Today started with our noses.  Ted and I went outside to get into the car, looked at each other, and said, “Do you smell smoke?”  The air was more hazy than it’s been, so we concluded we were actually smelling the smoke from the Montana wildfires.  North and South Dakota are very windy, which probably helps the smoke move along.  We haven’t had a calm day since we arrived in South Dakota a week ago.  In fact, the standard Dakota joke is the tourist asking, “Does the wind always blow like this?” and the resident responding with either, “No, sometimes it’s worse” or “No, sometimes it blows from a different direction.”  (P.S.  We had a message from Kathy saying Kirksville had a strange color of air all day and a very red sunset from the Montana fires, so the westerly winds must have been unusually strong today.)

After enjoying the Enchanted Highway, we arrived in Medora and spent some time walking around this small North Dakota city.  Think of it as Branson, MO, with only one show (the Medora Musical), so on a much smaller scale.  The entire downtown area can be walked in 30 minutes, including some time for browsing in the stores.  Actual shopping would, of course, take longer.

There was live music on a street corner, and we were hungry for a snack, so we bought a scotcheroo (the ever-present Dakota treat) and enjoyed the show for awhile.

School has started, so it looks like an old folks crowd.  How can we possible qualify for that designation????  Can you picture Ted in suspenders?

We were assured that parking would be plentiful at the Musical, but the crowd would be large, so we should arrive at the venue no later than 5:00.  The Pitchfork Steak Fondue didn’t start until 5:30, so we had time to look around and to browse in the gift shop.

Perhaps souvenir outfits for us to purchase and wear in Missouri.

We are in the North Dakota Badlands. The dining area is to the left. This is about half the sidewalk for the dinner line, but the line extended far beyond the sidewalk’s end.

Promptly at 5:30, the Coal Diggers began playing music in the dining area and a PA announcement directed us to begin lining up as indicated by the painted footprints on the concrete.  We weren’t too far from the front of the line.  The line you see in the background of the photo below became increasingly crowded and extended beyond the building in the upper right of the picture.  As we ate, we watched the steadily moving line, and we didn’t see the end of it for an hour.

At this point, we were directed to form four lines for the buffet tables.

12-ounce pitchfork steaks, ready to be cooked.

The Coal Diggers kept us entertained, but had to leave early. They also perform in the Musical and had to move their instruments and change clothes.

Here’s Ted in one of the buffet lines.

The food was plentiful and delicious, and included dessert.

The Medora Musical is BIG in ND. This bride and her entire wedding party had the wedding reception at the Pitchfork Steak Fondue and the Medora Musical.

The Medora Musical is advertised as the “rootin’-tootinest, boot-scootinest show in all the west!”  It was very family-oriented and positive.  There was lots of patriotism and the theme was “we’re all in this together, so we need to do the right thing.”  It’s a timeless message.

Medora.  Just like Hollywood. The amphitheater is set on a bluff of the Badlands. You can see the seats in the right center of the picture. Three lo-o-o-ng escalators are needed to get the crowd down to the seating area. The escalators were reversed at the end of the show to take us back up.

The Coal Diggers are in the gazebo, now in their show costumes. The Medora Singers are onstage.  Note the live horses pulling the stagecoach and entering from the right.

Every few weeks, the Musical changes its featured act.  We saw a comedian, who was really funny.  Previous headliners this summer included a music/ circus/ juggling act, a comedian/ magician/ balloon artist, and an acrobatics group.  At one point in every show, all children 12 and under are invited to come onstage.  At that point, the cowboy in center stage (above) talked about how all of us can be superheroes, just by doing the right thing.  After the kids went back to their seats, the onstage players talked about the first time they’d been on this stage.  They were all under 12 and got hooked on the Musical.

Here are the kids onstage. They are striking their superhero poses.

Thanks to all the North Dakotans who asked if we were going to Medora and to my curiosity to find out why they cared, Ted and I had a wonderful dinner with 900 of our new friends and enjoyed a light-hearted outdoor performance on a beautiful summer evening.

Today, we headed for the southwestern corner of North Dakota to see the Enchanted Highway.  Even if it’s just a state road running through a rural area, the name “Enchanted Highway” creates a sense of anticipation, doesn’t it?  This kitschy treasure extends from Gladstone to Regent and showcases seven large metal sculptures placed beside the road.  The sculptures are placed at irregular distances miles apart and on both sides of the highway.  The placement of the sculptures and the distances between them contribute to the anticipation of discovering them one at a time while driving.  The excitement builds!   Miniatures of each sculpture are available at the gift shop in Regent.

Note:  There is apparently a lot of scrap metal in the Dakotas.  (See Porter Sculpture Park and the W’eel Turtle.)

Before arriving in Gladstone, we saw an enchanting (?) sculpture along I-94.

We’ve seen a lot of wheat and sunflowers, but not many dairy cattle.  This sculpture might have a deeper meaning.

Now, prepare to be enchanted.  Here we go:

The adventure begins with “Geese in Flight” near Gladstone.

“Deer Crossing.”  You’ll notice that each sculpture is very logically named.  There’s nothing mystical about these, and probably no deeper meaning to any of them.  The premise seems to be “Enjoy them as they are!”

“Grasshoppers”

“Fisherman’s Dream.”  To see the scale of these sculptures, notice the man in the red shirt standing on the right of the boat on the left side of the picture.

“Pheasants on the Prairie.”  Several families were keeping pace with us on the highway.  The kids all loved climbing on the sculptures.

“Tin Family”

Thus ends the Enchanted Highway.  Ted and I were both smiling as we continued on to our next destination:  the North Dakota attraction of Medora.

The title above is the city slogan (there are T-shirts for sale), as well as a clue to the pronunciation of the city’s name.  As we drove to Minot, we couldn’t help noticing the smoke from the Montana wildfires.  We’ve seen hazy skies, smog, and red sunsets from the smoke every day, but on some days–like today–the smoke is thicker.

We passed this smoke-shrouded factory along the way to Minot.

We spent about two hours at the Scandinavian Heritage Park in Minot.  (Ya, shore, ve vere dare.)  I thought the Wisconsin northern accent was strong, but it can’t compare to the folks in the Dakotas.  Dakotans all sound like the Canadian professional hockey players on TV.  They are also very friendly and like to talk.

We saw signs for ticket purchases, so we thought we needed tickets to this venue and went into the gift shop to purchase them.  Discussion with the extremely friendly and talkative staff provided the information that a major festival is coming up in about a week and tickets are required for some of the festival events, but not for the park.

While we were talking with one of the ladies, she asked if we’re going to Medora.  Everyone in North Dakota seems to want to know if we’re going to Medora.  No one ever asks if we’re going to Bismarck or to Rugby or to Fargo.  They only want to know if we’re going to Medora.  The answer is “yes.”  We are going to visit the North Dakota Badlands in Theodore Roosevelt National Park, and the park’s entrance is at Medora.  It seemed logical to respond to the repeated query by simply saying, “Yes, we are.”

We will be in Medora tomorrow, so I decided it was time to find out why so many people care if we go there.  Well, the chatty lady was eager to tell us that the music festival in Medora has a performance every summer night, and this is the last week of performances.  The show is brilliantly named the Medora Musical and includes a Pitchfork Steak Fondue.  It is apparently a Big Deal.  (Note:  What else could we do?  When we arrived at our hotel, we went online and bought tickets to the Pitchfork Steak Fondue and the Medora Musical.  Now we know where we’ll eat dinner and how we’ll spend tomorrow evening.)

But back to Minot.  The gift shop was quite interesting and the ladies wanted to make sure we took pictures of the trolls and the stuffed buffalo.

Scandinavians have a troll tradition.  We saw trolls everywhere on our Viking Homelands cruise last summer.  They supposedly bring good luck, up to a point.  I hope I haven’t reached that point.

This is one of several beautifully hand-carved doors in the gift shop.

After our lengthy conversations with the gift shop staff, Ted and I started our walk around the grounds.  There is a display of the flags of the five Scandinavian countries, as well as a granite map of the Nordic countries.  A walking path takes visitors to all the buildings, monuments, and statues in the park.

Here’s an overview of part of the grounds with the Gol Stave Church in the background.

This is the granite map, showing Iceland, Norway, Denmark, Sweden, and Finland (hard to see–it’s green in the upper center).

This is another section of the beautiful grounds.  The buildings are scattered throughout the park.

We were peeking into one of the reconstructed log houses when a man who’d been sitting outside the house joined us and started telling us all about the house.  (The North Dakota men apparently like to talk as much as the women.)  He was very informative and we learned a lot about the early pioneer way of life.

The bars across the ceiling joists in the upper left are for drying clothes in front of the fire in the winter.  Notice the rosemaling on the door panels.

Need to whip some cream? A handy modified pine (?) tree branch quickly rolled back and forth between your hands will do the trick.

The ironing mangle had an interesting story to go with it.  Part 1:  To iron, place your wrinkled garment on the wooden roller.  Then grasp the mangle with both hands–one on each end.  Exert pressure on the mangle while moving it back and forth across the roller to smooth out the wrinkles.  Part 2:  If a young man was courting a woman and was interested in marrying her, he made an elaborate mangle and left it on her doorstep.  If the mangle was gone the next time he walked by, he was in luck; if it was still on the doorstep, he needed to keep looking for a wife.

This is prettier than my steam iron, but I’ll stick with steam.

The Gol Stave Church is the focal point of the park.  It is built without a single nail, and everything about its design is symbolic.  I can’t remember it all, but the inside is built in three sections–the sanctuary, the nave, and the altar–to represent the Holy Trinity.  The four large posts supporting the roof represent the four Gospels. The front door is narrow so that only one person at a time can enter, thus making it impossible for the Devil to come into the church.  A covered porch surrounds the church and provided a place to leave rifles before entering the sanctuary.  There is a gatehouse beside the church, through which people enter for services.  You go into the church through the gatehouse for the first time at your baptism; you go out of the church through the gatehouse for the last time after your funeral.

The Gol Stave Church.  The gatehouse is on the left.

The Dala (Dalecarlian) horse is a traditional Swedish carved, painted statuette, mostly used as a toy for children.  Dala horses have distinguishing features common to the locality of the site where they are produced, but the most common and widespread one is painted bright red with a harness in white, green, yellow, and blue.  In modern times, the Dala horse has become a symbol of Sweden.

This Dala horse is 27 feet tall.  Ted is 6 feet tall.

It wouldn’t be a Scandinavian park without a statue of a Scandinavian hero.

Guess who.  Why, it’s Leif Erikson, the Norse explorer from Iceland!  He was the first known European to discover continental North America, and he did it nearly four centuries before Christopher Columbus.  Definitely worth a statue.

Before leaving the park and driving to our next destination, we naturally used the rest rooms.  There was something different in this ladies’ room.

Yes, a hair dryer. With no towels or hand dryer, I admit that I dried my hands with the hair dryer.

After visiting the International Peace Garden, we spent the night in Rugby, ND.  Rugby has the distinction of being the geographic center of North America.  That made it imperative that we plant ourselves in the middle.

It’s Ted and me–right in the middle of North America!

In case you’re wondering how far it is to Acapulco, Neah Bay, WA, the Arctic Circle, or Lubec, ME.

The funny part?  The geographic center of North America is in the parking lot of this Mexican restaurant.  It’s just to the left of the picture.

Rugby has a population of about 2,800.  We had lunch at what appeared to be a small local restaurant in this small city.

We thought this was it, but there were three more larger dining rooms behind the wall with the “Cafe” sign, plus a huge banquet hall running the length of the building behind the four dining rooms.  We arrived around 11:30.  At noon, people started pouring in and two dining rooms were in use by the time we left.  Where do people come from to fill all these dining rooms?

We heard another customer discussing what to order.  He said he wanted dinner (noon meal), not breakfast (served all day).  I haven’t heard of eating “breakfast, dinner, and supper” since we moved out of Wisconsin.

The “supper” menu on the whiteboard included chicken “hot dish”–another northern favorite.

As we drove out of town, we found Rugby kitsch.  Yup!   We’re definitely having a kitsch-y trip.

Wherever we go in North Dakota, there are bales in the ditches along the highways.  Do they actually harvest the ditches or do they just wait that long to cut the grass?

Our next destination was the International Peace Garden on the U.S./Canada border.  This 3.65-square-mile park gives North Dakota the designation of “The Peace Garden State.”  On the way to the Peace Garden, we had to make a brief stop in Dunseith, ND.

Yes, the kitsch keeps a-coming on this trip.  This is the W’eel Turtle, made of over 2,000 steel wheel rims welded together.  It sits on the Turtle Mountain Plateau (a larger area than its resting place here) and is the world’s largest man-made turtle.  Kitsch, for sure!

After that enlightening experience, we headed for the Peace Garden.  The Peace Garden is not part of any country and lies between North Dakota and Manitoba.  Visitors from either country can enter the park without restriction; however, it is necessary to go through immigration procedures to return to or to visit either the U.S. or Canada.  Of course, it wasn’t that simple.  North Dakota is one of the states that has two seasons:  winter and road construction.

Ten miles from the Peace Garden, we had the pleasure of watching this guy for 35 minutes while waiting for the escort vehicle.  North Dakota is flat.

Four or five miles closer to the Peace Garden, we spent about 20 minutes watching this more creative guy (sideways sign) while we waited for the second escort vehicle.

At the entrance to the Peace Garden, there is a plaque mounted on the cairn between the flags.  It reads:  “To God in his glory, we two nations dedicate this garden, and pledge ourselves that as long as men shall live, we will not take up arms against one another.”  This is how world peace begins.

Just inside the garden are seven peace posts, each of which says “May peace prevail on earth.”  Each post is inscribed in a different language.

A little farther into the park is a garden with a sculpture of a peace dove.

Over 150,000 flowers are planted in the garden each year.

More flowers on the grounds.

Ted and I had a quiet, peaceful walk through the park, with its flowers, water features, and symbols of peace.

A 14-bell carillon chimes the quarter hours in beautiful tones.

The peace chapel is at the far end of the park (about a mile from the entrance).

The chapel is very reverent and truly brings the visitor a sense of peace.  The inside perimeter walls are inscribed with notable quotes about peace.

This is one of the inscriptions from a chapel wall.

Plutarch lived c. AD 46-120.  Unfortunately, his words are still true.

Some of the building remains of the World Trade Center attacks of September 11, 2001 have been placed in the garden as a memorial to that tragedy.

Ted and I felt such peace in this garden.  I wonder if world peace could become a reality if everyone in the world regularly visited a place like this.

P.S.  More than two weeks after visiting the International Peace Garden, we received a letter and a season pass to the garden in the mail.

Just in case we go back to the Peace Garden before the end of the year.  The pass expires December 31, 2017.

Yes, Bismarck provided so much fun for Ted and me, I have to tell the story in three parts!

Following the North Dakota Heritage Museum and the State Capitol, Ted and I thought a river cruise would give us a chance to rest our feet.  We bought tickets for a two-hour cruise on the Missouri River.  (Where Lewis and Clark sailed.)  We were right:  the weather was beautiful, the crowd was in a good mood, and cruising up and down a pretty stretch of river was very relaxing.

Here’s our boat.  Gotta love the fake paddle wheel on the side.  The cruise was (surprisingly, to us) sold out.

Here’s the crowd on the lower (but open) deck.

The girl sitting across from us had glitzy shoes.

Two North Dakotans relaxing on the river in their kayaks.

Who doesn’t want a boat with a slide that lets you splash into the river?

We’re having so much fun on this vacation.  (And we’re getting better at selfies.)

We had a wonderful time in Bismarck and finished the day with a delicious dinner at Mackenzie’s.

It was going on 9:00, so most people were finished eating.  The patio seating was tempting, but the air was cooling rapidly after the late northern sunset.

The Dakotas apparently consider themselves to be Western, and the restaurant decor supports that concept.

More Midwestern adventures are coming tomorrow, I’m sure.

Fortified by our shared scotcheroo at the Heritage Museum, Ted and I crossed the street from the museum to the State Capitol.  This is one of four State Capitols that does not have a dome.  Can you name the other three?  The answer is at the end of this post.

Look, Ma–no dome!  The building houses all state offices and the state supreme court. Dome-free capitols provide a far more efficient use of space than domed buildings.  In my opinion, it’s not that North Dakota is short of space–it’s that Scandinavians tend to be frugal.

We were in time for the guided tour.  Our guide was passionate about architecture and made the tour very interesting.

The Capitol elevator doors (four sets) present a pictorial history of North Dakota.

Not much was being done in either house of the legislature; their work for 2017 is long finished.  ND’s legislature meets biennially–and efficiently–in odd years.

The Monkey Room in the Capitol is named for the appearance of its California walnut wall panels.  The California walnut tree is now listed as seriously endangered, so it is very rare. What do you see in this section of the wood?  (My apologies for the reflection–the wood was highly varnished.)

The tour took us to the top floor of the Capitol with this view of the front grounds.  An outdoor deck circles the top floor and used to be open to the public.  Sometimes kids would throw snowballs from the top.  When someone spoiled the fun and changed to dropping rocks, the deck was closed.

Here’s another view from the top floor.  The building with the white tower (right center) is the Catholic church we saw from Fort Lincoln.  The haze in the sky is from the Montana wildfires.  The Missouri River flows through Bismarck.  Lewis and Clark were here.

The ground floor of the Capitol has a North Dakota hall of fame.  It’s a given that Lawrence Welk is included.  My dad used to say, “People laugh at Lawrence, and Lawrence laughs all the way to the bank.”

This picture is in memory of Ted’s dad, who I think owned and read every book written by Louis L’Amour, a North Dakota native.

Could you name the dome-free State Capitols?  They are:  Bismarck, ND; Lincoln, NE; Baton Rouge, LA; and Tallahassee, FL.

Unlike South Dakota’s capital city which is spelled Pierre and pronounced Peer, North Dakota’s capital city is spelled Bismarck and is pronounced Bismarck.  What a sensible state North Dakota is!

We started the day with a visit to the North Dakota Heritage Center and State Museum, the state’s official history museum.  According to the publicity, it has been called the “Smithsonian of the plains.”  We spent three very enjoyable hours in the building, looking and learning.

This is the front entrance to the museum.  It’s called the Northern Lights room.

It took us awhile to figure out where the quiet talking originated.  Speakers above the displays (arrow) are activated when visitors stand beneath them. The sound is loud enough to be heard at the exhibit and quiet enough not to disturb those listening at the next speaker.

This is a bull boat.  It’s made of willow branches and covered with buffalo hides.  The hair on the hides keeps the boat from spinning.  It’s about 4 feet in diameter and weighs about 30 pounds.

My sewing and hand-working skills always make me marvel at beautiful beadwork like this.

The museum wasn’t crowded, and there were no kids in line (they were presumably in school), so Ted and I played with the magnetic tiles and designed a quilt square and a pipe bag.  I bet you can guess which of us made each of these.

This was my favorite display.  The pictures below are three of the stories I found especially interesting in this display.

Before leaving the museum, we stopped at the snack bar.  Lo, and behold!  They had scotcheroos here too!  We shared one large scotcheroo.

The Standing Rock Native American Scenic Byway ends at Mandan, ND near Fort Lincoln, so we planned a visit to Abraham Lincoln State Park.  The park includes the Fort Lincoln historic site.  Within the park, there is a grave marker for Sitting Bull, but we knew he is really buried near Mobridge, SD, so we didn’t seek out the marker.  We took a guided tour of Custer’s house (yes, that Custer).  Lt. Col. George A. Custer arrived at Fort Lincoln in the fall of 1873 as the leader of six companies of the 7th Cavalry.

Custer’s house was very nice and homey.  That’s Ted and the tour guide on the porch.  We were the only two people on this very personal tour.

The parlor (foreground) is just to the left of the front door and opens into the dining room (the bow window in the above picture) and then into the kitchen.

One of the guest bedrooms.  There were several guest rooms and bathrooms for the Custers’ visitors to the frontier.

After the house tour, we had just enough time to scurry across the fort grounds to the Mandan On-A-Slant Village for a tour of that area.  It is called On-A-Slant because it is located on a slope beside the Missouri River.  The historically indigenous Mandan people of the area built this village, which existed as early as 1575.  The Mandan tribe was not nomadic, so they built large, permanent earth lodge homes.  The nearby city of Mandan, ND is named for this tribe and is populated by present-day Mandans.

Some of the Mandan earth homes in the village.  Multi-generational families lived in these roomy homes.   Fifteen people in a dwelling was not unusual.

One of the beds that circled the interior of the home.  The elderly and the sick slept on these beds; others slept on the floor.

The fire was in the center of the home.  An opening in the roof allowed smoke to leave the building.  The doorway (dark space on the left) made two turns before entering this room, helping to keep the cold or hot weather outside.

After the tours, we walked around the fort grounds.  The fort sits on a hill, so the views are wonderful.  This was good for defense in the 1800s; now it provides beautiful vistas for tourists.

This was one of the soldiers’ barracks.  The commanding officer had a separate room of his own at the far end of this room.

The Missouri River borders the fort on the east.  (Naturally, Lewis and Clark were here.)

This is one of the lookout towers.  Of course, we climbed the stairs/ladders to the top to enjoy the views.

Here’s a view of Bismarck (22 miles away) from near the lookout tower.  The tallest building (right center) is the state capitol.  The building with the narrow white tower in front of the capitol is a Catholic church.

We’re nearly 20 miles into North Dakota.  Woo-ee!  We need to go deeper into this previously unexplored (by us) state, so we left Fort Lincoln and headed for Bismarck.

While we were planning today’s activities, Ted and I learned last evening that our motel is within minutes of Sitting Bull’s grave.  We decided to visit the site.  It’s about two miles outside of Mobridge, SD on the Standing Rock Reservation.

Sitting Bull was shot by a Standing Rock policeman in 1890 near Fort Yates, ND and was buried at the Fort.  In 1953, his Lakota family exhumed what were believed to be his remains and buried them at his birthplace near Mobridge.  Fort Yates has a grave marker for Sitting Bull, but he is actually buried in the Mobridge area.

This is the monument at Sitting Bull’s gravesite.  People still leave things at the monument.

This is Sitting Bull’s monument from behind, showing how it overlooks the Missouri River.

Sakakawea is buried in Wyoming, where she died, but there is a monument to her near Sitting Bull’s grave.  We were quickly informed by local people that her name is properly Sakakawea, not Sacajawea, as we learned in school.  Sa-ka’-ka-way’-ah is said to be a more accurate pronunciation of her name.  She is recognized as the most remarkable Native American woman in history.

This is the monument to Sakakawea.

From Mobridge, we headed for Fort Yates to see the Standing Rock monument.  On the way, an exciting thing happened:  We entered North Dakota, one of three states we haven’t visited.

We made it!

It looks a lot like South Dakota.

After taking a moment to appreciate our arrival in North Dakota, we continued on our way to Fort Yates and Standing Rock.  We expected Standing Rock to be a tall pillar of rock standing on the bank of the Missouri River.  What we found was a large rock, mounted on a deteriorating structure in a parking lot.  Stories about the rock say it is a mother and an infant who were turned to stone.  The rock is held sacred by the Dakota/Lakota people.

From a certain angle (this one?) Standing Rock is supposed to show a likeness of the mother and infant who were turned to stone.

Fort Yates is a very small town (about as big as Hingham was when I was a child).  It is located on the Standing Rock Sioux Reservation and is populated by Native Americans.  We stopped for lunch at a restaurant called The Rock and were the only white people–and probably the only non-residents–eating there.  The food was very good and the people were very friendly.

Here’s the dining room of the restaurant.  Only the far right corner table is not in the picture.

There was a sign on the wall with Sioux words on it.  I asked the manager what it meant.

This is pronounced “m-nee’ wee-chon’-ni” and means “water is life.”

After lunch, Ted and I started our journey down the Standing Rock Native American Scenic Byway on our way to Mandan, where the byway ends.

My online research for things to do in Pierre, SD included the information that the name of the city is pronounced “Peer.”  When we stopped for gas in “Peer,” I asked the station owner, a native of Pierre, if this is true.  He told me the first time he ever heard the city called “Pee-air” was on an episode of Cheers and “that just sounded weird!”

State Capitol.  The big attraction in Pierre is, of course, the State Capitol, so that’s where we headed.

It looks similar (domed) to 46 other State Capitol buildings.  Do you know where the four undomed State Capitols are?

We were surprised to find no security for entering the building.  Zilch!  We just walked in and walked around to our hearts’ content.  Like all State Capitols, it’s a beautiful building.

Legislators have it pretty good in South Dakota.  They convene each year on the second Tuesday of January and meet for 35 working days in even-numbered years and for 40 working days in odd-numbered years.  In recent years, they have completed their work in 38 days each year.

The 38 working days for this year are over, so the houses are empty until next January.

Soldiers’ memorial.    On the Pierre State Capitol grounds, there is a memorial to fallen soldiers of all six branches of service (Army, Navy, Air Force, Marines, Coast Guard, and Merchant Marine).  The fountain in the memorial is fed by the natural artesian lake behind it.  The water is 92 degrees, so it never freezes in the lake or in the fountain.  The warm water is also used to heat the Capitol.  The water in the fountain used to bring natural gas to the surface, causing the water to burn constantly and making this a “flaming fountain,” but now it’s just water, no fire.  (There are old videos of the flaming fountain on YouTube.)

That’s the artesian lake in the picture.  The soldiers are life-sized and, from a distance, we thought they were live people until we noticed they never moved.  The former flaming fountain is in the foreground.

From the lake end of the memorial, you can see the cascading water flowing from the fountain toward the lake.

Before leaving the city, we went to LaFlamboise Island for a pretty view of Pierre.  The island is in the Missouri River and includes a park and a boat launch.  Lewis and Clark were here.

Here’s Ted, admiring Pierre.

Oahe Dam.  When Oahe (oh-ah’-hee) Dam was built on the Missouri River just north of Pierre in 1948, it was the largest rolled-earth dam in the world.  The reservoir behind the dam–Lake Oahe–is one of the longest man-made lakes in the world.  It’s 231 miles long and goes from one state capital to another:  from Pierre, SD to Bismarck, ND.

Oahe is a either a Nakota or a Dakota (no one knows for sure) word meaning “a firm place to stand.”  A good, solid name for a dam.

The sign affirms we were in the right place to see the dam.

Seven intake ducts in Lake Oahe direct water under the earthen dam.

Seven tailraces release the water from the intake ducts downstream into the river.  The tailraces are less visible than at some other dams because the water reaches them by passing under the earthen dam.

A portion of Lake Oahe.

This mission building was a church and a school. It would have been flooded by Lake Oahe, but money was raised to move it and save it for its historical value.

Pierre was fun to visit.  Now we have to remember to always pronounce it “Peer.”

Flat.  That describes what we’ve seen of South Dakota so far.  It makes Illinois look like a beginner in terms of flat.  I’ve never seen the horizon so far away in every direction.  A 360-degree turn presents a lot of sky all the way around.

Sunflowers and corn are everywhere.

South Dakota is truly a breadbasket.  In one area, I lost count of how many farms had 20-30 huge silos.  The smaller farms had 6-8 smaller silos.

Smaller breadbasket silos.

Our morning drive westward on I-90 presented almost as many Al’s Oasis signs as Wall Drug signs.  Since we were passing Al’s Oasis, we decided to take a break to visit this attraction.  It is obviously a “destination,” since a tour bus arrived at the same time we did.  The picture below shows about half of the Oasis, which is a long strip of stores.  They are all connected by a single indoor hallway for easy access.

The sign and the arrow told us this is the place.

Part of the throughway between Al’s stores.

Lunchtime arrived and the pickings were slim in this rural state.  We chose Pizza Ranch.  It turned out to be similar to Pizza Hut, but with a Western theme and with an extremely friendly and accommodating staff.

Pizza Ranch is a chain, but we didn’t learn that until we saw more of them.

A ranch requires Western decor.  It’s hard to see, but the buffet sign has a picture of a rodeo rider on a bucking bronco.

We spent our afternoon in Pierre (separate post) and ended today’s drive in Mobridge, SD, a very small town on the bank of the Missouri River.  Mobridge attracts fishermen and hunters.  The pheasant is not only the state bird of SD, it is the most popular for hunting and supports the SD economy with hunters from all over in the fall. Our motel room included some rags and the information that no game should be cleaned in our room.  Thank heavens!

We ended our drive with dinner in Mobridge, SD and shared the dining room with Imo, an 11-year-old Pacu fish.  He’s related to the piranha, but his vegetarian diet keeps him calm.

Ted and I spent a night in Mitchell, SD, so visiting the kitschy Corn Palace was a given.  What luck!  We were in time for the city celebration of the newly redecorated Corn Palace.

I didn’t know what to expect, but I found out the Corn Palace is a venue for concerts and other community events.  Every year, the Corn Palace is redecorated with a different theme, using yellow, red, blue, calico, and other colors of corn, plus bundles of oats, flax, and sour dockweed, all held together with over 200,000 nails.  Previous decoration themes included South Dakota industries, Indian ceremonies and games, the Space Age, and Mother Goose rhymes.  This year’s theme is rock and roll legends.

The Corn Palace facade.

A close-up of Willie Nelson to show the decorating detail.

A partial view of the decorated south side of the Corn Palace.

The King made the Corn Palace!

Corn cob-themed pillars in the lobby.

Huey Lewis was playing a concert in the Corn Palace.  Huey is original, but the “News-boys” are younger replacements.  The sound was still good.

Main Street in front of the Corn Palace hosted a five-day street festival to celebrate the new Palace decorations.

I wonder how many people know that there is a sculpture park in Montrose, SD just south of I-90.  Well, according to the guest book, at least a dozen people a day know about the Porter Sculpture Park.  There are more than fifty sculptures in the park, all made of scrap metal.  Some are low (three or four feet tall), but most are at least ten feet tall.  Interspersed with the definitely kitschy sculptures are poems composed by the artist-in-residence, who apparently spends his day sitting in a toolshed on the property while pondering new sculptures and poems.  The entire metal array is arranged in a field (watch out for dried cow pies and jumping grasshoppers).  The poems are actually pretty good and provide philosophical insights about the individual sculptures.

Yellow stick man greeted us as we entered the park.

A blue snake.  With a wing?

Sledding girl going down an apparently very steep hill.

Dancers looking carefree as they dance around an odd animal (a giant seated grasshopper?) in the field.

Plants that bloom fish instead of flowers.

A hammer pulling a nail (see the nail in the claw).

A fly holding a fly swatter.

Titled “Magic Dragon.”  (Puff?)  The artist told us people like to get engaged under the dragon.  Why?

Oversized flowers in an oversized pot standing on the SD prairie.

“The Scream”?  This one must be the birds’ favorite.  Check out the white streaks.

Little Miss Muffet and the spider that frightened her.

This bull is over 60 feet tall and is the signature piece.  It’s the single piece that can be seen from I-90 to tempt visitors.

This was my favorite, but the sharp object (a thorn?) stabbing the palm of the hand is a little off-putting.

Vermillion, SD is the home of the National Music Museum.  The New York Times described it as “one of the largest and most important collections of historical instruments in the world, whose galleries teem with masterpieces.”  We saw countless beautiful and unique musical instruments, narrowed down to a very few pictures below of the ones we enjoyed the most.

If you have a broken leg, but need to make music.

A nickelodeon with stained glass panels.

Decorated pipes on a pipe organ.

A guitar neck with historic Parisian scenes between the frets.

Eddie Peabody’s lavishly decorated banjo.

The trumpet specially designed for the Beatles’ “Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band” movie.

And finally, . . .

It’s South Dakota.  A music collection wouldn’t be complete without Lawrence Welk and Myron Floren.

Vermilion (less commonly vermillion)–A vivid reddish-orange color; a brilliant red or scarlet pigment.

–Merriam Webster/Wikipedia

Vermillion, SD, in the southeastern tip of the state, is a charming small town, and home to the main campus of the University of South Dakota.  The city has embraced its name.  The red/vermilion theme begins with the welcome sign which spells the city’s name in large, red letters.  Everywhere we looked, we saw red.

Red flowers are abundant, often accompanied by white flowers for contrast.

All the park benches and public trash cans are red, not to mention the USD flags around the campus.

There are red bike racks everywhere (there’s not a hill in the city).  This one included red bikes.

USD’s school colors are red and black.  The mascot is the scarlet tanager.  (Go figure!)

Another beautiful feature of Vermillion is its architecture, in private residences and on the USD campus.

This is one of the campus buildings.

This building on the campus looked like a dormitory.  What a gorgeous place to live!

Speaking of red, South Dakota must be set on a layer of rose quartz.  There is plenty of rose quartz to use for buildings, stone benches, etc.  It’s not truly red/vermilion, but it’s a derivative of the city’s theme color.

Townspeople call this the “main building” on the campus. It is built of rose quartz.

Here’s a rose quartz bench on the USD campus.

Rose quartz is so plentiful, there is even enough to use it for road surfaces.  We saw rose-tinted blacktop, rose-colored interstate ramps, rosy highway shoulders, and even rosy roads as we traveled through the state.

These are some of the interesting things Ted and I saw and did on our MAT today.

We had Sunday brunch at Hy-Vee.  There are no Hy-Vee grocery stores in St. Louis, but I have heard from Kathy and from another friend of mine that people flock to Hy-Vee for the Sunday morning brunch.  Our hotel in Vermillion, SD was next door to a Hy-Vee store, so we walked over and asked a store employee about the brunch.  We learned that you can either have brunch ($8.99) or order from the menu (the deli is right beside the dining room).  Brunch is served from 6:00 am until 1:00 pm, but the best time to come is before 10:00 am.  The woman told us that the Christians come after church at 10:00, the Catholics come at 11:00, and the Lutherans come at 12:00.  The brunch was wonderful!  There were pancakes, waffles, a variety of breads to toast, two kinds of eggs, two kinds of breakfast potatoes, sausage, bacon, at least a dozen kinds of fruit and just as many kinds of bakery sweets, plus almost any kind of non-alcoholic beverage you can name.

This is the Christian crowd.  A stream of Catholics came in a little while after we were seated, and the Lutherans started appearing as we were leaving.

As we were paying for our brunch, I noticed scotcheroos for sale at the cash register.  I’ve never known anyone who made scotcheroos except my college roommate, who gave me the recipe.  They are one of our family favorites and whenever I serve them to people, I’m always asked for the recipe.

The size of these commercial scotcheroos makes one of my size at home worth $0.50.

We visited the National Music Museum in Vermillion after lunch.  I’m going to post pictures of some of the beautiful musical instruments we saw in a separate blog, but I saw something familiar as we walked through one of the display rooms.

The front porch railing of my parents’ house had twisted iron posts like these.  My dad and my grandpa (a former blacksmith) heated the metal and twisted it themselves.  The porch railing at home had a twisted “S” attached in the center for our last name. 

We’re in South Dakota, so you know what that means.  Yes, Wall Drug!!!!  The signs appear with regularity along the interstates.  We saw the first one (“Wall Drug or Bust”) just north of Vermillion, SD.  Wall Drug qualifies as pure South Dakota kitsch.

Too bad it’s 150 miles out of our way; otherwise, we could have this signature South Dakota experience on our MAT.  We haven’t been to Wall Drug since our one and only visit in 1971.  Do you think it has changed much?

The next stop was the Porter Sculpture Park (also coming up in a separate blog).  From the park, there was a beautiful view of South Dakota.

You can see the clouds from the thunderstorms that are building over north central Iowa.

Farther down the highway, we stopped at a rest area.  A sign informed us that South Dakota celebrates its history at its rest areas.  The concrete tipi is a tribute to the native people of South Dakota.  It doesn’t show in the picture, but at the feet of the tipi posts are triangles that form a thunderbird.  The stone building is designed to be reminiscent of the South Dakota settlers’ sod houses.

There are floodlights around the tipi to light it at night.  It must be a beautiful sight from the highway after dark.

We closed out our day with a quick stop at Wal-Mart.  As we were leaving, we noticed a group of campers in a corner of the parking lot.  One of our friends told us that Wal-Mart allows people to park their campers in the parking lot overnight, but I’ve never actually seen one.  It was about 8:45 pm and there were a dozen campers settled in for the night.

Good-night, everyone.

More MAT adventures coming up tomorrow.  We’re having lots of fun.

The word loess comes from the German löβ, pronounced “luss.”  It is what the Germans call the silt deposits in the Rhine River valley, and means “loose” or “crumbly.”

The Loess Hills in western Iowa rise up along the Missouri River and are a product of the Illinoian and Wisconsinan glacial periods.  The silt particles of loess were formed by the grinding movement of glaciers on the rock underneath them, and were carried downstream by rivers.  When the river flow decreased (as in winter), exposed loess deposits dried up and were carried by the wind to be deposited in great, rolling drifts.  The drifts in western Iowa were later shaped by erosion to create the topography of the Loess Hills.  Loess itself is not rare, but loess deposits greater than 200 feet deep are found only in the Loess Hills of Iowa and in the Yellow River valley in China.  Even where loess is less deep, it is some of the richest soil in the world.  Most of Iowa is covered with loess.

The Loess Hills National Scenic Byway is 220 miles long with 15 additional excursion loops to access natural, historic, and recreational attractions in the area.  This network links the most spectacular scenic areas in the Loess Hills and provided a beautiful drive through western Iowa for Ted and me today.

The Loess Hills National Scenic Byway–an American treasure.

A view of the Loess Hills as we approached them.

Overlooking the Missouri River plain to the west of the Loess Hills.

A typical scene as we drove through the Loess Hills.

The top sign says “Caution: Minimum maintenance road.”  The bottom sign says “Level B service.  Enter at your own risk.”  The picture fails to capture how steep and narrow this road is.  Ted and I plan to drive several National Scenic Byways on our Midwest Adventure Trip (MAT).  The Loess Hills Byway was the first and it was so beautiful, we are looking forward to the others on our itinerary.

The first overnight stop on our Midwestern Adventure Trip (MAT) was Kirksville, where Ted and I spent the evening with Kathy and Annette.  The girls treated us to dinner and we had several hours to catch up on what’s new with each of us.  After all, we hadn’t been together since the eclipse two days ago.  Before settling in for our talk time, the girls took us to see a Kirksville home with many unusual yard ornaments.  The objects definitely qualify as kitsch–a developing theme of this vacation.

Can you see the spider in the lower right center?  There is also a praying mantis hidden in the bushes, and don’t miss the smiling face on the center tree trunk.  You can see smaller sculptures ahead of the bushes on the left.

Yes, those are jello molds and yes, they spin in the wind.

A carved wooden figure welcomes visitors at the front door.  Note that there are elves under the bench on the left.

The entire width of the back yard fence is lined with sculptures–also constructed of jello molds and also capable of spinning in the wind.

After this kitschy stop, we found more kitsch at the girls’ house.

Annette made this for an art sculpture project while attending Moberly Area Community College.  It now serves as a storage shed for the girls.

We are definitely viewing a different kind of scenery on this vacation.

kitsch—also called “cheesiness” or “tackiness.”  Applied to objects that appeal to popular or uncultivated taste because they are garish or overly sentimental.  These objects are considered by other people to be ugly, without style, false, or in poor taste, but are enjoyed or appreciated by still other people in an ironic or knowing way or because they are funny.

–Wikipedia

In search of adventure as we started our midwestern vacation, Ted and I stopped at a place we’ve driven past countless times.  Never before have we entered . . . Ozarkland!

Just as predicted from the outside, the building has some of nearly everything inside.  After marveling at the thousands of items on the first floor, we discovered there is a second floor with many thousand more items (not an exaggeration).

This is less than half of what’s available on the second floor.

And here are a few things from the well-stocked first floor.

Decorative hens and roosters for your home.

Route 66 themed items–even though Ozarkland is roughly 100 miles from Route 66.

Simple, declarative door mats.

Fireworks.  But don’t smoke in this area.  That could bring an end to the tourist wonder that is Ozarkland. It’s going to be a kitschy vacation.

There were a few things along the way on Ted’s and my Spring Break Road Trip that I found interesting, amusing, or at least worth a picture.

The Biltmore gift shop offered wall hangings with bits of wisdom.  Here are two of them.

. . . and we’re proud of it!

Never underestimate the power of new shoes.

The Cummer Museum in Jacksonville also offered gift shop-based advice.

Yes!  Groove like the King!  Forever!

On our way home, we stopped at a rest stop and couldn’t help overhearing a lady on her cell phone.  She was standing in the parking lot and giving an update to her listener.  “I’m not sure where I am.  I think I’m in Missouri.”  (She was.)  If she’d been in Mississippi, she would have had no doubt.  All the restrooms at the rest stops provide location information.

In case you’re wondering which state provided the bathroom you’re using.

The Blue Angels are garrisoned at the Naval Air Station in Pensacola.  When we pulled into a rest stop near Pensacola, we saw this in the parking lot.

Go, Navy!

The goal of the Spring Break Road Trip was to find warmer weather.  That didn’t happen until we got to Jupiter, FL.  Temperatures were in the mid- and upper 70s in Jupiter and in the Keys, but we finally hit the 80s in the Florida panhandle.

We had to travel 2,687.4 miles to get above 80 degrees.  The thermometer actually got up to 90, but I was zipping along on the interstate and it dropped before we reached a stopping point.

Now that we’re back in Missouri, it’s time for spring.  Twenty-eight days until we open the pool.

New Orleans was the last stop on Ted’s and my Spring Break Road Trip.  It’s been many years (1996?) since we’ve been to New Orleans and we were hungry for beignets.  We arrived in the city in the late afternoon and spent the evening walking around, enjoying the sights.  Yes, it was warm.

Our hotel was in the French Quarter and had a pretty courtyard.

The line to hear the Preservation Hall Jazz Band was a block long.  The sign above the door says “Preservation Hall,” in case you’re wondering.

It didn’t take long to find the Preservation Hall Jazz Band.  They were jivin’ in the street prior to their performance time in Preservation Hall.  (Drumming up business?)

The trombone player with the white hat is a PHJB member doing some impromptu jamming with the band in one of the bars on Bourbon Street.

It’s fun to walk up and down the streets of the French Quarter, listening to the live music coming out of so many open doorways.  We enjoyed that for awhile, but then got down to business:  beignets.  We’ve had beignets at Café du Monde on previous visits to New Orleans, but I don’t remember the Café being open 24 hours a day on our other trips.  Well, there’s such a demand for beignets that they are now available all day and all night.

This is the place–the home of the world-famous New Orleans beignets.  The open-sided outdoor seating was beautiful on this warm evening.

Two orders of beignets, please.  P.S. Don’t inhale before taking a bite.  The thick powdered sugar is a choking hazard.

Before heading back to the hotel and packing up for the drive home tomorrow, we went to the top of the levee and watched the Mississippi River flow by, then admired the night beauty of New Orleans.

It seems wrong that the river is higher than the city.  One year, we watched the Fourth of July fireworks from this levee.

The St. Louis Cathedral in Jackson Square was a beautiful evening sight.

In spite of the cold start we had, it was a wonderful Spring Break Road Trip.  The good times and the good memories are abundant, and a destination birthday was certainly a great way to celebrate.

After the Cardinals game, we drove to Key Largo.  I wish we’d have planned another day here.  It was warm and there were more things to do and more ways to relax at the resort than we’d known about.  Now we have an idea for a future spring break trip.

The weather was so nice, we spent the evening getting to know the resort and spending some time relaxing outside.  Then we found other things to do around the resort in the morning.

There was live music so we found a seat, ordered margaritas, and put ourselves into “island mode.”

I even got my margarita free.  Hahahahaha!

The conch (cahnk) shell is an icon of the Keys.

The resort pool was pretty in the sunshine, but more striking and romantic at night.

Island life at its best:  relaxing on a warm night in a hammock under the grass roof of a tiki hut beside the water.

Some of the resort property, complete with tiki huts.

Mmmmm!   Yet another way to relax while looking out at the water.

Where I would have spent a chunk of time if we’d stayed longer in Key Largo.  I wanted to swim out to the raft.

After lunch, it was time to board a glass-bottomed boat to seek out a coral reef in the Atlantic Ocean.

Here we go!

The water is beautiful green, turquoise, and blue.

Because of the type of water here, the coral is earth-toned in color.

We saw several sharks.

We returned through the “bowling alley”–an old, narrow, dredged channel marked by buoys.  It’s illegal to dredge in this area of water now because of the coral.

Mangrove roots are so dense that, over a hundred years, they collect enough sediment to form new islands.

We were in John Pennecamp Coral Reef State Park.  There were a lot of people enjoying the park waters.

Two years ago, Ted and I went to a Cardinals Spring Training game in Jupiter, FL.  We enjoyed it so much, we bought tickets to do it again this year on our Spring Break Road Trip.  Just like last time, it was sunny with a temperature in the mid-70s–a great day to sit outside and watch baseball.  We were hoping some flying objects would leave the field, and they did–twice.  Unfortunately, both were hit by the Mets and the Cards lost the game, 5-4.  It’s Spring Training, so no big deal; just being at the game was fun for us.

One of the things I like best about Spring Training games is that the stadium is much smaller than Busch Stadium.  There are only about 4,000 seats and no more than 20 rows.  We were in the eighth row behind home plate looking directly down the first base line.  We could see all the players’ faces and could even hear them talking.  I believe this is referred to as an “intimate” setting.  Whatever.  It’s more fun and more personal than watching from hundreds of feet away.

Here we are in cardinal red, ready to have a good time.

It wouldn’t be a Cards game without a full stadium and a sea of red shirts and hats.

Jhonny Peralto got one of the Cards’ hits.

Greg Garcia also got a hit.  He was safe at first.

The Mets had a sidearm pitcher.  He reminded me of Randy Johnson back in the day.

Tim Tebow, a former NFL player, decided he’d like to try playing baseball.  The Mets are giving him a chance.  He wasn’t spectacular, but he got a hit.  His jersey has a number (97), but no name because he doesn’t have a contract with the Mets yet.  If they keep him, will he get a new shirt, or will the team seamstress just add his name to this one?

Here’s Tim.

I can’t believe what good timing I had on this picture.  You can see the pitcher after releasing the ball, Matt Carpenter showing the bunt, the catcher in position, the umpire focused on the ball, the first baseman running into the infield to play the bunt, and the ball just in front of the bat.

Carpenter was out, but he advanced the runner.

It was a good game and fun in the sun.  We’ll have to do this again.

It’s not my imagination that it’s been surprisingly cold on Ted’s and my Spring Break Road Trip.  On Wednesday night while we were there, Jacksonville tied a record low temperature of 28 degrees.  The record was set in 1871–146 years ago!  Today, however, the car thermometer hit 73 degrees on our way to Jupiter.  We walked around the area near our hotel without jackets and ate dinner outside without jackets.  After eight days of travel, we have reached Southern Spring at last!

Our hotel is handy to the stadium for tomorrow’s Cardinals/Mets spring training game.

The hotel is the green building on the left; the stadium is the red brick on the right.  Yes, we’ll have to walk all the way across the street.

We arrived early enough to walk around in the warm weather for awhile before dinner, so we checked out the stadium and the nearby restaurant/shopping area.  The Cardinals and the Marlins share this stadium for spring training.  We talked to a resident of Jupiter who told us that when the Marlins play in the stadium, parking is plentiful, but when the Cardinals play, parking is hard to find.  Dedicated Cardinals fans fill the 4,000-seat stadium.

Here’s the main gate to enter Roger Dean Stadium.

We’re hoping the Cardinals’ batters will send some flying objects out of the field during tomorrow’s game.

Today is St. Patrick’s Day and the Marlins had a ball game, so there were lots of people in the area.  Many of them were in green St. Patrick’s Day t-shirts.  One street was obviously going to be the party street tonight.  There were games set up, sidewalk vendors, live bands, and lots of restaurants and bars.  There were also many policemen–I assume to handle the D&D’s that are likely this evening.  Families with younger children settled on blankets and in lawn chairs in the amphitheater area, leaving the party street to the party people.

The party street with St. Patrick’s Day revelers.  It was still early, but it was already very noisy and getting very crowded.

The family fun area, where the boisterous voices of green beer drinkers were replaced with the squeals of younger children.

When we decided it was time to eat, we selected a restaurant on a street filled with more “adult” diners than the party street restaurants and had some awesome bread, beef tips with fettucini, and peach melba for dessert.  Yum!

Our more sedate restaurant.  The empty table in the center was ours.

When we go to the game tomorrow, for the first time on our trip, we’re looking forward to wearing short-sleeved shirts and no jackets instead of long-sleeved shirts and fleece-lined jackets.  We’ve already unpacked the sunscreen.  Yes!!

We spent today in Jacksonville, FL (JAX) and we think/hope it was our last day of winter.  People in JAX have been telling us this is the coldest weather they’ve had all winter.  Well, thank you for sharing your cold weather with us!  We still needed warm clothing today, but it was sunny and pleasant outside–for late winter.  There’s another freeze warning out for tonight for JAX, but we are heading for Jupiter tomorrow and it better be warm!  Jupiter is just north of Miami, and that’s pretty far south for winter to visit.

We enjoyed our afternoon field trip to the Cummer Museum of Art and its gardens.  It’s rated as a gem by AAA, and we agreed.  We saw very nice artwork.

By the all-American sculptor, Remington, of course.  This piece is “Bronco.”

This is a picture of Mt. Washington in NH.  We were at the top of Mt. W. in October 1972.

This room displayed some of the modern art.  The photo at the left honors African Americans who struggled to achieve the right to serve in the military in WWII.  Notice the piles of old AM radios on the floor beneath that painting.

The portraits below were done by Andy Warhol.  They are:

Left to right, top row:  George Gershwin, Gertrude Stein, Franz Kafka, Louis Brandeis, and Golda Meir.  Left to right, bottom row:  Martin Buber, Albert Einstein, Sarah Bernhardt, Sigmund Freud, and the Marx Brothers.

No Campbell’s tomato soup can in sight.

The picture below is by Normal Rockwell.  I found the story behind it bittersweet.  The woman needs to go to the Mayo Clinic for some detailed tests, so she and her husband decide to treat the journey as a vacation.  They talk about it excitedly with their friends and finally make the trip.  The woman knows something is seriously wrong with her, but decides to spare her husband and keeps that knowledge to herself.  The husband finds out that his wife is seriously ill, and decides to keep that information to himself to spare her.  Shades of “The Gift of the Magi” by O. Henry.

This should probably be titled “True love.”

After viewing the works in the gallery, we went out to the gardens.  The azaleas were in full bloom and the designs of the gardens were beautiful to see and relaxing to walk through and enjoy.

The English garden.  Spanish moss is growing in the tree on the left.  The tree hasn’t leafed out yet–it’s been too cold!

The Italian garden.

This is a huge live oak tree.

And this is the live oak from the inside.  Live oaks are monstrous, majestic Southern trees.  I wonder how old this one is.

Between the museum and the gardens, we saw a wall decorated with fish sculptures.

After the Cummer Museum, we went to see Fort Caroline.  The short story is:  The Fort was originally established by the French, who hoped to develop the entire eastern Florida coast as a mercantile enterprise.  The Spanish came and massacred the French.  The French (not the dead ones) got mad and came back to massacre the Spanish.  After that, the Fort was abandoned.  My opinion:  This is a perfect illustration of the waste of wars.

There is written history of the existence of the fort, but no artifacts have been found.  The National Park Service has re-created a fort to provide a feeling for what things might have been like, but there are no claims of authenticity for the recreation.  Our tax dollars at work.

The fort is actually (and historically) triangular.  Speaking of no authenticity, it doesn’t look like any fort we’ve ever seen before and I doubt if it would provide much protection from any enemies.

The (non-authentic) cannon was aimed at the gate, not at the river.  I guess it kept enemies from getting in by land.  No gunnery was pointed at the river on the other side of the fort.  Definitely not authentic.

The farther south we go, the colder the weather gets.  I don’t think that’s how it’s supposed to work.  Sure, it snowed in Nashville and Asheville, but the temperatures were in the 30s overnight and in the 40s during the day.  Not to mention that the latitude wasn’t too far south of St. Louis.  Hilton Head, on the other hand, is in southern South Carolina and not only was it cool while we were there yesterday, but today’s high temperature was five degrees cooler than yesterday’s and there’s a freeze warning out for tonight.  We’re in Jacksonville, Florida now, and there’s a hard freeze warning in tonight’s forecast with the low temperature expected to be in the mid-20s.  Luckily, we brought plenty of warm clothes with us, so we’re having fun anyway.

Today we visited Okefenokee Swamp Park in southern Georgia.  Of course it was cool (low 50s), but the sun was shining, so we were comfortable with jackets.  The swamp is over 500,000 acres in size, so we saw only a small part of it.  Due to drought conditions, there was no water in the swamp rivers in 2007 or in 2011, resulting in several large fires.  There was water today, however, so we were able to take a boat tour.

The front end of our boat as we traveled down the Suwannee River.  The Suwannee and St. Mary rivers drain Okefenokee Swamp into the Gulf of Mexico.

Mirror Lake. .ekaL rorriM

A pretty view under a walking trail bridge in the park.Our guide could name every plant in the swamp.  Now we can name some of them as well.

Several varieties of water lilies are native to Okefenokee Swamp.

This is soapweed.  Our guide made his hands wet, rubbed the weed vigorously in his palms and produced a generous soapy lather.

These are the smallest plants in the swamp.  Look at the next picture to see some individual plants.

Ted has dozens of the plants on his fingertip.

This plant is called “never wet.”  It actually repels water and never gets wet.  In a swamp!

The green clumps in this tree are mistletoe, a parasitic plant.

The bald cypress has very shallow roots, so it grows “knees” to help support itself. The knees–the knobby things growing upward–can grow as far as 100 yards from the tree’s trunk.We saw a half dozen alligators.  None of the alligators was out when we visited the Everglades two years ago, so this is the first time Ted and I have seen alligators in their natural habitat.  We learned that the females are much smaller than the males.  The male alligator will fight and eat any other male alligators he encounters in his territory so he can have all the female alligators for himself.  We had a glimpse of a baby alligator in the water, but it hid in the plants while our boat was nearby.  Our guide said if you try to grab a baby alligator with your hands, it will rapidly bite you a half dozen times before you can let go.  Ouch!

The bull alligator on the left is estimated to be 110 years old and is about 20 feet long. One of his many wives (on the right) is about 35 years old and 6-8 feet long.

Look carefully. There is an alligator in the water.At one point on our tour, we got off the boat and climbed a viewing tower.  I don’t know how high it was, but there were over 100 steps to the top and we were above the treetops.  We had a small tour group and took pictures of each other.

Ted and me in the viewing tower.

Here we are in the boat.We had a very nice afternoon and enjoyed visiting Okefenokee.  We also greatly enjoyed our time in the Everglades two years ago.  Are we weird to like swamps?

A few days ago, the forecast for today on Hilton Head Island predicted a high temperature in the low 60s with sunny skies.  The reality when today arrived was a high temperature in the mid-50s, cloudy with a few peeks of sunshine, and a 25-30 mph cold west wind.  In short, a blustery day.

It was too cold to swim or to sit on the beach, so we drove around the island to see what we could see.  A realtor’s sign told us we could own part of the foot.  We looked at the map and noticed that the island is shaped remarkably like a foot.  (So why is it named Hilton Head?)

The pink area is HH Island.

At the toe of the island is a lighthouse and a small specialty shopping district, so we took a look around.

The Harbourtown lighthouse.

The trees along the roads we traveled definitely had a Southern look.

Y’all come in and have some sweet tea now, y’heah?

After exploring the island, we went back to the hotel and explored the resort at which we are staying.  It has indoor and outdoor swimming pools.  Two women were sunbathing in swimsuits at the outdoor pool.  On a nearby chair, a man reading a book was bundled up in a jacket and a pool blanket.  Someone was wearing the wrong clothing.  Given the weather, methinks it was the two women.

The view from our hotel room balcony.

Part of the hotel’s beachside backyard.

We took a walk along the beach and then spent some time relaxing outside on the lee/beach side of the hotel protected from the cold west wind.

The beach was pretty deserted on this blustery day, but it was still a beach.  Yes!  We’re at the beach!

It’s a tough life.  I had to wear a jacket to be comfortable in a hammock at the beach.

Ted said this is the first time he’s ever been in a hammock.

Obligatory foot shot of Ted and me taking life easy and watching the ocean waves.

We finished the day with a delicious steak dinner and some very good wine at a nearby restaurant.  The restaurant was described as “swanky.”  The food and prices were swanky, but it’s a beach town filled with resort visitors, so diners were in very casual clothes.  Can a restaurant be “swanky” if the diners are wearing flip-flops and shorts or jeans?

Tomorrow we head farther south in our continuing search for warmer weather.

After clearing today’s snow off the car, we drove to the Biltmore Estate.  Guess what we saw on our way to the main house.

In honor of today’s three inches of snow.

The first sight of Biltmore is impressive to visitors as they enter through the gates at the end of the 2.5-mile driveway.

It’s not much (hah!) but it was home for George and Edith Vanderbilt.

We had lunch in the Stables Cafe, right next door to the main house.  It was really a stable.  The Vanderbilts kept their horses here in the 1890s.

Our table was in one of the stalls below the windows.  No horses were present.

It took six years to complete the major portion of the house, and many more years to finish everything.  It cost $5 million and has 175,000 square feet with 250 rooms and 65 fireplaces.  The fireplace in the library is 6 feet high and 10 feet wide.  About 60 rooms have been restored and 39 are included on the public tours.  Biltmore was a private residence with 125,000 acres of land (now 8,000 acres).  It was opened to the public in 1930 to help increase tourism in the area.  Biltmore is a working plantation with about 2,000 employees.  Some of the Vanderbilt family still live on the grounds.  It was designed by three major architects and was obviously the home of a very wealthy family (shipping and railroad money), but is not ostentatious.  It feels welcoming, warm, and comfortable.  Season passes are available to the public for $99 and allow people to picnic on the grounds and to use the estate trails for walking, hiking, running, and biking.  The season pass also allows admission to special events held at the estate.

We toured the house, the gardens, and Antler Hill Village.  Biltmore has its own winery (wine tasting and purchase available in Antler Village), greenhouses, and horticultural buildings.  We also saw horses, cattle, and fields of farm crops.  We spent nearly six hours at Biltmore and enjoyed every minute of the time.  It helped a lot that the weather was sunny with the temperature in the upper 40s.

This is the room I want to have–filled bookshelves all the way to the ceiling and all the way around the room, with a balcony to reach the upper shelves (see the railing).

Check out this ceiling.

This is a basement room called the Hallowe’en Room.  It has murals painted on all the walls.

The dining room table was designed to seat 64 people.  The room includes a pipe organ–for dinner music?

This is a part of the gardens where spring bulbs were beginning to bloom.

The grand staircase.  In one stairwell, Ted and I counted seven floors.

I must get a dress and headpiece like this.  Peacock feathers are so me!

Ted and I left home this morning, heading for the southeast U.S. and warm, non-wintery weather.  St. Louis had such an early spring this year–nine days above 70 degrees in February and four in March so far–we wondered why we felt we needed to get away.  We’re going to miss lots of the early spring blooms.  Then the forecast for next week came out:  it’s going to be unseasonably cold next week.  In fact, St. Louis will be having its coldest temperatures of the year while we are gone.  The low temperature one night is going to be in the teens, so all those early blooms are going to freeze.  Well, at least we’ll feel like we’re escaping from winter to bask in southern sunshine!  Or so we thought.

Today we drove to Nashville.  We’ve been here several times, so didn’t plan any activities beyond getting here.  We had the worst lunch we ever remember eating:  horrible sandwiches with toasted bread literally as hard as croutons at Applebee’s in Marion, IL.  Dinner was much better at a restaurant near our Nashville hotel.  It’s Friday night, so we had to wait about 20 minutes for a table, but it was worth it.

After dinner, we checked the forecast for Asheville, NC–tomorrow’s destination.  The plan was to spend some time driving and hiking in Great Smoky Mountains National Park one day and to visit the Biltmore Estate and historic Hendersonville the next day.  We might get Biltmore in, but the weather doesn’t look promising for doing anything in the national park.

Yes, Saturday and Sunday are our scheduled days in Asheville.  This is not an escape from winter weather!  We’re planning an early start for tomorrow so we can arrive in Asheville before the worst of the snow hits the area.