Aug 27 - Santa Barbara CA

So now we're home and the adventure has come to an end!  What a fabulous experience we've had - from sea to shining sea in 76 days!

Malibu - our starting and ending spot

Our RV went 11,918 miles with some hiccups but no major mishaps.

Aug 26 - Malibu CA

Visit and overnight stay with family.

Aug 25 - Victorville CA

We continue to be lucky and miss the major storms.  I hope the trend continues tomorrow as that’s the last of the storms (San Bernardino).  We are now in Victorville and continue getting the weather service alerts for flash floods – they’re saying that just south of us they could get 1-3” of rain per hour.  The green, yellow and red radar are all around us but so far, so good right here, although it’s very warm.

A very boring drive today from Las Vegas in that there’s nothing to see or explore – lots of traffic though with people going home and those escaping the storm expected to hit today.

One more day and we’ll be home.  It'll be interesting to see our RV final mileage!  It's been quite an adventure.  We will spend Monday night in Malibu with family and get home on Tuesday.  

Aug 24 - Las Vegas NV

So here we are in Las Vegas.  We only drove a couple of hours as the wind was so strong it was blowing us all over the road.  It didn’t help any that the radio was interrupting programming every 15 minutes with warnings from the weather service.  Flash floods, severe thunderstorms, heavy rain, hail, damaging winds.  I was definitely on my phone checking the radar!  The skies were quite dark.

Well nothing came to pass here although there were areas that had that storm.  Still, the forecast for Sunday is rain and flash flood warnings as far as San Bernardino.  We’ll see how it goes.

At least we got to walk around the Strip on a Saturday night along with a mass of humanity and then took a cab back to our hotel.  I’ve no idea how we managed to walk to the Strip from our hotel!  I guess we were just determined to see the fountain show at the Bellagio again.

Aug 23 - St. George UT

We almost abandoned our plans to go to Zion National Park this morning because of a weather forecast.  We were supposed to have dangerous lightning, severe thunderstorms and heavy rain so we started out and figured we’d decide when we got to the turnoff.  While we did get some rain, it didn’t look too bad when we got to the turnoff so we decided we’d go for it.  Thankfully the dire predictions never came to pass.

Zion was very different from Bryce but equally impressive and awe-inspiring.  When we got to the gate we had to get measured to see if we could go through.  The height was fine but we were 4” too wide to get through the second tunnel.  This second tunnel is a 1.1 mile long tunnel and in order for us to go through they stopped traffic on both sides so we could go through in the center of the tunnel.  Yikes!  From time to time in the tunnel there were windows or openings that let in some light but otherwise it was pretty dark. 

You can see one of the openings in the tunnel above and to the right of the RV

Between Bryce and Zion we have seen so many rental RV’s and have heard many languages being spoken; it’s interesting that these are the only places we have seen evidence of out of country tourists.

We went through a town called Virgin and had to stop at Fort Virgin when we passed.  What a laugh!

Aug 22 - Bryce Canyon National Park UT

What can I say about today?  It’s all about scenery!!!

First just a lovely drive south on the 89 (which parallels I-15) with little traffic.  We were going to go south to Zion National Park but at one point found that we were 23 miles from Bryce Canyon National Park and it would have been insane to miss that opportunity.

We turned onto “Scenic Hwy 12” and almost immediately went into Red Canyon which was so spectacular we stopped at every vista stop and there’s one every 2 minutes on the road.  Unbelievable red rocks; it just blows your mind.

Then we went through Bryce Canyon which was phenomenal!  Can you tell I’m running out of superlatives!! There just isn’t any explanation of Bryce Canyon and even the photos don’t do it justice.  

We decided to stay just outside the gates to the park for the night as there is a little village here called Bryce Canyon City which, of course, is a tourist mecca but we had enough and didn’t want to drive further today.

Aug 21 - Salina UT

Gorgeous drive today.  When we started out the terrain was flat and desert.  Then we got into farmland.  As soon as we turned onto Highway 189 toward Provo we were greeted by REAL mountains.  This highway was spectacular!  We had the same phenomenon of the landscape looking like a painting rather than real.

You can really see the size of the mountains when you see our RV parked by the road

We took a little side road to see Bridal Veil Falls which was really something.  It must be incredible in the spring when there’s much more water coming down.  Norm ran across a bunch of kids jumping into the river and took some photos of them.  They will presumably email me to get copies of the photos.  There is so much activity going on this river – rafting, kayaking, white water rapid running, canoeing, etc. 

We went on I-15 south for a short stretch and then moved to a parallel scenic road which we’ll take down to Zion National Park.  Interesting campsite tonight (Butch Cassidy Campground) with an aviary and rabbits and chickens running around everywhere.

Aug 20 - Vernal UT

Today we took Hwy 191 south to the Flaming Gorge Recreation Area.  The scenery is spectacular; so much so that when you look at it, it doesn’t seem real but seems like it’s a painting.  We reached the dam and reservoir and checked out the marina and a couple of campgrounds there.  We were disappointed that none of the campgrounds were on the water – an item that seems to be increasingly important to us. 

As most scenic roads, however, it was a two lane road, windy and we climbed to 8400 feet, at times we had huge gorges on both sides of the road  - a very long way down to the bottom.  As anyone who knows me can attest, I am nervous unless I’m on the “safe” side of the road.  What really got me however, was an 8-10% downgrade for ten miles of switchbacks with our brakes overheating (the smell is the telltale sign).

I think in an effort to lighten the atmosphere, whenever we stopped along the road to cool off the brakes, or came to a switchback and had to brake to 20 mph from 40 mph, Norm would say “brace for impact” in his Scotty of Star Trek accent, which made me laugh.  Just the same, I was delighted when we reached Vernal and stopped.

This campground is unusual in that it is in the middle of town.  It’s off the main drag in a gully so you can’t even see it from the road but we can go walk around the town and come back to what feels and looks totally secluded.

Aug 19 - Green River WY

Visited the Lincoln Monument in Laramie WY – we were so impressed with the sculpture!  WOW!  The Lincoln Highway goes from Times Square to the Golden Gate Bridge (3,389 miles) and this monument is situated on the highest point of the highway at 8,640 feet.

We then had a tour around the Wyoming Territorial Prison Historic site (where Butch Cassidy was interred for 18 months).  Interesting place but as we were inside the prison I started to feel very funny and had to go outside.  It wasn’t particularly claustrophobic so I don’t know what that was all about.  At any rate, there were other exhibits outside the prison so it was all fun to explore.

I-80 through Wyoming has been quite unexpected.  Because we have previously been in northern Wyoming through Yellowstone, Grand Teton and the Devil’s Tower we were expecting the terrain to be similar – NOT!  The first hour after Laramie was flat farmland, then an area of hills which still have snow, and then after that it was flat desert.  After 3 hours we suddenly started seeing some amazing rock formations and we’ll take some photos of those tomorrow morning as we stopped at the first available place.

We’re in a hotel tonight because the campgrounds we saw, which were few and far in-between, left a lot to be desired.

Aug 18 - Cheyenne WY

Our first stop this morning was at Chimney Rock National Historic Site.  Chimney Rock is one of the most famous and recognizable landmarks for pioneer travelers on the Oregon, California, and Mormon Trails, a symbol of the great western migration.  We were disappointed first, because it was foggy and second, because we were so far away from the Rock.  Still, we managed a few photos even though they’re not very good. 

Next we stopped at Scotts Bluff National Monument.  “Scotts Bluff is a topographic feature rising to 4,659 feet above sea level and 800 feet above the North Platte River. The geology of Scotts Bluff is significant from a natural resource standpoint because it affords a view of 740 feet of continuous geologic strata that spans a time period extending from 33 to 22 million years before present.” National Park Service

We took a shuttle up to almost the top of the monument and were able to look around for miles.  It was still hazy out but the sight was impressive just the same.

Before arriving in Cheyenne we had heard about the cowboy boot sculptures painted by local artists that are scattered all over town.  We were interested in trying to find as many as we could and started looking in the downtown area.  We had a museum we wanted to visit but forgot it was Sunday and everything is closed.  We did get to see the outside of the State Capitol which was quite impressive and managed to find 10 of the boots.  

Aug 17 - Alliance NE

We stopped in at the Fort Cody Trading Post which was an interesting store of many bizarre items.  “The Fort Cody Trading Post has remained true to its original vision -- a replica frontier redoubt of the 1860-to-1875 era that claims to be "Nebraska's Largest Souvenir and Western Gift Store." While many gift shops in the West attempt to look like frontier stockades, this is probably the largest, maybe even larger than life. Soldier dummies man the stockade battlements and towers; one has an arrow sticking out of his butt.” <RoadsideAmerica>

Then we went to see Buffalo Bill Cody’s home which is now a historic state park.  We saw his home and his barn as well as having a walk around the grounds.  Quite an interesting stop – beautiful grounds.  He was quite a character and visionary.

We took a detour from our projected route to visit Carhenge in Alliance.  This is the No. 2 Wackiest Attraction (No. 1 being the Toilet Seat Museum in Alamo Heights Texas according to RoadtripAmerica).  What a hoot!

Aug 16 - Gothenburg NE

Today was housekeeping day so we didn’t actually get on the road until noon.

We stopped at the Rowe Sanctuary which is a staging area for Sandhill Cranes.  Even though this is a very quiet time there it was interesting to talk to the docent.  We will be looking at the “crane cam” next March when they get anywhere from 200,000 to 400,000 cranes on their way north.  They have web cams set up mornings and evenings in March that are actually manned so that you can get the best view of what’s happening each day.

A woman in the laundry room this morning mentioned that we should watch for and stop at the Archway which is a museum built over the I-90.  Sounded interesting and we certainly were keeping an eye out for it but couldn’t have missed it if we tried.  We did stop and walked around the grounds and a little into the museum but there were steep escalators and no elevators so we couldn’t really go through the museum.  There are photos in the album and this awful photo through the windshield at least shows the outline.

Aug 15 - Gretna NE

Our campsite last night was almost perfect.  We were right beside a river and could hear the water moving; we were able to have a campfire (only the 2^nd one this trip); and there were only about a dozen campers spread around so that it really felt like we were all alone.  It was glorious.

In Clear Lake we followed 315 Street to its end and saw the scene in the photo below.

This is the marker for the 10 minute walk to a plane crash site.  On Feb 2, 1959, rock stars Buddy Holly, Ritchie Valens and Big Booper performed at Surf Ballroom in Clear Lake, Iowa. Shortly after midnight, the three rock stars took off in a charted plane that promptly crashed on take-off, killing the pilot and the three rock stars.  There is a small memorial and people obviously still come by and leave various items. 

Passing through Britt we discovered that we missed the National Hobo Convention which had been held the previous weekend – rats!!

Our next stop was in West Bend at the Grotto of the Redemption.  This is considered to be the world's most complete man-made collection of minerals, fossils, shells, and petrifications in one place.  The history is that Father Paul Dobberstein was a German immigrant ordained in 1897 who became critically ill with pneumonia and promised to build a shrine to the Virgin Mary if she interceded for him.  After his recovery, he began stockpiling rocks and precious stones.   Construction of the Grotto began in 1912 and continued year round for 42 years.

Our last stop of the day was in Ida Grove to see the castles.  There was one man largely responsible for the castle structures, Byron Godbersen (1925-2003), founder and owner of Midwest Industries in Ida Grove.  He built his castles all over town and since they are privately owned you can only see them from the outside.

Aug 14 - Nashua IA

No WiFi here.  Getting annoying.   Next trip I get a mobile hotspot.

We had a lovely walk through the downtown of Galena IL.  This is the home of Ulysses S. Grant so there are many civil war attractions to see plus very old buildings that have been maintained.  In fact, in the downtown area, 85% of the buildings are listed on the National Registry of Historic Places.  All the buildings have small boutiques and there are many vintage shops – can’t imagine where all the stuff comes from (Norm, the cynic, says China.) 

Then we spend some hours in the National Mississippi River Museum & Aquarium in Dubuque IA.  What a wonderful place!  We really enjoyed the interactive exhibits, videos and animals.

Aug 13 - Savanna IL

Today was a repositioning day as we wanted to get to the Mississippi River and then be in a line to see the four Road America attractions in Iowa that we’ve identified as worth visiting. 

We decided to start listening to the audio book we bought at the library earlier on this trip – The Dirty Girls Social Club.  It’s actually interesting and we listened to 2 of the 4 discs today. 

We made a stop in Henry IL and just happened to see The Spirit of Peoria coming along the Illinois River.  Wish we knew about this earlier today and we may have stopped and taken a river cruise.  They have from 1 to 5 day cruises on the Mississippi and Illinois Rivers and it’s one of the few authentic paddlewheel-driven boats that offer overnight trips.

We then made a stop at the Hennepin Canal – “The Hennepin was the first American canal built of concrete without stone cut facings. Although the Hennepin enjoyed limited success as a waterway, engineering innovations used in its construction were a bonus to the construction industry. Some of the innovations pioneered on the Hennepin Canal were used on the Panama Canal. Both used concrete lock chambers and both used a feeder canal from a man-made lake to water the canals because both needed water to flow ‘uphill.”  We never heard of it before so it was quite interesting and we got to watch a little video and talked for quite a while to a woman in the visitor’s center.

We didn’t plan our day too well so we are in a hotel instead of a campground.

Aug 12 - Monticello IN

No internet here so will post tomorrow.

It rained pretty hard overnight and as we travelled on, the rain got progressively worse to the point where we got off the highway and took a parallel road until it finally stopped close to noon.  We stopped in Coldwater IN and had a walk around the old section of town.  We saw a couple of war memorials and passed some wonderful old buildings that are still being used.  On our way back to the RV we saw a sign and followed it to Tibbits Opera House built in 1882 and recently refurbished.  It is used extensively for plays, concerts, all kinds of things – it’s a very busy place.  It was just lovely and we’ll add a couple of photos to the web album when we next find WiFi service.

We made a brief stop in Fort Wayne at the Visitor’s Center but discovered it was only a visitor’s center for the city, not the state, so it wasn’t very helpful.

The rest of the afternoon was b-o-r-i-n-g!  We didn’t see any place to stop and explore and didn’t see any camping signs anywhere on the road we travelled.  I finally found a campground in Monticello on my phone and we were able to put the address into the GPS (the GPS didn’t have any of the 4 campgrounds that are in Monticello for some unknown reason).  There were no camping signs anywhere on any of the roads we came on and when we got here we were amazed to see only a dozen campers in this huge campground – seems incredible for mid-August!  But many of the campgrounds we’ve been in have had many empty spots and we can’t really figure out why they’re not at least close to full at this time of year.

Another camping first – when we arrived at this campground we took our usual walk around and when we checked out the showers we were amazed to find that there was no way to adjust the water, just a button to turn the shower on – the water stayed on for about 10 seconds and was cold.

Aug 11 - Lansing MI

This morning we crossed the Blue Water Bridge into the US, leaving Canada behind for the last time this trip.

When we reached Port Huron we decided to have lunch and found this great spot - Lynch's Irish Tavern - where we had a feast of bangers and mash plus bread pudding for desert!  What a hoot!!  After lunch we took a walk and discovered that today was the International Offshore Powerboat Race and the boats were getting ready.  The races were going to begin towards the end of the afternoon so we decided not to hang around.  We saw some pretty incredible boats and I've posted photos of a few in the album.

As we were walking back to the RV, a sign a block away caught my eye and we had to go check it out.  It was the Ice Museum of North America which unfortunately was closed today.  This is a little blurb I found that explains the museum:  “Just imagine Ice Harvesting was one of the ten largest industries in the U.S. at one time.  The Knowlton’s Ice Museum of North America has one of the largest collections in the U.S. of ice tools and implements from the 1800’s to the early 1900’s.  From old ice picks to the horse drawn ice wagons, you will see history brought to life.”  It would have been fun to explore.  Onward and upward – we carried on to Lansing, Michigan where we found a great campsite.

Aug 10 - Hamilton Ont

Aug 10-connection not allowing photo uploads today <photos added Aug 11>

Today we stopped to visit my niece Nicki  and grand niece Chloe in Hamilton and got to meet dad, Paul. They have a lovely home and have done all the decorating themselves.  My grand niece is 3 months old and her name is Chloe Alexandra.

Charlie, the dog, would not leave Norm alone - he found a friend.

Aug 9 - Wasaga Beach Ont

Aug 10-internet connection not allowing photo uploads today <photos added Aug 11>

This morning we drove up Yonge Street from our friend's house to Barrie Ont.  Yonge Street is the longest street in the world at 1,178 miles long.  We were amazed at the miles we drove  before we stopped seeing high rises and when we got to Barrie (which was a smallish town) we saw more high rises!  Say it isn't so!!

We got to Wasaga Beach and were so reminded of the Florida spring break movies!  Amazing!  We took a drive to Thornbury and the Blue Mountains before heading back to Wasaga Beach and Norm's cousin, Norman Armstrong's place.

We were able to park the RV in his driveway so life was grand and we had a fabulous visit.  He has a wonderful set-up there, a lovely downstairs unit with a pastoral view and a little stream.  His hobby is wood-working and carving and he has created some magnificent pieces.  He lives to ski and bike so is kept quite occupied all year around but he is also doing housing renovations as he feels like it.