The Windy City

I'm not sure if I can top the Sock Monkey Museum, but I'll try.    Saturday we drove up to Wisconsin Dells to attend my great niece's high school graduation party.   Turns out my great nephew was playing tuba in a street concert with his Jazz Camp group, so I got to see that also!   It was a fun day, and I got to meet 'almost' family members I've not previously met.  

Waddles has been sitting 'mooch-docked' in my sister's driveway, skootched up against the garage and I've been sleeping out there all cozy.   When I got up on Saturday morning I thought there was a terrible smell in the air, and figured it was the hot, humid weather creating it.  When we got back from the graduation party, my brother-in-law commented on the smell and told me it was not something he'd smelled before.   I did some investigating and discovered that it was coming from Waddle's battery!  And the battery was quite hot.   So I unplugged the shore power right away.  The battery is sitting right next to the propane tank, so that was NOT a good thing.    The smell went away  and the battery cooled down.    Something was not right.   So Sunday we went to a Batteries Plus store and they tested it.  They said if it had just been charged (which it had) something was definitely wrong and I should replace it.  They did not have a similar battery in stock, so we went to Napa and found what we were looking for.   I installed it and all is well.

Also, I think I may have mentioned before that Waddles' battery is not charging when hooked up to the running car, which it should be.  So today I took it to an automotive place to see if they could figure out why.   I'd not tested this before leaving home, and suspected that the needed wire was not hooked up when the hitch and wiring was installed.   They confirmed that suspicion and fixed the problem.  I just hooked up the trailer and all is right with the world.   I'm hoping this will make my return trip a little easier.  I've been worried about the battery up until now.

Old battery 

The new battery charging while the car is running!  YEA!

Last night we took the train into downtown Chicago to attend the Chicago Blues Festival. This is a free 3-day event with 4 different stages!    On the way from the train to the festival we found the end of Route 66!

And the festival was right next to 'The Bean', which has a virtual geocache.

The music at the stage we went to was wonderful...and there were a LOT of people

Rhiannon Giddens was fabulous

Gary Clark Jr.  was really amazing

The first performer was Ronnie Baker Brooks, son of Lonny Brooks.   Another wonderful performance.    We headed back to the train at about 9:30pm.  On the way we saw this Picasso sculpture:

The the view sky-ward was pretty cool...

On the train home, the doors were not working, so we got home after midnight because two conductors had to manually open the doors at every stop!   It was entertaining.  At least the train was running.

Tonight we are going to see my other great nephew play baseball.    Tomorrow I'm not sure what is on the schedule.  Wednesday I'm planning to head home, via Ontario to visit another friend!   The next few days here in Illinois are going to be tough.....  check the precipitation as well as the temperature.

Family

Spent Wednesday driving south from Hannibal toward St. Louis Missouri, to visit Cahokia Mounds.  We took in the Visitor's Center and climbed the largest Mound.  I followed a path through the prairie vegetation from one site to another.   It was very interesting and informative.    From the top of the Mound we could see the St Louis Arch.  We spent a second night in Hannibal before heading home,

Thursday we took backroads driving from Hannibal, Missouri to Elgin, Illinois  It was lovely countryside.  We discovered Coatsburg, Illinois is the birthplace of William S. Gray, one of the authors of the Dick and Jane readers.    We also drove through Cherry, Illinois and learned that in 1909, it was the site of third largest Coal Mine disaster in the US.   It is truly amazing what you discover when you go off the beaten track!

Waddles is parked in my sister's driveway for the next week or so. Today I did laundry and changed out the flannel sheets for cooler sheets.    It was almost 90 degrees today and predicted to be hot and humid for the next couple days.    The Pendleton blankets are also off the bed!

Today I took the car in for an oil change and general check to make sure everything is operating properly.  Got a clean bill of health.  My sister and I then drove to Rockford Illinois to visit the gravesite of an aunt and uncle.  I had never been there, so it was lovely.   Then we attempted to find the historical society office to see if we could find more information about these relatives.  That search took us to a museum, where the historical society meets, but they do not have an office.  What WAS there was the Sock Monkey Museum!!!   I didn't know that was on my bucket list, but it was pretty darn cool!

We will be attending my great niece's High School Graduation party tomorrow.

Heartland

I had a wonderful time in Colorado Springs.   Catching up with people I'd not seen in more than FIFTY YEARS was just incredible.    Lots of hugs and smiles, and music and new friends.   Here I am with my best friend from 5th and 6th grade....  She lives in Chile, and has two beautiful daughters,   who are 1/2 Easter Islanders.  One daughter, Mahani, is a concert pianist, the other a journalist and concert organizer.   Check out this music school on Easter Island that Mahani and her husband, Enrique Icke, are creating.  It is really amazing.

I spent 3 nights in Colorado Springs, and visited the Garden of the Gods, which I remember being WAY north of town... and is now kind of in the middle of town, but still awe-inspiring, with Pikes Peak behind it.

The last night I spent at Cheyenne Mountain State Park, south of Colorado Springs.   The views were wonderful, and gave me a pretty good sense of the landscape I'd be seeing for the next few days driving East.   This was looking east during sunset.

As I have mentioned before, I'm trying to stay off Freeways, so chose to drive east on Hwy 36 across northern Kansas and Missouri, ending in Hannibal.   In Colorado and Kansas this is a 2 lane highway with a speed limit of 65 mph.  It goes through lots of very small farm towns.   Cope, Colorado is one of those (I stopped to mail some postcards here).

I finally hit the Kansas border and had to stop for a photo op.

No longer seeing spectacular mountains, but rather spectacular skies!

A few observations about traveling in Kansas.

1. There are many 'picnic' areas along the highway. They have picnic tables, but no bathrooms.

2. Semi trucks drive with their right tires on the white line, whether they need to or not.

3. Cars wait for the 4th opportunity to pass before they actually pass.

4.  Kansas is not flat, but miles and miles of rolling hills.

5.  I got better gas mileage driving in the mountains of Colorado at 45-50 mph than I did in the rolling hills of Kansas at 65 mph (on a 2 lane highway I didn't want to hold up traffic so tried to do the speed limit).

6.  There was a Post Office in almost every small town I passed through.

7.  There was a Dollar One store in a lot of the small towns I passed through.   I wanted to go inside one to see what they sold, but didn't.

8.  There are almost no McDonalds along Hwy 36 (they have clean bathrooms, so I stop there a lot)

I had to stop here (and found a geocache even though I didn't have any geocaching technology with me).

I spent the night at Lovewell State Park, near Mankato, Kansas.  It was 94 degrees and humid when I arrived, so I was glad for lots of shade in a lovely park on a large body of water and lots of camping opportunities.   I think it must be a Kansas thing... the ONE bathroom was about 1/8 mile from my campsite.  I saw an Eastern Bluebird and a Baltimore Oriole in the campground.

Up early the next day so I could make it to my destination to meet up with my sister and brother-in-law.   When I crossed the border into Missouri, Hwy 36 became a 4 lane divided hwy, so I slowed down to a saner 55 mph and my gas mileage improved a great deal.

So now I'm in the land of Mark Twain's Tom Sawyer, Hannibal, Missouri.    We are spending a few nights here before heading back to my sister's house near Chicago.   Tonight we went on a dinner cruise on the Mississippi River.   It was sweet!

Tomorrow we are going to explore Cahokia Mounds, near St. Louis.   Not sure how long I'll stay in Illinois, so now I have to plan my trip back to Oregon!   Waddles and I are still in love.

Oh Colorado!

I made it back over Teton Pass, and the weather was MUCH MUCH better this time.

Then headed south with a destination of Dinosaur National Monument.   I am trying to avoid freeways as much as possible, so I headed down Hwy 191 south into the corner of Utah, past Flaming Gorge National Recreation Area.   It was a great drive, with little traffic, just the way I like it.      I spent 1 night at Dinosaur NM, went on a 3 mile hike that turned into a 5 mile hike  because I missed the junction where the trail looped back and didn't realize it for about a mile.   Nice hike though.

The Green River

The campground is in those trees

The next day I headed south on Hwy 139 from Rangley to Grand Junction.  What a beautiful road!  Again, not a lot of traffic.

From Grande Junction I took Hwy 50 to Montrose and to Black Canyon of the Gunnison National Park.  I'd heard about this park, but never been there.   I decided to spend 2 nights and I'm glad I did.  The campground was small and the sites close together, but I didn't spend a lot of time there.  The weather was a bit overcast, and there was a DOWNPOUR the second day I was there.

Lots of wildlife wandered through camp, including this lovely Dusky Grouse.

And there were lots of wildflowers.

There is a 'rim road' and a lot of short hikes off that road to overlook the canyon.  I hiked most of those trails and I struggled to capture the canyon with my camera.  It is a very deep, very narrow gorge, through which the Gunnison River runs.    Very interesting history of people trying to survey the river; it is a wild one.   It was finally accomplished on air mattresses!   There was a tunnel dug through 6 miles of solid rock to divert water to the Uncompahgre Valley that is an amazing story in itself.   Here are a few of the photos I took:

I left the park early this morning heading for Colorado Springs.   The drive was again wonderful.   Colorado is a spectacular state.     I crossed the Continental Divide at Monarch Pass,

I am staying at a motel for a couple nights in Colorado Springs because the only campground near town is a State Park that was booked solid until Sunday.    So I'm feeling like I'm abandoning Waddles, but she's safely parked outside my room.   There was a huge thunderstorm and downpour for a couple hours after I arrived so I guess I'm glad to be in a Motel!

The reason I'm in Colorado Springs is because I lived here when I was in the 5th and 6th grades (back in the dark ages) and my best friend and I have kept in touch over the past oh, 50+ years.   She now lives in Chile and I usually hear that she's been in the US after the fact, so when I was planning this trip I asked her if there was any chance she'd be in the country.  Turns out she was planning a surprise 70th Wedding Anniversary party for her parents who still live in Colorado Springs.  The party is June 3, and I was invited!    The last time I saw her was in the 1970's.   The last time I saw any of the rest of her family was in 1965, when I spent a month backpacking, with her family, her aunt, uncle and cousins and 10 burros, in the Sierra.    All her siblings are going to be here, her two daughters, their  husbands, and their 2 new babies, none of whom I've ever met.   This was reason enough for me to divert from a direct route to Illinois!!!  I'm very excited to see them all.

Colorado Springs has grown a great deal since I was here last, but I managed to find the two houses we lived it.  They were both rentals when we lived in them, and both look like they have been well cared for.   My elementary school building is no longer there, but new building/school has been built in it's place.  I guess that is called progress.

My sister and I shared a bedroom, window to the left of the front door.  My sister and I took accordion lessons when we lived in this house. I've always wondered why my folks thought that was a good idea!

My bedroom was the window above the porch.  My best friend and I used to dumpster dive behind the local flower store and rescue geraniums.  My bedroom was full of them.

Lots of memories are flooding back to me!  The next few days are going to be fun.  And then I'll be back on the road.