A really busy and exciting time continues for us in the US. We spent a night in Hot Springs just on the edge of the Black Hills of Dakota, which Soph found very exciting because of the links to Calamity Jane. This is real cowboy country and this was proven at breakfast as 3 rodeo riders came in for their waffles and syrup. The old lady running the place said ‘does yo momma let you wear spurs in the house?’ and basically shamed the guys into taking off said spurs and their huge hats, which lay on the floor like small miner’s cottages.
We visited our first paleontology dig at the Mammoth site, the premier such site in the world, apparently. The first mammoth jaw bone was discovered in 1974 on a housing development, unbelievably, as opposed to just covering it up, the owner sold the land at cost value to the Mammoth Society – what a guy, probably wouldn’t happen today. It was fascinating and we saw both Colombian Mammoth and Short-Faced Bear bones (only 13 now-extinct short-faced bears ever discovered anywhere). The site is still being excavated, they have only dug up about 25% of the 80ft hole that is available. It’s like a mammoth grave yard, because originally 26000 years ago this pit was a sink-hole, filled with artesian water that tempted the beasties in and was so steep sided that they couldn’t get back out – hence the calcification of their bones and voila, a tourist attraction! It was a bit of a shame as some of the shapes of the skeletons were obviously of Mammoths in distress trying to get out of a muddy hole! After this we drove right through the Black Hills, passing through Custer (which isn’t the site of Custer’s Last Stand in 1876, this is actually next door in Montana) and all the while, still surrounded by hundreds of Harley Davidsons on their way to the Sturgis Bike Rally. Next up was the Crazy Horse monument, which was started as a guilt ridden tribute to the Native American tribes of the Sioux in 1948. This massive project was the inspiration of Korczak Ziolowski, a Polish immigrant, who won the contract at the World Fair in New York in 1939. Unfortunatley he has since died and the project doesn’t seem to moving very fast. We saw a photo of it in 1999 and there’s been little progress. I think his family are cashing in, charging 20 bucks just to see the half finished version. This thing (Crazy Horse on his horse) is going to be 200 ft long, so it’s not easy, but they really need to crack on with it.
Feeling a bit jaded and like seen off tourists, we headed for Mount Rushmore, which is the site of another huge rock carving of 4 US presidents (Washington, Roosevelt, Jefferson and Lincoln). We were well impressed, completed between 1927 and 1941 by Gutzon Burglun, this was fast work. Washington’s nose is 20ft long, which gives you a clue as to the size of it. Visible for miles as you drive up through the beautiful wooded Black Hills, it’s a fantastic piece of work close up as well. Sophs got up close and personal with 2 Rangers, but on cuddling one of them he sheepishly admitted that he was wearing a bullet proof vest – either the animals here are violent and fight back OR they were undercover coppers!! We took loads of photos and only left when the black clouds gathered over the Black Hills, threatening a storm (poor Harley Davidson riders). We drove East again after this to make Kimble for a night in another of these great Super 8 motels, although the tap water tastes a bit ‘creamy’ for want of a better word. Dining in a real live American Diner ‘Doowah Ditty’s Diner’ was pure Americana.
On the road again the next day to drive through Sioux Falls, which didn’t feel like a Native American village as we had hoped. We passed into Minnesota in its’ 150th anniversary year and during the day we saw a lot of wind turbines, huge corn fields (stay out of the corn!) and large corn towers with rounded aluminium roofs (looked more like missile silos than grain silos) next to picture book farmsteads. We also saw a small CAT earth-digger doing a wheelie and Sophs swore she saw a monkey road-kill on the side of the road (it was destined to be a strange day). Ended up bedding down in a town called Blue Earth, so named for the blue clay earth on the river bank that winds through the town. We walked into the town in the hot, soupy air via the Park marked on the map, which turned out to be an industrial park, so we had to turn back and find another way – very sweaty. We passed a huge 60ft high Jolly Green Giant wearing a charity run T-shirt, very surreal. Almost exhausted, we relieved our thirst by popping into a bar called the Double Play, with a barman who worked in the local school as a Biology teacher. The evening was just one of those evenings, Doc was very friendly and with his encouragement we downed a few local beverages and yapped to the locals, including one man who looked like Hurley from the programme LOST and a family who were out for a meal, but ended up giving us a lift home, giggling in the back of their pick up truck – great fun howling at the moon and being silly.
Up a bit slow for obvious reasons and on our way to the state capitol of Wisconsin, Madison. Not many people know this but Wisconsin is considered the circus centre of the world, perfect for a pair of clowns like us! First we passed through Iowa by heading South, through beautiful farmland, with some of the best maintained farms (with painted grain silos and signature tapered-arched barns), straightest corn fields and cleanest farm equipment this side of the black stump. We also noticed here that the KFC signs included a suprisingly youthful looking ‘Colonel’ (looks about 30 here, as opposed to a pensioner everywhere else). We were delighted to discover that we had to cross over the Mississippi, for some reason I hadn’t spotted this on the map! The landscape got greener and lusher and then we saw the huge expanse of this famous river. It’s a biggy as well, running approx 2300 miles from Lake Itasca in the North right to the Gulf of Mexico and New Orleans. If you played pooh sticks at Itasca, it would take about 90 days for your twig to make it to the ocean. It’s about 4 miles at it’s widest point and where we crossed at La Crosse, we leapfrogged between islands such as French Island to get to the other side. To complete the picture, we saw a red and white paddle steamer come up river as we crossed the bridge – very Mark Twainesque. On crossing the Muddy, we passed into our 10th State so far, Wisconsin and then into the town of Madison. The bridges aren’t here by the way, they’re in a smaller town called Winterset, so no phots I’m afraid. Had a quiet night, which was made interesting by the inclusion of glazed carrots with our steak, glazed in Maple Syrup (uurrgghh).
On the road to Chicageee! Not much to report of journey, on the motorway all the way with the driving speed getting higher and higher as we approached the City. No sign of Illinois’ Law Enforcement Community, thankfully. Huge town, but managed to find our accommodation and went out immediately to take the noisiest train in the world into the centre. Chicago sits on Lake Michigan and we didn’t really have particularly high hopes from the centre, thinking it would be very industrial. As we got off the train, our ears still ringing, we were very suprised to see a mix of stunning Victorian architecture and innovatively designed modern high rises and art. We passed the old water tower and pump house, spotless and looking like they’d been put up last year and the fire station built in the 1902, the same year as our house. We soon realised that our planned bus tour around the city was too expensive, so we walked to a restaurant to get our energy levels up by eating a ridiculously sized portion of pasta. The place, Gino’s East, was very cool and the walls were covered in baseball and entertainment memorabilia and lots and lots of graffitti, done by the public (and the band Aerosmith). We didn’t have any silver pens or Tipex, so nothing from us.
After this came a deluge of culture, more culture than Louis Pasteur’s fingernails. First up was the Museum of Contemporary Art and we just had time to see the exhibition of Jeff Koons, free entry but we only had 20 minutes to get round and out. His work is an eclectic mix of sex, basketballs and blow up lobsters – but pretty interesting for all that. We then walked down Michigan Avenue, the Magnificent Mile, with its’ varied skyline of old gothic buildings, such as the Chicago Tribune Building, and huge looming, shiny skyscrapers, like Gotham City but with designer shops and boutiques. We crossed the bridge over the Chicago River, looking East towards the lake, and then came into the Millenium Park with two fantastic pieces of art. The first by an Englishman Anish Kapoor, called the Cloud Gate (nicknamed ‘The Bean’ by locals). It’s a 110 ton shining, reflective circular shape. It’s very interactive and everyone who walks up to it has a smile on their face. You can walk through an arch under it or just see the buildings of the city in its’ reflection – it’s a visual feast. The second was two tall towers of glass blocks, that are also screens showing faces of Chicago residents, they face each other across a shallow pool of water, which creates further reflections in turn! There are waterfalls and spouts and the kids were running through it all going crazy, our nieces and nephews and friend’s kiddies would have loved it and so would Chris Taylor! We also saw a 925 ft bridge, its’ sides clad in squares of brushed steel panels, like a snake it wound its way over a normal freeway to another park, crazy but brilliant. To round all this off, we were lucky enough to be there in the park when a free concert was going on in the Jay Pritzker Pavillion. The Grant Park Orchestra, playing a freebie rendition of Mendelssohn’s Violin Concerto 64 in E minor (what else?). We sat enjoying this as it got darker and the sun set over the city, very tranquil. All in all, what started as a low expectation day – ended up with us thinking Chicago deserves more than just one day. Unfortunately, we are running out of time and with Canada, Boston, Washington and the Big Apple to get in before the flight home, we can’t stay. I’ll leave Soph to tell you about our fleeting visit to Canada on next blog, see y’all.
Good Blog!
I like Harley Davidson too.
It is classic motorcycle.