Oct 15 Ontonagan MI

In our campground in Ontonagan, Michigan, we found that we had a couple of hundred hitchhikers we picked up in the North Woods of Wisconsin. We had noticed the ladybugs were really attracted to our motorhome, but we thought we'd left them in Wisconsin. Not so--in fact, as I'm posting here in Ohio about a week later (we've had a lot of trouble finding internet connections along the way lately), I can see another ladybug tucked up in a window shade.

Here's a picture of one of our little friends, along with the view out the dining room of the motorhome in our pretty campground in Ontonagan.

Oct 11-14 Wisconsin North Woods

This week, we were in Upper Wisconsin to visit with cousins, Missy and Sue, whom Tip hasn't seen in over 40 years! Amazingly, nobody had changed in all that time :-)

We had a wonderful visit, and as you can see, they live in a fantastically beautiful area. Both have lovely log homes, which are located right on the shore of two different lakes in the North Woods. We enjoyed ourselves so much that we stretched our visit out a couple of extra days just to give us time to catch up on the past "few" years and to see more of that part of the state.

I'll be forever grateful to Missy, who was able to get me an appointment with her hairdresser. Who would have thought that one of the biggest problems I'd run into on this trip would be horrible hair? But, I'm sure most women can appreciate the fact that bad hair can ruin your whole day!!! It was such a relief to get a great new haircut--things looked much brighter after that. Could be brighter just because my bangs aren't hanging in my eyes.

Oct 8-10 Door County, WI

Just some random pictures from the end of our week in beautiful Door County, WI--picturesque villages up and down the peninsula, and fabulous fall colors. The picture showing a flaming fire was at one of the famous Wisconsin fish boil dinners. Pretty tasty, considering that it was just boiled potatoes, onions, and white fish. (Yes--boiled fish!). They serve it floating in melted butter, so of course it tasted pretty good :-)

The little log cabin is the oldest building in Door County--it's presently being used as a bookstore. Notice also the fall decorations in some of the pictures--people really get into the pumpkin and Halloween season in this state. It must have something to do with living among such beautiful natural fall colors.

Oct 6-7 Bjorklunden

We picked up Mike on Friday at the Green Bay Airport and took him to a condo in Bailey's Harbor that was about 10 minutes from our RV park. Friends Tim and Loretta came up from Illinois and joined us, staying in the condo with Mike.

Monday and Tuesday, we were able to visit Bjorklunden and the chapel that Mike and Tip's grandparents built, beginning in 1929. The property was willed to Lawrence University when they passed away, and since then it has been used as their northern campus, where students and artists can come for study and retreat. We were treated like royalty by the caretaker, Mark, who is the Bjorklunden administrator for Lawrence Univ. He was so knowledgeable about the grandparents and the whole history, that the guys learned a lot about their family history that hadn't been passed on before. It was wonderful for me to learn more about the place I've heard so many stories about over the years.

The stone cottage in the pictures is the workshop where their grandmother did her artwork for the chapel--drawings that she later added to the chapel in the form of frescoes. The darker wood building is where their grandfather worked on his carvings and woodwork for the chapel. The baptismal font alone took over 600 hours of carving. They worked on the chapel every summer for 9 years. The original house where they spent their summers burned about 5 years ago, but the University has constructed the building shown in the pics above that look more modern. The view of the beach is part of the mile-long beachfront on Lake Michigan that now belongs to the University. It's really a fabulous place, and while we were there it was being used as an elder hostel where people could take part in classes. It was so great to see what has become of their grandparents' vision and hard work--they were really amazing and talented, hardworking people.

On Tuesday, we also were able to scatter John's ashes near the chapel (where all the kids were baptised) and on the beautiful grounds of the estate. It brought more of a sense of closure for Tip and Mike, and I think John would be pleased.

Sept 30-Oct 3

The monotony of the trip across South Dakota was broken only by miles of advertising for and a stop at the famous Wall Drug. Thanks to Dave and Vonja's suggestion to visit the "biggest tourist trap in the US," we enjoyed our visit there and partook of their famous free ice water, 5-cent coffee, and donuts. And oops--how did those $70 jeans find their way into my shopping bag?

After stopping for the night at the border of SD, we zipped across Minnesota the next day. The remarkable thing about that state, other than the rolling hills and impressive farmland was all the alternative energy sources we could see, especially the wind farms. Those Minnesotans look like they have it all over the rest of us in that respect. Good for them!!!!

On Wednesday, I got my first view of the Mississippi River, and in fact we stayed at a pretty campground right on the river that night in LaCrosse, WI. What a nice little college town. Obama was campaigning there Thursday morning, and as much as I would have liked to drop by and say hello, we found a way to avoid all the traffic and hit the road again on our way to northern Wisconsin and Door County. Wisconsin is fantastically beautiful and so CLEAN!!! We passed hundreds of dairy farms and didn't see one junk car parked beside a barn! The fall leaves are coming on strong, and we're seeing a state I think I could be happy living in. Of course, the winter snows could change my mind on that, but we'll be long gone by then.

Friday, Tip will pick up his brother, Mike, at the Green Bay airport, and our friends Tim and Loretta will be driving up the next day from west of Chicago for our week-long stay in Door County and the visit to Bjorklunden, which was the original reason we started thinking about making this whole trip.

By the way, I'm sorry I can't figure out how to put the pictures next to the related text as I write the blog, and I can't even rearrange them so they're in some kind of chronological order. You may have noticed, in fact, that the pictures are completely in the opposite order of what I'm talking about. Pretty frustrating!

Sept 27-29 Black Hills SD

Wow! The Black Hills are even better than we expected. Such beautiful fall colors this time of year. We drove up a highway called the Needles because of the shape of the rock formations that form the mountains and just jut straight up out of the earth. They are so huge that they have carved tunnels through them for the winding road that takes you through the area. When you come through the last tunnel, in the distance you can see the faces on Mt. Rushmore framed in the tunnel. Really a magnificent view, but it didn't photograph well, unfortunately. And then when we found out it would be $10 to park, another fee to get into the Park, and then a bus ride you had to take to get close enough to photograph the faces, we decided--since we'd been driving on the Needles highway all day anyway--that we'd just buy a postcard somewhere. So, sorry about that if you were hoping for a picture of the presidents!

As you can see, we got up close and personal with the wild burros on that drive, too. Kinda made us miss our donkey, Hoti!

On this same drive, we stopped at the Crazy Horse Memorial. Learning the history of that artist and what he had to go through to get as far as he did before his death really made us feel like slackers! Can you imagine taking on a job where you're going to single-handedly turn a mountain into a statue??? Today, his wife and seven of his 10 children are continuing the work. Hopefully, in this picture you can see not only the projected statue as a model, but the mountain in the distance that they're blasting away at. Along with the statue, the Memorial site has a really wonderful Native American museum and you can tour the home of the artist and his family and see all of his other carvings and artwork. You can read more about it here: http://www.crazyhorse.org/. I think it's an incredible story.

The trip to Deadwood was a wonderful surprise--I had it pictured as being in country like the Badlands, but it was a beautiful little valley with the town restored to pristine condition, thanks to the legalized gambling they've put into place there. We went to three different museums that day, so we didn't finish up with the tour of the graveyard where Wild Bill Hickock and Calamity Jane and the rest of that crew were buried. We were great fans of the HBO Deadwood series, and it was fun to find out how much research went into the series to make it as realistic as possible, without being a total documentary. Most of the characters were based on the real saloon owners, lawmen, ladies of the evening, and miners and business people from that time, and they captured their personalities very well.

On Monday, we had to hit the road again. There was a lot more we could have done in that area--could have easily spent another day or two there--but it was time to move on get to our Wisconsin destination and reunion by Oct 2.