Is This America?

I believe last time I left off we were at Ian's apartment and just met his roommate, Jake. Ian, Nate, and I drove over to Wheaton College which has a beautiful campus. I can see why Ian likes it so much. We saw the outside of the Billy Graham museum, the creative home of Narnia and “the animal” as Ian called it, inside the science building. Thanks Ian for being a part of this memory for us!

It was my turn to drive when we left Ian's and I was very thankful for the "booster seat" the we had rigged up so that I could reach the pedals in Nate's car (a text book with a towel wrapped around it). Regardless of the fact that I don't really fit in the driver's seat of the car, it is very comfortable and despite the long hours in the car I haven't gotten very sore. After driving for a while we pulled over and took a 2 hour nap, before I grabbed some coffee and hit the road again around 4:30 in the morning. I had considered making the nap longer than 2 hours but I'm very glad I didn't because I got the privilege of seeing one of God's hand crafted Wisconsin sunrises. I say privilege because I feel like people generally see more sunsets than sunrises. It was amazing to see it unfold. It started out with some cool pastels greens and purples, and then as the sun came up onto the horizon it turned into a beautiful vibrant pink and orange. The drive was really neat to. I saw crops getting watered, and some really neat stone towers coming out of the fields that were covered in mist. It almost makes me wish that I was more of a morning person... But that thought didn't last long. When the last of the pink clouds whisped away I thought... I could have stopped and taken a picture. Maybe I'll get the hang of this road trip, flexible, no schedule thing yet.

Eventually we rolled into Minnesota which turned out to be less of “The land of ten thousand lakes” and more like “The land of ten thousand windmills.” There also have been fields and fields of sunflowers, which I really enjoyed. Gas Buddy app has been great for finding cheap gas. It shows exactly where the gas station is and how much it is. Nate has had a fun time updating them as we go along too. On our way into Sioux Falls, Dakota we saw a memorial for the U.S.S. South Dakota which was a WWII Battleship. They had different parts of the ship on display and a lot of 8X10's along the wall. Philip's Avenue Diner was a delicious place to stop for burch Nate had a breakfast burrito, I had french toast, and we split a smores milkshake and they even toasted the marshmallows that they put on top. It actually smelled like a campfire! Since we happened to be in Sioux Falls we went to the zoo there and used our zoo pass for the second time. It was a really nice zoo and we enjoyed watching the monkeys getting fed, almost touching a gator, and laughing at the giraffe licking a tree with it's rather lengthy tongue. I also fed the ducks/geese and the goats. The goats were especially entertaining to feed because they would follow you around and the bigger ones would butt the smaller ones out of the way. There was a small grey one that was my favorite because while most of the goats used their lips to eat the food he used his tongue to lap it up. We got lots of video of that.

Again, even though it might be a little boring driving for hours on end, number one the scenery is a lot different than Binghamton's and number two we get to drive so fast! The speed limit is around 70-75 most of the way. We arrived at the Badlands around 6. I was totally taken by surprise. I hadn't looked at any pictures of where we were going so I didn't know what to expect. But all of the gray and red stripped rocks were amazing. I got out of the car and asked Nate, “Is this America?” As we were driving through I kept telling Nate that I wanted to see bison! Wild bison! Twice we saw herds of black dots around the bend. Only to discover when we got closer that they were cows. Talk about a let down! However, we did see some long horned goats, two frolicking dear, some more dear with antlers. The drive to the campsite seemed to take forever and it was an unpaved road with all kinds of twist and turns. For a while we drove behind a yellow volkswagen bus that had "Shaggin' Wagon" written on the back of it. I had also seen it on the highway so it was funny to see it again in the park. It was getting dark when we rounded a corner and there they were... my bison! Sauntering across the road, munching on their grass, but definitely not a fan of cars. It was neat to see the calves running around, one was even nursing some food from mom. Nate couldn't resist getting out of the car and trying to touch one, but they all ran away from him. But our bison viewing wasn't over, just around the next corner was another herd of bison. This time we had one younger guy just stand in the middle of the road. Nate said, “nothing like a bison in headlights!” haha. Finally, we got the campsite and set up our tent. We'll have an early morning exploring the Badlands!