Preamble Boogie:
It started out as a winter’s trip to southern Florida. Morphed into a fly in tourist tour of California. Almost was a trip into the deep forests of northern Maine. Came close to being a group run with @Scott B. and Laura and finally despite the swirl of COVID, closures, possible quarantine it settled into a F...It run to South Dakota.
With the trip to Cali out and our backup plan of Maine collapsing I drew a circle on the map centered on the Clanhold that was within the radius of the planned Maine trip. I was looking for someplace new to us, with interesting bits to poke around and room to distance ourselves. Hey, South Dakota is the same driving distance as Moosehead Lake in Maine. Who would have thought. Umm, wanna go?
It was a last minute thought, utilizing already scheduled vacation time but no real planning we just loaded up the Mouser and headed West early one Friday morning.
We were already in Ohio as the sun rose...
As we drove Michelle was researching points of interests. Hiking trails, historic sites, national forests, state parks and tourist traps. Anything that caught her interest was noted, collated and than turned into a basic itinerary.
Indiana, Illinois (Chicago traffic sucks), and Wisconsin rolled under the Tacoma’s treads. We crossed the Mississippi by vehicle for only the second time for me and a first for Michelle.
We turned off I-90 someplace in extreme western Minnesota at some little town, grabbed a decent motel room and a take out meal.
Snagging some sleep we were back on asphalt long before sunrise. We crossed the South Dakota border in pitch darkness. As the sun rose the terrain was very much foreign to us. Flat grasslands and low rising hills in all shades of browns, golds and greys where we were use to never ending greens of forest canopies. The more me drove the more enthralled we became.
With plenty of time to putz around we were putting the emphasis on chill, giving us the opportunity to stop anywhere that caught our interest. The Corn Palace was cool...
Though all 836 roadside billboards proclaimed it as the best stop in the known multiverse...Walls Drug not so much.
We had determined that the Black Hills of South Dakota was going to be our main focus but than Wyoming called...
And with that the trip really began.
This will be episodic as my rural internet sucks and I have way too many pictures i’d love to share with you all. I’ll do my best not to chase ya off.
It started out as a winter’s trip to southern Florida. Morphed into a fly in tourist tour of California. Almost was a trip into the deep forests of northern Maine. Came close to being a group run with @Scott B. and Laura and finally despite the swirl of COVID, closures, possible quarantine it settled into a F...It run to South Dakota.
With the trip to Cali out and our backup plan of Maine collapsing I drew a circle on the map centered on the Clanhold that was within the radius of the planned Maine trip. I was looking for someplace new to us, with interesting bits to poke around and room to distance ourselves. Hey, South Dakota is the same driving distance as Moosehead Lake in Maine. Who would have thought. Umm, wanna go?
It was a last minute thought, utilizing already scheduled vacation time but no real planning we just loaded up the Mouser and headed West early one Friday morning.
We were already in Ohio as the sun rose...
As we drove Michelle was researching points of interests. Hiking trails, historic sites, national forests, state parks and tourist traps. Anything that caught her interest was noted, collated and than turned into a basic itinerary.
Indiana, Illinois (Chicago traffic sucks), and Wisconsin rolled under the Tacoma’s treads. We crossed the Mississippi by vehicle for only the second time for me and a first for Michelle.
We turned off I-90 someplace in extreme western Minnesota at some little town, grabbed a decent motel room and a take out meal.
Snagging some sleep we were back on asphalt long before sunrise. We crossed the South Dakota border in pitch darkness. As the sun rose the terrain was very much foreign to us. Flat grasslands and low rising hills in all shades of browns, golds and greys where we were use to never ending greens of forest canopies. The more me drove the more enthralled we became.
With plenty of time to putz around we were putting the emphasis on chill, giving us the opportunity to stop anywhere that caught our interest. The Corn Palace was cool...
Though all 836 roadside billboards proclaimed it as the best stop in the known multiverse...Walls Drug not so much.
We had determined that the Black Hills of South Dakota was going to be our main focus but than Wyoming called...
And with that the trip really began.
This will be episodic as my rural internet sucks and I have way too many pictures i’d love to share with you all. I’ll do my best not to chase ya off.