22 October 2016, Saturday We leave Sioux Falls and drive for about an hour, arriving at Pipestone National Monument a bit after 10 am. It is a beautiful sunny morning. We begin at the visitor center. In the museum we learn that Native Americans have long considered this place sacred. Beneath thick layers of very hard 1.7 billion year old quartzite lies a thin layer of softer red pipestone, a
21 October 2016, Friday We leave Rapid City and continue our eastward trek across South Dakota. We resume our driving routine of switching off every 60 miles. This is especially important crossing South Dakota’s hypnotic flat brown landscape. One of our switch-offs is at a rest area where I-90 crosses the Missouri River. Here there is a stainless steel statue of a Native American woman with a blue diamond quilt.
20 October 2016, Thursday The night was pleasantly cold. We wake and decide to seek breakfast at nearby Bluebell Lodge so as not to freeze our fingers while cooking. We make the short drive over to the “chuck wagon,” disturbing a flock of wild turkeys in the parking lot, only to find the restaurant is closed. Hmmmmm. Strike two for the morning. Strike one was finding a bright green notice
19 October 2016, Wednesday We are off to Rapid City early this morning for Jazz’s oil change. Although we leave the park at 6:30 am hoping to get breakfast before our appointment, we do not account for the winding park roads and the low speed limit. There is no time for breakfast, so we arrive at Courtesy Subaru at 7:45 for our 8:30 appointment. No problem. They take Jazz in
18 October 2016, Tuesday Today O and I finish the left-over bacon-pecan pancakes for breakfast. Even though we divide them between us, we are both stuffed. After breakfast we drive north a little way and then east across Wyoming. Much of the day we go miles without seeing another car. The landscape is generally flat and open. In between herds of cattle we pass herds of pronghorn. I am looking
17 October 2016, Monday The alarm goes off at 6 am. It is still quite dark. The “super moon” is shining as we repack Jazz. I check the road reports before we leave. We decide to avoid Route 22 over the Tetons and instead drive a bit out of our way southward, to follow the Snake River Valley. Before heading up into the mountains we fortify ourselves with breakfast at
16 October 2016, Sunday Once again we wake to sunshine, but the forecast is for heavy rain tonight with snow in the higher elevations. After breakfast we stop to photograph the desert submarine and then drive to Craters of the Moon once again. We head to Broken Top and the Wilderness Trail where we begin our hike by walking the trail around Broken Top, formed when lava was sprayed into
15 October 2016, Saturday There is actually a bit of sunshine trying to peek through the ragged clouds this morning. After cobbling together some breakfast in our room we begin our drive to the national monument. We stop on the way out of town at a historic marker which notes that Arco, in 1955, was the first town in the US and in the free world to be lit by
14 October 2016, Friday The weather spirits are laughing at us. I view the weather map as we eat our complimentary breakfast at our hotel. Here we are, in the dry eastern part of Oregon, about to drive into the high desert plateau of southern Idaho, and the entire US is enjoying sunshine, all that is except the northwest which is experiencing blustery wet weather. O and I are concerned
13 October 2016, Sunday A steady light rain begins about 2 am. We sleep well, and by 7:15 our wet tent is packed and we are on the road. We stop at the town of Klamath Falls for breakfast at a restaurant called Nibbley’s. We have 385 miles to drive in order to get to Ontario, Oregon on the state’s eastern border with Idaho. We are expecting an ordinary drive