Day 3 - Road Trip - South Dakota/Montana

We survived the short thunder and rain storm last night in our tent.  Isn't this an angelic face?  ;-)

Then it was packing up and loading up again to visit Badlands National Park.  We visited here with Michaela, Benjamin, and Johanna in 2004, so it was fun to bring Ami and Elijah here.  The geology, unusual formations, and wide treeless plains are an incredible sight.  It's like nothing else anywhere.  I love seeing the vast creativity that God displays.

Benjamin had remembered climbing around last time we were here and was anxious to try it out again.  Well, remember that last night it rained?

We spent more time cleaning off mud and using wet wipes than we did climbing!  Oh well, it made for a funny memory.

 

Then, after miles and miles of billboards, we found Wall Drug.  We got our free ice water and 5 cent coffee, and enjoyed some homemade donuts, too.

 

When Benjamin was 5, he was totally frightened of this T-rex.  He returned to face his fears, and although it was still very loud, he survived.  :)

Amid the smoky T-rex.  Victory!

The famous jackalope.

Johanna is our animal lover and also a lover of Native American history.

Next stop, Mount Rushmore National Monument.  It's neat to see, but once you've seen it, well, that's about it.  There is a small museum where you can "blow up" the dynamite to help form the faces.  

 

From the Badlands, we decided to make another detour, adding only 20 minutes, so that we could "hit" Wyoming, a first for Ami and Elijah.

Next, North Dakota in our "collection" of states.

And finally into Montana, our final destination for the night.

Currently we are hunkered down in the game room of our campground as severe storms with high winds are expected to pass through.  We're watching the weather channel and hoping that the storm dissipates before it gets here!

Day 2 - Road Trip - South Dakota

As camping goes, you tend to wake up with the sun and the birds.  This morning was no different, but we were well rested and ready to hit the road again by about 7:40.  That's not bad considering we had to load up seven sleeping bags and pads, seven suitcases and pillows, the tent, and a bit more.  We did breakfast on the go with granola bars and dry cereal.

We only planned about 400 miles today, so it was nice to make a couple of unplanned stops.  Since we were going along the Missouri River and were right across from Nebraska, we took a quick bridge over just to say that we had hit Nebraska on this trip.

Seeing the flooded Missouri was amazing and sad at the same time.

 

As we got farther north, we went 15 miles east just to hit Minnesota.  I'm the only one that had been there before, so now the kids (and Chris!) can mark another state on their "been there" list. 

 

If you've ever been anywhere near South Dakota, you cannot miss seeing the plethora of Wall Drug billboards and Corn Palace billboards.  With time on our hands, we made a stop at the famous (or rather infamous!) Corn Palace.  Yes, it was pretty corny and we can check that off our "been there" list and don't ever have to go again.  Funny place, weird, don't really get it.  It's apparently been around since 1892 and undergoes new designs each year.

Um, yeah....3 of 5 kids were less than impressed with the Corn Palace stop!

After a nice picnic stop at a rest area, it was back on the Interstate to our final destination another tourist stop.  We had seen billboards for a prairie dog town and remembered it from seven years ago when we were through this area.  We knew the kids would love it, and they did!  I'm sure the dogs are a nuisance to the locals, but to us they were so cute.

I'm sitting in our tent listening to the pitter patter of rain, enjoying being out in God's great creation, and ready to hit the sack (sleeping bag!).

Beautiful rolling hills of South Dakota: 

Easy entertainment on the big screen. :)

Prairie Dog Town:

 

Finally to our destination, we'll see these tomorrow:

 

Day 1 - Road Trip - Iowa

And we're off!  We said good-bye to our cousins after lunch.  They headed out following behind us for a bit.  It sure was a treat to have them at our house for a whole week.  Thankfully we didn't have to boo-hoo because we get to meet back up in about a week for more days of fun together out west. 

Our afternoon and some of the evening was spent just driving to head north and west.

Ami wanted me to take a picture of all the corn.  It was pretty!

"Welcome to Iowa"

Michaela doing Brain Quest with Ami

 Unfortunately, due to the flooding of the Missouri River, we had to detour a few different times and ended up taking another hour to get to our destination than we had originally planned.  The picture below is of the Interstate with single-lanes for each direction, sandbagged on both sides, and water up to the road and seeping under the sandbags.  Glad we got through at this place!

 
We had expected Iowa to be hot, humid, and miserable, but we were welcomed with a strong breeze and very little humidity.  Yea!  We cooked a quick supper and then the kids had time to jump in the cold swimming pool for a short bit.

One day's drive down, just a few thousand more miles to go, but a boatload of memories to be made!

Wolfe Family

Here's the picture with the larger Wolfe pack that I promised from a week ago.

We are blessed!