Adventures Through the Midwest

Woke up at 4:15 am to get ready and got a text from my friend, Oliver, wishing us luck on our travels. We left my house in Galilee, PA, yesterday morning at 5:40am. Did the necessary stop and get gas and ice for the coolers at Turkey Hill in Honesdale, and then ventured over Farview Mountain and through Wilkes Barre to get onto I-80 West. Stopped at a Dunkin Donuts and my co-worker, Elsa, called to check up on us and to pray for me over the phone, which I found very touching. We entered Ohio around noon and stopped at the first rest area to lay in the grass and eat peanut butter sandwiches. We had forgotten a knife for the peanut butter, but Chrissy was able to find a worker at the rest area who had an extra plastic fork so we improvised and used that. I drove all the way across Ohio and into Indiana. I noticed that the truck drivers in the Midwest are all either overachievers or crazy and have 3 trailers hooked to their trucks. Quite an interesting feat if you ask me.

We successfully found Indiana Dunes State Park and pitched our tent at site 24. Since we realized that we changed time zones and gained an hour, we decided to drive the hour into Chicago so that we could play tourist there. We parked in a lot off Ohio Street by the ESPN Zone and walked to Navy Pier, Millenium Park, Chicago Theatre, and up the Magnificent Mile back to the truck. One of my goals was to see the sign to the Chicago Theatre lit up at night because I am a big fan of the movie Chicago and of the Roaring 20s in general. I also achieved another goal and went to where the garage at 2122 North Clark Street used to exist because that is where the St. Valentine's Day Massacre occurred back in 1929. With my fascination with the Roaring 20s comes a keen interest of the gangsters of the day. Actually, while driving through Indiana I felt like I was in Road to Perdition, which is a movie that stars Tom Hanks. We finally went to bed around midnight after our fun-filled driving and excitement.

Today we woke up at 7am and took advantage of the shower facilities at the campground. Packed up the tent, caught a glimpse of the beach along Lake Michigan, and then set out to fight through Chicago traffic on our way up to Minneapolis, MN. Wisconsin is apparently very big on the indoor waterpark resort because we saw about 7 of them along the way. We stopped at one to get a picture of a statue of a gigantic orange moose, deer hurdling a log, and mouse sitting on a piece of cheese (go figure).

We crossed over the Mississippi River and arrived at the Mall of America with not much of an issue after I got a warning for speeding. The mall was a good time. One of Chrissy's favorite authors was holding a book signing there, so we stood in line so she could get a signed copy of the newest book. The people in line were really entertaining and one helped Chrissy get a free shirt because she yelled that we had driven 21 hours from Pennsylvania to the signing. (I have now heard Chrissy tell me amazing for the hundredth time. One day she'll realize that this is her trip too and that I am happy when others are happy.)

Before the book signing, we got asked by this woman if we were planning on going on any rides. We told her that we were and she gave us some free extra tickets that she didn't have time to use. We both felt blessed by all of the kind people that we came across this evening. After buying souvenirs, we drove to Starbucks to sit in the parking lot and get some internet so that we could both update our blogs. The goal is to drive all the way to Cactus Flat, SD, tonight so that we are outside the Badlands National Park to do a hike early in the morning on the Big Notch Trail. I'm excited to show Chrissy where I almost accidentally ran off a cliff 5 year ago when I visited the park. Well, time to get back to driving. More again soon.