St. Louis has a very interesting history as the gateway to the westward expansion of the United States. It was the third busiest port in the US in 1850 since you can navigate big boats up the Mississippi River without passing through a single lock. The current in the river is 3.5 miles per hour in St. Louis. We continue to really enjoy all of the parks. Click the link below to see our page.
Mammoth Cave
Today was cold and rainy – 40s. A good day to catch up on business obligations. Read our update to see why I had the time.
Great Smoky Mountains
Another beautiful National Park. This is the most visited park of the 62, with over 11 million visitors a year. It was very busy while we were here as well. Click the link below to see our pictures and narrative.
Congaree
We continue to really enjoy these wonderful parks. Today was Congaree National Park. We are staying in Columbia an extra day tomorrow and will explore a local state park and probably head into town to see South Carolina’s capital. Wednesday morning we plan to get an early start to the Great Smoky Mountains. Click the link below to visit our page on Congaree.
Shenandoah
What a great week we have had. Rangeley loved Indiana Dunes, then we went to Millersburg, Ohio and spent 4 nights visiting Rangeley’s dog mom and hanging out on farms, then Shenandoah is spectacular in the fall with lots of sticks on the Appalachian trail. The link below will take you to our recap. Thanks for reading along.
Indiana Dunes – Day 2
We made it to Millersburg and had a great evening with our young Amish family. Rangeley had fun playing with his real mom – Roxy. Not sure if there was any recognition, but he was loose and playing and having a great time. We had dinner and then went for a buggy ride. Yes, Rangeley went as well.
I was able to finish uploading pictures, so Day 2 at Indiana Dunes is now complete. It is at the bottom of the same page as Day 1. Here is the link. This turned out to be a great park, Rangeley’s favorite for how dog friendly it is and with hiking and great swimming.
Indiana Dunes Day 2
We are having trouble with wifi and my data on my phone, so uploading pictures is a problem. Tomorrow morning we head off to Ohio. We have dinner plans with our Amish friends. Hopefully I will get a chance to finish our day 2 post Saturday afternoon. If not I will post the remainder on Sunday morning.
Indiana Dunes
This was our longest distance between parks – over 900 miles from Badlands to Indiana Dunes. The driving has not been bad at all. It is fun seeing America and all the diversity of landscapes and people. It was amazing going from the chaos of metro Chicago and driving around the southern point of Lake Michigan to the serenity of this wonderful National Park in just a few miles. Elizabeth mentions the trucks we saw, it was like a parking lot, but moving at 60 miles per hour. It was quite nerve racking after being in the open spaces of the west. Click the link below for our Day 1 update. More to follow later today.
Badlands
What a great day again yesterday visiting Badlands National Park. We are now in Minnesota, making our way to Indiana Dunes. This journey continues to be amazing. So many memories in such a short time period. Whenever we think we are going to have a few hours to do nothing, something seems to pop up which has always been great. Last night we were working on this journal at 9:30PM and decided to wait till today to finish it. I am in the hotel in Fairmont, MN with Rangeley and Elizabeth is shopping at Walmart. It is 5:12 as I write this, we still plan to go to a dog park this evening. Rangeley had a ball at a dog park in Sioux Falls South Dakota at lunchtime on a side trip today. It was great fun as 3 different dogs came through while we were there.
Click the link below to read about Badlands.
Wind Cave
We have been on the road for four weeks now, visited 14 parks and driven 4,000 miles. The trip is everything we wanted and expected. There are so many good people we have met and it has been great to see America’s positive side during this tough time. The west is truly an incredible place with such an amazing diversity of landscapes.
My favorite has been Yellowstone. Incredible beauty and so many animals. As we thought, the journey has been as much fun as visiting the actual parks. We continue to find side trips to fun places along the way. For example, Elizabeth loved driving through Sturgis, SD and we aren’t motorcycle people. Rangeley has been beyond amazing as a travel companion for a 5 month old pup.
It seems there are many people like us wanting to get out and explore the US during the pandemic. Weekends have been difficult to find lodging. Next weekend we will be in Millersburg Ohio to visit the Amish family we got Rangeley from. The place we wanted to stay is full as is the Holiday Inn. We got the last pet friendly room at the Comfort Inn for $180 on Saturday night. It has been great to see.
The weather has been surprisingly cold but not much rain. It has been tough since we can’t eat in a restaurant because of Rangeley. The patios are fine, but we have had to bundle up and the food gets cold quickly.
We continue to find a geocache in each state we visit, which has been another fun little activity. We were in Idaho for only a few miles, but we still found a cache.
Click on the link below to visit our page on Wind Cave National Park.
Gary and Elizabeth's Adventures 