Tuesday, 7 August

Back on the road. This morning we took showers inside and Barb gave us breakfast. The fresh water was very low and the sewage tanks were almost full. We filled the fresh water from the house. Got underway about 10:30.

Spent a large part of the day working our way down to the southwest corner of Minnesota. Some rolling country, but mostly low hills and huge fields. Corn and soybeans from horizon to horizon. We did run across a couple of the "10,000 lakes" (more like 20,000). This one has a French name, Lac qui Parle. but most of the area is huge fields and small towns.




We needed to put together a series of back roads, nothing direct to where we wanted to go. We needed to follow MN-40 to get to MN-75. Before we got there we spotted a sign announcing "Detour South 75." So Gene turned on that and followed it until we ran out of Detour signs and found ourselves going east when we wanted to go south and west. One more we seem to have missed a turn sign somewhere (seems to happen a lot in Minnesota, we think that sometimes they forget a sign). Jean worked out an alternate route and we headed west on a county road. Eventually we ran into the continuation of Detour S-75. More adventures on the road.

Eventually we connected with I-90, which runs across the country from Cleveland to Seattle. We'll probably take it all the way across South Dakota and pick it up again later after some side trips.

Our goal for the day was Mitchell, SD. We went in to town to look at the Corn Palace.

 

  This is a large auditorium (?) whose outside is decorated with corn. There are a number of panels made entirely of corn. Mostly corn cobs of different colors, but also using other parts of the corn plant, such as leaves and straw.

  

  There are several panels on the theme of "Saluting Youth Activities." Jean's favorite was, of course, the dancer.

After looking at the Corn Palace, we headed for our campground, which was off the next exit on the interstate. Instead of turning left on Business 90 (which would be the way we came) we turned right, expecting it to lead us to the next exit. In usual Minnesota (Pair of Jeans?) fashion we missed a turn and ended up out in the boonies on a back road. When we figured out what had happened we were five miles past our exit and had to back-track. We finally found our campground for the night and got settled in and tanks dumped about 6:45. Tomorrow we cross South Dakota, which we are looking forward to about as much as crossing the Gobi Desert. Maybe it will surprise us.