Hawaii here we come!

Next adventure..summer of 2012.. California and Hawaii!

You.know you are home when. ..

The birds wake you up at 4 am!  It:s good to be home.  Thanks for following our travels.  Until our next adventure...

A Room with a View

John scored again!  Our room looked over the Horseshoe Falls with the American Falls to the left

The kids were excited to revisit Niagara. We did a handful of Falls' touristy things. The most exciting was Cave of the Winds on the US side. We were right under the Bridal Veil Falls. We were soaked and blown by the spray! One really appreciates the power of the Falls there!  The kids enjoyed the attractions but we lamented the absence of real interpretive information.

It was a fun ending to our trip.  We are traveling home now. We catch glimpses of the Erie Canal every now and again.  Thoughts of a camping-canal trip get tossed around.  Perhaps next summer??

We have put together a fun playlist of folk songs and the like reflecting our travels.  Did you know that there is no old folk song about Niagara Falls?  Amazing.  We found one by Green Bean that worked though.  And Wisconsin has a pretty impressive collection amassed.

We are also enjoying Lord of the Rings on audio.  It's a great adaptation.

We're looking forward to getting home although a little sad to see our adventures end.  In some ways the trip has gone by so quickly and in others it seems like we have been away for an eternity!

Eeeww!!

Now here's a well traveled car!  Another challenge for our fair readers...

We all participated in the "Great License Plate Scavenger Hunt."  We did pretty well heading west and rocked at Yellowstone.  Still, we are missing ONE state!  Any guesses as to what it is???

As for our travels, we just left Ohio where we had a wonderful time with the Patry's (Michele' s family). The kids had a squirt fight with Uncle Matt---I think Matt got the better of the kids:  ) We relaxed in the hot tub, celebrated Uncle Paul's birthday, feasted on grill grub, and visited and laughed the day away!  I had a walk down memory lane while walking around my childhood neighborhood.  I even got to traipse through the woods with Nicholas, Andrew and his girlfriend. The little falls with the hollow reeds was still there!

Later, Nicholas lugged up 4 river rocks from the "Crick" for Aunt Renee's garden.  The deal was a dollar a rock.  Talk about determination. An overgrown trail, a deep ravine, an unwieldy 5 gallon bucket, and heavy rocks. No small task! The adults got a chuckle out of this and he was pleases as punch with his $4. And I reckon Renee will find a good spot in the garden for them!

After a breakfast feast of bacon and waffles, we hit the road again.  Thank you Matt and Renee for your grand hospitality.  And thanks Matthew and Andrew for making time for us.

We are headed to Niagara Falls for the surprise part of our trip.  The kids think we are heading home, but it will be a short journey today!

Stops in Minnesota

We stepped off the beaten path today and stopped Pipestone National Monument. Another stamp for the Passbook!  This area is considered sacred land by Native Americans.  It has been quarried for many centuries for the pipestone which had been used to make peace pipes. It is a soft, red stone akin to soapstone.  There is an old agreement in place that allows Native Americans to still quarry and there is an 8 year waiting list.  Adelaide recalls that to get to the pipestone, one must chisel through sioux quartzite which we told is the third hardest stone in the world (although the moh's hardness scale doesn't totally support this).

We then stopped at the Laura Ingalls Wilder Museum in Walnut Grove. This is the area the Ingalls family lived in On the Banks of Plum Creek.

It was fun driving though Minnesota for awhile. We saw a great many wind turbines as well as some being transported on trucks.
THEY ARE HUGE!  After awhile though, all the green crop fields and farms become monotonous.

We have listened to some great audios on our trip: Paddle to the Sea, The Lone Ranger, Call of the Wild, and Robinson Crusoe.  And Google loves me.

We have just entered WI and I think a stop for cheese curds could be in order...

And now to leave you with a little trivia we learned on this trip.  There are technically no Buffalo or antelope in the US.  The correct terms are bison and pronghorn, unless, of course, you live in India or Africa. So you can now add that to your knowledge box!

Pipestone National Park

http://www.nps.gov/pipe/index.htm

Oacama, SD

Yes it really is an oasis when driving through SD.  We stopped for dinner here.  It is reminiscent of Wall Drug in that it had a restaurant, gift shop, grocery store, motel and probably more.  It was a taxidermist' s dream and had more 5¢ coffee.