnesota! We stopped for lunch at a Wendy's in Minnesota and they had a nice fence that we tied the dogs to and ate outside...now dinner was a different story, I'll write about it later in the post! Enjoy the pics!

Crossing over the Mississippi River into Iowa.

Dad and I on the Iowa side of the Mississippi River. The dogs were very unsure about the water! We found a little area of boat docks that had a stone staircase leading to them, it looked as though they hadn't been used in years! The Mississippi was definitely what I had imagined it, big!

Dad enjoying the view, Browni ready to go! I was testing the camera so I'm not sure Dad knew I was taking his picture :)

Award for the BEST WELCOME CENTER goes to... IOWA! We had to wait about 5 minutes for it to open, but it was well worth the wait. It was basically a gift shop, but it was two stories worth of a gift shop! We decided to purchase our state t-shirts here, so they are probably the best quality t-shirts in our collection too! We didn't take the dogs out for this picture because they were just out at the river...so it counts!
Well, sometimes you just can't be ready for the state sign! The bottom reads "Fields of Opportunities" and we agree that there are definitely plenty of fields in Iowa...opportunity?

So the next five pictures comprise the World's Largest Truckstop: Iowa 80. I measured how big it was by the amount of pictures it took so I'd say 5 makes it a pretty big place!

Dad and I realized later that these funny looking airplane wing things are actually the rutters for a turbine! This is where the truck stop began...
and kept going...

and going...
and going....

and ended :)

This is pretty much the scenery in Iowa...fields and turbines. We really enjoyed seeing the turbines though and every time a new batch came along we would estimate how many there were...always more than the last bunch :) They really are huge!
Award for the BEST STATE SIGN goes to...MINNESOTA! By far the most detailed sign and so it made for a good topic of conversation for a while. Just think about all of the state signs you've seen!

A very cool welcome center and probably the runner-up. There was a staircase that lead down to the "pet area" which was really a nice trail down behind the welcome center. So, as we came back up on the opposite side of the welcome center we realized that we were walking into a cloud of ladybugs! They were everywhere!! We had to wipe them off of each other when we got into the truck...Dad thought he had one go down the back of his shirt and sure enough when he leaned forward there was a little bump on his shoulder blade and we had to rescue the little guy :) Unfortunately the front of the truck suffered from the cloud of ladybugs... :(

We stopped at a Wal-mart to purchase our state t-shirt and found this little lady walking around in the truck...we ended up transplanting it to Washington...every once in a while it would walk across the window and then disappear somewhere in the truck.

South Dakota...Great Faces Great Places.

The South Dakota welcome center...the least welcoming. Why? Well, the bathrooms were open, but the desk had a chain link wall in front of it and the sign on the desk read: "Closed for the season. Will reopen in May." LOL! We could not get over that!

We were very curious about the dead trees on the hillsides in South Dakota...and still are! We enjoyed this scenery more than the flat fields!

Well, as it became time to stop for the night we realized that there weren't very many cities to choose. We stopped for gas in Presho and the attendant told us there were places in the next town called Murdo. We pulled into Murdo and found several hotels, however we also found out that it was the opening weekend of pheasant season!!! ALL of the hotels were occupied!!! Who knew!!! We decided to stop and eat at a local diner and here is what followed...

Waitress: "Hi, the special tonight is the Roast Beef and Vegetables, it's a dollar off the menu price. What can I get you guys to drink?"

Dad: "Diet"

Me: "Lemonade"

Waitress: Bringing us our drinks. (apparently lemonade translates to Mt. Dew in SD) "Have you decided?"

Dad: "I'll take the special."

Waitress: "Umm actually the cook just told me not to serve the beef, it's no good...so actually that means we can't serve...(going through a list of things on the menu that use the beef)..."

Dad: Holding back a laugh! "Ok...I'll take.........

So our dinner at the local diner was very entertaining...or maybe Dad and I were really tired from the road, but we found this to be SOOO funny! We had to keep our laughing down cause they had no music playing and there were lots of people in the diner besides us.

Anyways, we got on the road and headed to the next town, Kadoka. We found 1 hotel and it was pet friendly. I think we would have been fine leaving the dogs in the truck at this point. We very happily laid down and went to bed that night!!

Stay tuned for day 4!