Epic Road Trip, Part 3

Day 9:  St. Malo, MB to Itasca State Park, MN, USA

We left Manitoba via highway 59 which took us to a border crossing in the middle of nowhere, between Tolstoi, MB and Lancaster, MN (I know we hadn’t heard of these places, either).

  

After learning we were from Alberta, the US border guards were curious why we were crossing at this out of the way place.  “Because I’m a Winnipegger,” Sandy proudly announced, “and I have just been visiting my brother.” After the usual questions regarding what we might be transporting across the border, we were asked our destination. “Ohio,” Sandy replied. The first agent went to the back of Boxy to read out her license plate number, and when he returned, he told us we could proceed.  “Wait!” called out the second agent.  Oh my god, what have we done? Are we about to be denied entry? “What’s in Ohio?,” he asked as if wondering what we could possibly be up to.  Sandy responded, “Going to visit my sister.” He just shook his head as though no one ever goes there and waved us through.  Two old girls just carrying on with our adventure.  

As we crossed the border, clouds rolled in and we said goodbye to the sun we had been enjoying up until then.

Our first stop in the US was Bemidji, Minnesota.  What’s so special about Bemidji, you ask? Well, Paul Bunyan, of course! Sandy loved the family holiday trips to the area the Williamson clan took when she was a kid. The statues of Paul, and his blue ox, Babe, were built in 1937 and still attract many visitors, including the two of us on a cool, rainy day.

Paul, Kate, Sandy, and Babe

About half an hour from Bemidji is Itasca State Park, the home of the head waters of the Mississippi River.  At the time of its disovery, explorers and government surveyors had difficulty identifying the true head waters of that mighty river.  If you have been to Minnesota, you can understand why. From my observations of the state, it seems to be nothing but lakes, ponds, rivers, streams, and forest.  In 1832, Henry Schoolcraft identified the lake that was the primary source of the Mississippi, and named it Lake Itasca, by combining the last four letters of veritas and the first two of caput, the Latin words meaning “true head.” 

We found a lovely camp spot, but had to eat inside Boxy while a pretty decent rain shower moved through. Fortunately, it stopped long enough for us to use all the firewood we bought on the way in, before it started raining again. 

Day 10:  Itasca State Park, MN to Spring Valley, WI

We got up bright and early the next morning to get to the headwaters before anyone else. 

Headwaters of the Mississippi River

As you can tell from the photo, it was a cool, misty morning.  Enjoy the video of me crossing the headwaters of the Mississippi. In my defense, the rocks were damp and slippery!

While walking back to our vehicle we had to cross a foot bridge. Crossing at the same time was a little turtle. When it got to the edge of the bridge, it reached out with one foot, but couldn’t feel anything there.  It then reached out with its other foot and still couldn’t feel anything. Finally, it reached out with both front feet, and seemed to think, “What the heck, I’m going for it!,” and over the edge it went, dropping about 10 feet down to the foliage below. Brave little thing. We showed its photo to an attendant at the tourist information booth who identified it as a baby snapping turtle. As cute as it was, apparently they can be rather nasty when they are older and much bigger. I guess they have earned their “snappng” name by their rather unsociable behavior!

Baby Snapping turtle 

Upon making our way out of Itasca State Park, we stopped to have a look at the Mississippi River as it starts its 2,552 mile journey to the Gulf Coast.

The Mississippi doesn’t look very
mighty at this point

Our destination this day was Minneapolis, Minnesota, where we hoped to do a bit of cycling  on some routes Sandy had researched before we left home. Unfortunately, the weather wasn’t on our side, so we dropped in to check out the Mall of America, built by the Ghermezians, the same family that built West Edmonton Mall in Edmonton.

Time for a little shopping

As we left the mall, heading to its twin city, St. Paul, it started to rain harder and harder. Wisely, Sandy decided to pull over into a parking lot to avoid driving in the downpour. Excellent decision! The rain started to pound down, and the wind rocked Boxy back and forth. Good thing we decided to abandon any thoughts of a bike ride that day!

We crossed into Wisconsin and made our way to a rustic campground, well off the beaten path, at Eau Galle Lake near Spring Valley.  Apparently, we were in Amish country, as evidenced by this sign.

The weather had been dreary all day, and the storm we had in St. Paul caused a number or trees and branches to come down in the campground. Again we had rain in the evening, but still managed a short session around the campfire after the rain stopped… and hoped there would be no big winds in the night to bring any timber down onto Boxy!

Boxy nestled in in the trees

  

Day 11:  Spring Valley, MN to Belvidere, IL

The warm temperatures, combined with overcast skies and drizzle, made it rather humid for the likes of us, so we just kept carrying on as we continued to abandoned thoughts of short bike rides.  The thing we noticed since we crossed the border was all the forests, lakes, ponds, and rivers. No wonder it’s humid!  And the crops, you ask? Absolutely no wheat or canola anywhere, but field after field of corn with the occasional field of soy beans. And why all the corn? One reason is to feed the dairy herds that produce the cheese the region is famous for.

Maybe this moose has had too much cheese! 

This day saw us cross in to Illinois to be met by this rather disturbing statistic.

The Illinois scenery remained much the same:  forest, lakes, corn fields, repeat.  Again, it was overcast with the heat and humidity beginning to be rather stifling. We found another campground that, once more, was off the beaten path. We had showers, did our laundry, and returned to Boxy to have our supper. In no time, we felt ready to head back to the showers; it was so humid, the moisture was condensing on our skin and our arms were soaking wet. Finally, it started to rain (again) and we thought that would ease the humidity situation.  

Boxy has a TV and DVD player, so we settled in to an evening of popcorn and a murder mystery. It began raining so hard, for a while we could not hear the TV over the pounding rain. After about half an hour, the rain eased off but continued through the night. Trust me, we are SOOOOO glad we decided to upgrade from out tent to Boxy!!!!

DVD in Boxy to escape the rain

Day 12:  Belvidere, IL to Dublin, OH

When we arose the morning of day 12, we almost wondered if we would be able to get out of the campground. The ground outside Boxy squished when we walked on it, it was so saturated with water, and there were huge puddles every where.

After the rain

Our original plan was to drive about a couple of hours west of Indianapolis and do some cycling. Again, the weather and the humidity was against us, so we just carried right on through Illinois and across Indiana.  We only stopped long enough for stretch breaks, short walks, and to find a Geocache in each state.

Once we hit Indianapolis, it was only just over 3 hours to the Columbus, Ohio area and Cathy's place in the suburb of Dublin, so we decided to have a quick supper and keep on going. I know I probably sound like a broken record, but here goes. The scenery was mostly forests, rivers, and corn fields. And the humidity was beginning to be almost unbearable.

As we passed through Dayton, the setting sun created some beautiful colours in the eastern (yes, I said eastern) sky. It looked like we would be getting yet more rain before we got to Dublin.

Eastern sky at sunset

We pulled up to Cathy’s house at 9:30 PM, safe, sound, tired, and a day early!  Cathy and her husband, Harry, invited us to stay and visit with them and their family for a few days. Here’s hoping the rain stops, the humidity settles, and we can get on our bikes for a few rides.

Stay tuned for Part 4 when we report on how all the family togetherness worked out!