24 October 2016, Monday
Today is our last day of car camping for this trip, and a fine day it is! The forecast for our next few stops on the way home is for rain and somehow, the thought of tent camping in cold October rains is unappealing to both of us. We abandon plans to stop at Indiana Dunes National Lakeshore tomorrow. That will have to wait for a future trip. Our plans are to enjoy the bright sunshine today and get an early start eastward tomorrow. Home is just over 1000 miles away.
We cook up our last bacon-cheddar-potato pancake and then drive a short distance along the great Mississippi to Effigy Mounds National Monument. The people who created these mounds lived in this area 1400-750 years ago. The purpose of the mounds is unknown, although there are burials in some of them. The builders were ancestors of many modern day Native American bands who consider these sites sacred.
We walk a trail up a ridge to a series of conical mounds with a small bear effigy and a great bear effigy nearby. There were thousands of mounds throughout southern Wisconsin, southeastern Minnesota and eastern Iowa. Many of them were plowed under by European settlers. O and I attempt to photograph some of the mounds but it is difficult to get a proper photo as there is no way to see them from above. It is still quite an experience just to walk among them and contemplate what they may have meant to the people who built them.
As we walk we meet two women also taking photographs. One asks if we are married, and if so, have we been married very long. We reply “over 30 years.” She is very surprised. She thought perhaps we were newlyweds based on “how we were acting.” O and I are very puzzled. Is it because we are talking to each other and enjoying each other’s company?
We stop at an overlook and sit quietly while we eat lunch and enjoy the view. A bald eagle flies right overhead, near enough for us to hear the wind whistle through its wings. As we stand up to resume our hike, a stag bounds by. We return to the visitor center and from there drive to the south unit of the monument where, on another ridgetop, there is a line of “marching bears.” There are 10 bear effigies and three bird effigy mounds. By now we have walked almost seven miles. It is time to return to camp for our last car camping meal. As I am fetching warm water from the washroom with which to wash our dishes (true luxury) I see a notice posted. Washrooms are closing for the season tomorrow – another sign that it is time to head home for the winter.