This trip was one of those once-in-a-lifetime trips - unless you are a horse racing nut. It was fun and very interesting. It also provided us with an excuse to go to Minneapolis for a visit with friends and relatives and to see a little country we hadn't seen before. We did sort of forget that, like Estes Park, it is not yet spring in Minnesota!
| April 15-17 | Estes Park to Pipestone, MN to Minneapolis |
| April 18-24 | In Minneapolis |
| April 25-27 | To Louisville |
| April 28 | Start of the Kentucky Derby Rally |
| April 29 | Lexington: Thoroughbred Center; Kentucky Horse Park |
| April 30 | |
| May 1 | Louisville Slugger Museum; Pegasus Parade |
| May 2 | Bourbon distilleries |
| May 3 | Kentucky Derby Day |
| May 4-5 | Mammoth Cave National Park |
| May 6-8 | Trip home |
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Sunday’s five inches of snow had mostly melted Monday so getting the camper (Foxy – it is an Arctic Fox brand) out of the yard was easy. We learned a lesson once before and knew to turn it around so it faced down hill to the street before the snow arrived. After a pause in Ft. Collins to get a tire fixed and for Gale to make a doctor stop, we headed down the road to Kearney, NE for dinner at a favorite restaurant (Whisky Creek). The next day we had a pleasant trip north on US 281 and then east toward I-29 and Sioux Falls, SD. Shortly before we turned north on I-29, the weather turned on us and we drove through rain and then heavy wet snow on our way up to and around Sioux Falls. It was cold enough to stick but we continued on to Pipestone, MN as we wanted to visit the Pipestone National Monument. We got to the only RV park in the area, right across from the National Monument only to find it “CLOSED.” Marge backed the truck and camper 100 yards to an intersection to try to turn around. We backed into the cross street and drove to the Pipestone Nat’l Monument Visitor Center to turn around. (We had been here in 2010 and thought we knew what we were doing.) The snow by now was 3 inches deep and the roads very icy. To make a long story short, having gotten turned around and heading back toward town, we had a hill to get up. A truck ahead of us fishtailed about 6 times before he got to the top. We decided not to try the hill. I walked to the nearest house which happened to belong to the Park Ranger and he said “for safety reasons” we could park at the Visitors Center for the night. We turned around again by backing into a picnic ground parking lot and parked at the Visitor Center. Backing up the camper is not our forte.
Fortunately, "dry" camping is not a problem and we were snug in our little "house on wheels" for the night. At 9 AM we went into the Visitor Center and watched the 20-minute documentary film on the use of the red stone quarried here by hand to make the bowls of peace pipes. Certified Indian tribes still have access to the stone here in the National Monument and still make pipes, jewelry, and sculpt animals for traditional uses and for tourist souvenirs.
April 17-18 at Pipestone, MN
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A quarry
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The landscape at the Monument |
Pipe material
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The ice on the roads and paths was beginning to melt so we walked out on the trails to look at the quarries. By the time we got back we decided it was safe to drive out. The rangers were all very helpful and nice. We had no trouble driving but the camper was still covered with ice and icicles. We stopped in town for gas and to get cinnamon buns from Lange’s Cafe – to eat for lunch.
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Class of 1961
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We had a nice visit in Minneapolis. Included was a trip with Sue and Pat to the Minneapolis Institute of Art to see their Matisse exhibit and discover what a wonderful art museum it has become. Nothing like the musty old place that it was years (lots of them) ago. We, of course, went to REI; had dinner with Rachel Morrison, our travel agent; lunch with Marge's college classmates; and time just relaxing - the weather wasn't great - cold and rainy, for the most part.
(Clockwise around the table: Carol Brink, Ann Berry, Chrys Bryant, Donna Peter, Rose Wiley, Marge, Jo Johnson)
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We pulled out of Montrose at 8:30 AM (April 25) and headed east and south toward Louisville, KY. We took the scenic back roads south of Minneapolis and down the Great River Road in Minnesota on the west side of the Mississippi, crossed the river at LaCrosse into Wisconsin and stayed on the Great River Road on the east side of the Mississippi. Even this far north, the Mississippi is an impressive waterway. We saw one riverboat (a fake steam paddle wheeler), several tugs with their large barges (one was pushing six hulls full of something) and passed several power station dams and locks. The river is running very high and nearly all of the islands are completely under water. It was sunny all day and reached 69°. It was quite a difference from the 31° we woke up to this morning.
Some of the roads we were on today were very rough and in need of resurfacing, but the trip was scenic.
We stopped for the night at the Blackhawk Valley Campground just south of Rockford, IL.
We left Rockford (April 26) and drove to Eureka, IL to meet Bob and Ellen Greeley. They were campground hosts when we camped at Olive Ridge Nat’l Forest campground while our house in Estes Park was being built. They have come out to Estes Park to volunteer in Rocky Mtn. Nat’l Park every summer for 29 years. They are 86 years old and plan to be back again this summer. We headed south at 2 PM and finally got on the interstate into Effingham, IL and spent the night at Camp Lakewood, another Good Sam park. It is another very nice shaded, clean campground. This one even has a fishing and canoeing lake.
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