Six Months Later

Well, I have had my journals and notes from the trip sitting on my deck since we got back, meaning to complete our travelogue.  I estimated I had about three postings left.  But the heck with it!  I'm simply going to share the balance of the experience in this blog post.

Journal entries:

9/20/16:  SD

9 AM and already road-weary and sun sensitive.  Heading to Wall Drug in Wall, SD.

9/21/16: Walgreen's in Sioux Falls for Rx (Rick).  Long, hot, boring day yesterday across South Dakota.  Today's goal?  The QC.

Later:  You can tell how far you've come when 150 miles doesn't seem like much. (143 miles to Albert Lea, MN.

Later still: Midwestern thunderstorm at Clear Lake.  Ahhhh!  It's not Iowa without a thunderstorm...look!  Black dirt.  Oh, yes, it's Iowa.

Charles City, IA: Got turned off and around because Rick had to stop! Big, ground-shaking thunder overhead.  Cool!

Brandon, IA: "Gas" off I-380, 1 mile.  Tiny town.  Cafe closed.  Gas?  No unleaded.  No credit or debit cards.  Really?

Dinner (Mexican) in Mount Vernon, Iowa.  Excellent margarita!

Our old house in Iowa--gardens destroyed and replace with lawn--disgusting!

Visit with Cat an Paul in Bettendorf.  All our kitties are gone now.

09/22/16:  Spent the night in the trailer in Fisherman's Corner in Hampton.  Feels like  home, in a way.  We spent so much time camping here that first summer in the RV! Thoughts on packing:  put files in boxes and sell cabinets on Craigslist.  So the next few days are

• Cleanup and organize
• Wedding stuff til Monday
• Friends
• Car
• Sales & packing

END OF JOURNAL

September 22nd was Thursday.  Thursday evening, we visited with Mary Ellen. Friday evening was the wedding party pedicure.  I had a very nice visit with everyone. Even Lisa was especially nice to me.  All my anxieties about being treated like an outcast dissipated.  It was wonderful.  Afterward, we all went to a Mexican restaurant for dinner and drank margaritas (again!).  Sarah handed out very special necklaces to her wedding party--gold-covered leaves from various trees, one for each person, each leaf representing that person's role in Sarah's life.  Absolutely beautiful and very moving.

Pedicure for the wedding party. My Mom in the foreground.

The bride is happy!

Lisa looking good

My first pedicure

 Saturday the 24th was the rehearsal.  Got to visit with Bob--a rare treat--we haven't seem him since our stop in Phoenix 3 years ago.  He was recently diagnosed with lung cancer but was preparing to battle it via chemotherapy, etc.

Honestly, now, six months later, I remember very little of Saturday.  I was exhausted--beyond exhausted and at Sarah's house, we could not park in the driveway.  Instead we had to park up the hill across the street and walk up and down her driveway (the equivalent of a three-story climb).  Even IN her house, much of the activity was downstairs, or down the hill even further near the creek.  I was in such pain doing all that walking and the climbing was nearly unbearable. I looked up the elevations:  The street is 701 ft., the house at about 670 ft., and the creek (where the wedding was actually performed) is at 636 ft.  That's about a 70 foot change in elevation for someone (two someones!) with bad backs and hips who cannot really even climb stairs anymore.  It was hard.

Then, my trusty Nikon camera died, never again to take photos.  So I took that as a sign from the Universe that I was supposed to participate more than observe and photograph.  I did a blessing, calling the four directions and our ancestors into the space in the yard where the wedding was going to be held.  Andromeda secretly filmed me, but I haven't seen the footage yet. 

Sunday was the actual wedding--the most beautiful wedding I've ever seen!  Every detail was tended to by Sarah-created and supervised by her and Travis.  Very extensive, tree-themed.  (We're still waiting for the wedding pictures.)

Monday morning we had the after-wedding breakfast at Sarah's where she and Travis opened wedding presents.  Almost as much fun as Christmas morning!  Visited with Jay and Sherry, spent some quality time with Bob.  As we were all preparing to leave, there was a lovely moment with Bob.  A hug, a tender farewell, he tells me with tears how much he has prayed that we find happiness! His lung cancer is stage 3, and this may be the last time I see him.  It was so beautiful and bittersweet.

And the love from Lisa was wonderfully surprising!  Amazing.  Patience and practicing good karma really does pay off in the long run.  Kelly was NOT at the wedding and Kip was distant and aloof.  I don't believe we even exchanged a single word.  What an ass.  Our daughter getting married and he can't even say a kind hello.  So sad.  He misses out on so much by being a dick.

The driveway being set up for the reception.  You can see the driveway hill in the back to the left.

Rick made it partway down the hill, but had to stop and rest on the way.  The creek is in the background to the right.

Sarah gifting me my leaf.

Lisa and Mom

Mary Ellen cutting up with Sarah--my baby girls all grown up!

September 27 was simply resting in the hotel, but not trouble-free as the Internet refused to work.  And I couldn't get Internet reception on my T-Mobile phone!  In the middle of the country, in the middle of a city, next to a airport and I can't get the internet!

The next week consisted of climbing up and down the stairs at the storage unit. lifting, dragging, pushing and sorting stuff.  We hired some help from the homeless shelter, but I had to follow them up and down the stairs to supervise.  We also had to sell our Ford Explorer and find another vehicle.  We finally managed to make an even trade for a 12 passenger van capable of towing our loaded trailer on October 2.

In the end, I was only able to empty one storage unit, but I condensed stuff and gave a lot of stuff to Goodwill, Salvation Army and DAV.

We did manage to visit Arlene in Clinton, and Rick visited with Hutch a couple of times, and Fritz helped us fix something on the vehicles.  

We were staying with a friend who lived out in Orion, but by the third or fourth day, it was apparent that it wasn't working out very well for us.  So we moved to a hotel near the airport instead.

Journal Entry:
Sad sunflowers mourn summer's passing, heads hanging, brown-leaf arms drooping.

We finally loaded the trailer on October 4.  Left the QCA the morning of the 5th, much to my relief, because all along, I had a great fear that we would get stranded in the Midwest!

I-280 W out of Rock Island, heading home.

We napped about 40 miles east of Des Moines in Victoa, IA. 67 degrees and sunny. I found a perfect butterfly lying on the ground.  This lovely little yellow butterfly, who has since been lost from the pages of my journal.








 

Lunch at I-80 truck stop.  Can't miss!

Our rig coming home (napping in Victoa).

By 6:21 PM, we were in Walnut, Iowa, eating dinner at Emma Jean's Restaurant.  The same place we at at three years ago on our first on the road with the RV.  Almost three years to the day.

Only 1,719 miles from home.

We stayed in a great hotel in Underwood, Iowa--the Underwood Hotel.  At least that's what it says in my journal--I have no memory of the place!

 In Walnut, we drove into the quaint town and got some lovely pictures.

An amazing Midwestern sky!

Rest area sculpture in Nebraska

On October 6th, I wrote "If you think Nebraska is dreary in the sunlight, try it in the rain." At one point, the rain was snowflakes."

These great "hanging" spiders for Halloween at a HyVee in Nebraska.

October 7th brought me closer to feeling right. My writer self came forth and wrote:

Nebraska in the rain.

I remember the rain lasted all across Nebraska.  Then as we neared the border, we could see a break in the clouds ahead. 

 

I told Rick, "See that line of light?  That's Wyoming!"  Sure enough just as we crossed the Wyoming border we had this magnificent angel-wing formation across the sunset, encouraging us westward to home.

We stayed that night in Wyoming, next to the Sapp Brothers coffee house.  I was thrilled to discover that in Wyoming, you can still smoke in restaurants!  (Can you say "Marlboro Country?")

Smoking after breakfast--indoors!

The hotel from the restaurant window. That's our trailer back there.

Looking at the mountains ahead!

 By the time you get to Cheyenne, you can see the Rockies, at last.  A great gradual uplift of land carries you, almost imperceptibly higher.  The nearby terrain, short grass prairie where only the ghosts of the buffalo roam.  Populated by martial rows of graceful windmills, their white wings stroking the sky, the golden yellow hills are peppered with black cattle.

To the south, the white teeth of an unnamed range of the Rockies grin at us from Colorado.  This is the true high plains, criss-crossed now with snow fences and power lines and the black tape of highways. The climb, so far, is gentle, like rising in a hot air balloon.  The crest ahead of us is blind, full of promise--what view awaits us?


Over it, you see larger hillocks studded with stones.  The the north a miles-long train moves in clacking uniformity.  The engine whines a bit, reminding us we are climbing, foreshadowing the passes ahead.

Stone cairns and glacial erratics become more frequent; a small herd of antelope graze in the morning sun.  Another few miles and the rocks become larger, the earlier stones mere crumbs to these chunks.  Stone people--stone spirits--begin to populate the landscape, in partnership with some hardy evergreens.  

We begin to pass rock walls, fractured by the earth processes that created them.  The walls become buttes, the rocks, boulders.

The hills are folded closer now, deep pleats that harbor small trees and shrubs.  I can feel the bones of ancient creatures lurking deep beneath the soil, awaiting the weathering that will inevitably reveal them.

A Jeep bumps dustily down a dirt road toward a copse of trees, a hunter perhaps, in pursuit of dinner or trophy, or a rancher out to count his cattle.

A turn to the north and we enter the higher hills, their sides sheared naked to make room for the interstate.

Then, suddenly, we are there--the Lincoln Monument at the summit, the highest point on both Interstate 80 and the Lincoln Highway. Three crows swoop and dive in greeting as we park and I visit the visitor's center.

View to the east at the highest point on I-80.

View to the north.

The hills now morph into mountains, wearing coats of trees, evergreens, high alpine.  And down we go, between high cliffs and I am home again--in the west!

Through the downward pass, we emerge around a curve to witness a vast valley with purple-blue mountains sporting cleaming white caps where clouds appear to be birthing. The Medicine Bow Mountains.

The gentle downslope delivers us to Laramie in the Laramie River Valley.   

My poet's voice has returned along with my desire to write.  The last nearly three weeks has been too stressful, too exhausting to leave me any energy for creativity.  But now, being back in the west I feel my energy rising, my creativity returning.

The vast and bright blue sky demands I don sunglasses and everything becomes  bathed in an amber glow.  Rick sings quietly--"On the Road Again"--he knows nearly all the words.  The first verse remarkably on key, but he soon drifts into two or three more.  I don't sing along for two reasons:  my voice is shot from talking over road noise, and I can't keep up with his drifting key changes.  

But I refrain from verbal comment.  He loves to sing and I love him and has a lovely timbre to his voice (if only he had a better ear!) and I think there may come a day when I am no longer able to hear my husband sing and so I savor the moment and let him be.

We skirt the mountains, moving northwest and the gentle climb begins again.  I am grateful to the unknown engineers of the Interstate for not subjecting us to steep grades. It is much less frightening than the Alt 14 through the Beartooth range of the Bighorn Mountains to the north!

Here in the remnants of the Laramie Valley, the few trees are donning their autumn colors, some shedding their leaves preparing to embrace winter with naked arms.  Patches of orange and yellow, red and chartreuse nestle in the leeward shelter of the hills.

 We climb a rise at the Carbon County line to behold a vista of windmills marching like hundreds of soldiers along the ridgelines. 

I can easily imagine Ice Age hunters pursuing mammoths on these grassy foothills.  What would they think of the wind farm and the highway?

Snow fences hem the foothills' feet blocking only snow, the snows of past and future.  Today the only snow visible is on the peaks.  More trees ablaze along the riparian cracks in the landscape.  the hills move closer together once more.

Perhaps the most wonderful thing about the West are the vistas, the incredible distances to which you can see.  

From the Beartooth heights, Rick remarked that you can practically see the curvature of the earth!

The snowy mountainsides are closer to us now; Elk Mountain wearing its veil of white.

We exit at Wagon Hound Road to a rest area with Elk Mountain views.  When we stop the engine, we can hear the wind singing--clear hoo-ing notes, continuous music moving into the 5-note pentatonic scale.  Is this how music was born?  Did our ancestors hear and imitate the sounds of the wind to make songs?

The northern end of the Snowy Range of the mountains, "where the high peaks end and the winds begin." Over another small peak and we can see what look like chalk cliffs.  Semi-mesas with sheer sides scoured clean revealing several million years of Earth's history to those who can discern such things.  

We cross the Medicine Bow River and climb again what seems a gentle slope but which makes the van engine complain at mile 204.

Now we have entered a desert.  Upthrusts of rock and formations resembling ancient ruins.  Nothing else but brown grass and scrub shrubs and another long train in the distance.  Almost makes me miss Nebraska!

To the north, the Great Divide Basin lies basking.  We cross the Continental Divide at 7,000 feet and enter Sweetwater County the next to the last county in Wyoming.

Mile 150: To our right in the far distance are the Wind River Mountains.  To our left Table Rock.  Elk graze all along the roadside, behind range fences, nearly invisible among the brown vegetation.  Tried to photograph them from the car, but failed--my "new" camera is far too slow.

This desert landscape may seem boring but I learned that the primary vegetation is sage--Mama Sage--and it provides food year-round for America's largest herds of antelope, as well as deer, muledeer and wild horses and burros.

 

Approximately 1,000 miles from home:  The land begins to fold up again into mountains or pre-mountains.  Evidence of mining, oil drilling and some isolated manufacturing dots the landscape.  A dirt road reveals why it is called the Red Desert.

Fractured layers of what appears to be shale top the hills like frosting.  The smokestacks in the distance belong to the Jim Bridger Power Plant.  We pass the Point of Rocks.  The speed limits rises to 80. Around a curve we confront straight-faced cliffs of granite.  Layers reveal the eons--tan, white, red, green, black.  

127 miles to Utah, elevation 1500 and falling.  To the south are the Aspen Mountains, denuded desert, but mountains nonetheless.  Rock Springs could be a city in Arizona or New Mexico, tucked into interesting hills and rocks.  I'm excitedly anticipating our first trip to Utah. At Green River we encounter towering bare rock cliffs.  Next stop:  Little America.

Okay, I guess I do need to make at least one more entry!  So here are more photos from the trip--at Little America and finally making the Utah border.