We are home! It was a wonderful trip but it is good to be home in our own bed again. I'll put some summary information at the end of this post.
Wednesday morning we left Wall and drove a loop through the Badlands National Park. The wonderful moonscape quality of the eroded hills was amazing. We were fortunate to see a bighorn sheep at one of the overlooks. I think it was a young one, as the horns were not fully grown.
I-90 was a pleasant highway without heavy traffic. We stopped for a picnic lunch and talked with a rest stop employee who recommended a side trip to the Laura Ingalls Wilder homestead near DeSmet. So we drove about an hour north. They have a nice visitors' center and restored and rebuilt buildings on the site. It was extremely hot and we decided to take a look around and leave. I'm sure it would have been interesting to tour all the buildings and take a covered wagon ride to a schoolhouse, but we didn't feel we had the time.
Continuing our eastward trek, we passed through a tiny corner of Minnesota and headed south to Sioux Center, Iowa. We had a pleasant visit with former Woodstock staff Bill and Dixie Roelofs. Bill's family has been in the town for a long time; his grandparents had a general store. Dixie runs the successor to that store, a quilt shop downtown. My mother would have loved it! As always, it's fun to catch up with old friends.
We left Sioux Center at 7:00 Thursday morning and arrived home just after 7:00 PM, losing one hour along the way, so just over 11 hours. We worked our way through Iowa to I-80 and took it most of the way back. The house was warm, but the AC brought it down to a comfortable level fairly quickly.
We had always wanted to do a drive west like this one, and now we've done it. I don't know if I would want to do such a long driving trip again. It was hard on my back and sleeping in a different bed almost every night (most very comfortable!) wasn't always easy. But we saw many wonderful things, enjoyed incredible scenery, had great times with family and friends! All, in all, a success.
We finished two more audio books on the way home -- Whiteout by Ken Follett (thriller about a theft of a dangerous virus by terrorists) and The Art of Fielding by Chad Harbach (a college baseball prodigy and the people around him). The latter was excellent, and we had only about 20 minutes left when we pulled into the garage. We'll have to finish it soon! I also completed one sweater and got the back done on a second. Working toward Christmas gifts.
We drove a total of 5707 miles, averaged about 43 miles to the gallon in our 2010 Prius, drove 646 miles on our longest day (Thursday August 2), and had non-driving days of rest in Vancouver, Seattle and Spokane. Thanks to all of those who hosted us along the way!
Wednesday morning we left Wall and drove a loop through the Badlands National Park. The wonderful moonscape quality of the eroded hills was amazing. We were fortunate to see a bighorn sheep at one of the overlooks. I think it was a young one, as the horns were not fully grown.
I-90 was a pleasant highway without heavy traffic. We stopped for a picnic lunch and talked with a rest stop employee who recommended a side trip to the Laura Ingalls Wilder homestead near DeSmet. So we drove about an hour north. They have a nice visitors' center and restored and rebuilt buildings on the site. It was extremely hot and we decided to take a look around and leave. I'm sure it would have been interesting to tour all the buildings and take a covered wagon ride to a schoolhouse, but we didn't feel we had the time.
Continuing our eastward trek, we passed through a tiny corner of Minnesota and headed south to Sioux Center, Iowa. We had a pleasant visit with former Woodstock staff Bill and Dixie Roelofs. Bill's family has been in the town for a long time; his grandparents had a general store. Dixie runs the successor to that store, a quilt shop downtown. My mother would have loved it! As always, it's fun to catch up with old friends.
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| Recreation of original store in historical village area |
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| Downtown quilt shop |
We had always wanted to do a drive west like this one, and now we've done it. I don't know if I would want to do such a long driving trip again. It was hard on my back and sleeping in a different bed almost every night (most very comfortable!) wasn't always easy. But we saw many wonderful things, enjoyed incredible scenery, had great times with family and friends! All, in all, a success.
We finished two more audio books on the way home -- Whiteout by Ken Follett (thriller about a theft of a dangerous virus by terrorists) and The Art of Fielding by Chad Harbach (a college baseball prodigy and the people around him). The latter was excellent, and we had only about 20 minutes left when we pulled into the garage. We'll have to finish it soon! I also completed one sweater and got the back done on a second. Working toward Christmas gifts.
We drove a total of 5707 miles, averaged about 43 miles to the gallon in our 2010 Prius, drove 646 miles on our longest day (Thursday August 2), and had non-driving days of rest in Vancouver, Seattle and Spokane. Thanks to all of those who hosted us along the way!
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