No coffee at hotel! Rushmore at 8 am Museum, trail walk. Drove to Sylvan lake Tunnels Needles Crazy Horse from highway. Deadwood - walked main street, shootout at 6.dinner at Harry's spaghetti Western.

We were now on our way to South Dakota and, at 6.40 AM, the roads were misty and empty. We stopped for breakfast at Burger King, got Connor a breakfast sandwich and Jordan and I were going to share an order of the 3 large pancakes for 0.89 cent deal. The server misunderstood me and we were presented with our 3 orders of 3 large pancakes! Oh well, they were a bargain. If only they looked like that!! It was another long days drive into South Dakota and our first sightseeing stop at Badlands National Park. This park was like the Grand Canyon with amazing views, walks and climbs and steep and winding roads. It was a smoking hot afternoon and the park had a nice energy with all the awestruck travelers. Crossing the border. Our adventurer! Rock layer detail After a few hours, we continued on to Rapid City and the M Star, our hotel for the next couple of nights. While unwinding we looked through our photos but upon ejection somehow the SD card ...

With the relief of our car being intact, we headed out early, crossing into Illinois on 1-80 then Iowa. Connor made a game of spotting state license plates and we passed such things as signs for the birthplace of Ronald Reagan in Tampico IL and the Hoover (vacuum king) historical museum in Iowa (no desire to stop at anything though!!). We did stop for lunch in the picturesque small town of Grinnell, Iowa, with its historic downtown and population of 9,000, 50s diner and old tyme gas station. Our resting place for the night was the Highland Court Motel in Fairmont, Minnesota, with tiny but quaint room and a most beautiful lake setting. We headed out for a lovely stroll around the lake and then enjoyed an evening meal at the single Chinese buffet in town. Lake trail Picturesque bridge We checked out early the following morning and I went to the front desk to get ice. I was greeted by a 7-year-old girl who informed me that "daddy was still  slaping ", ...

Day 1 - Michigan, Indiana Jordan has always loved the Black Hills of South Dakota so wanted to take us for a visit as we made our way across Canada to our new home. We hit the road at 7.30 am, grabbed coffee and began the drive to the border in Sarnia. 2.5 hours later, we crossed into Michigan where we had met 23 years before. The driving day was pretty straightforward and we stopped for the night at the Motel 6 in Hammond Indiana. This motel was the kind of place you wondered whether your car would be there in the morning and, if it was, would it be propped up on bricks?!! We had two visitors that evening - one was the housekeeper barging in and the other was a 'lady' mistakenly looking for a room that might be booked by the hour! We had a very pleasant dinner at the Amici Grill.

We got to spend time with everyone back in Burlington this summer. From the airport, we went straight to Helen's to find the house busy with Grade 8 Grad preparations. Elegant 13-year-old Lucy.  The first few days were busy with organizing back to Canada things ... and the inevitable problems! While using Helen's van to go to Service Canada for Health Cards and driving permits, out of nowhere, the drive shaft fell out of the van leaving us stranded and in need of a tow! We thought we had been rear-ended when this heavy metal piece hit the ground! Luckily, we had secured a temporary permit to drive our car so we had transportation to get Helen's car back on the road!  We also realized that our old Saturn was going to need too much work to make it roadworthy again so went in search of a new car. Frustration was setting in quickly as we remembered the stress-free environment we had left behind. Trish picked us up and we spent the day in the garden at th...