For Tiffani

Okay, so after getting a bit of a naggy push, I'm FINALLY sitting down to do a major update here!!!!! If you're interested, there's about six new posts before this one. If you're less interested, here's an updated post to say hello! We're here! We're alive and well, and we're back in Canada!!!!!!!!

From South Dakota we drove straight through Missouri to get to Lake Superior. It was my 34th birthday on the 26th and I'd had visions of canoeing and hanging out on the shores of Lake Superior, but instead it was windy and rainy and more of a down day in the barth. We did wander through the little town we were staying in, found a great little donut shop to spoil ourselves in, went swimming in the municipal pool, and hung out with some tea, games and reading!

The Barth had been starting to make some funny noises, but we really wanted to get into Thunder Bay in order to stay a couple of days to get it checked out. We had brought it into a couple of different shops in South Dakota, but they each declared that they had no idea what the sound was and it was likely not serious. So we drove on, realizing it was getting worse but also that it was Memorial Day Weekend so nothing was open. So on we drove. Until we reached one and a half miles to the Canadian border and Bartha started really smoking. Oh, THAT wasn't good! We pulled over to discover a corroded transmission line leaking red fluid all over the place. No cell service, holiday Monday - what to do?! Jamie tried fixing it without any of the right tools - aluminum foil and ties will not do. We were at the top of hill, so decided to coast our way down. Made it most of the way, but 1/2 a mile from the border, the road started to incline, though luckily there was a gas station for us to go into. From here, we had to call BCAA, get towed to ThunderBay, and thus we limped our way into Canada - us on foot in order to catch a taxi on the other side and Bartha on the back of a big tow truck!!!!!


Luckily, it was just a cracked plate, which was easily fixed, and we're back on the road again after one night spent in the Canadian Tire parking lot and one night in a hotel!!!!!! Next stop, exploring the many beautiful parks along Lake Superior!!!!

Little Town on the Prairies

And finally, we arrived in DeSmet, the highlight of our time in South Dakota!!!!! This is where the Ingalls settled down for good, and we were able to spend the night in a covered wagon in their original homestead and also tour around various houses that they lived in in the town. I'd grown up watching the LIttle House on the Prairies tv series, and was amazed to see how different they all looked from their characters! And we all really enjoyed hanging out at the actual homestead - there were so many neat activities to take part in. We made corncob dolls, learned how to make rope, the girls got to lead pack horses as they pulled the wagon, attend old-fashioned school, they got to use a scrub board and wringer to do laundry, play a pump organ, sew with an old machine, make braided rag rugs, collect eggs, explore various styles of wagons, etc etc etc - the staff there were amazing in their acceptance of the girls help in everything and we all learned so much about the early pioneers of DeSmet!

Driving across South Dakota...

When we were visiting my grandparents in Princeton, my grandad had told us about a program he'd seen on an 1880 steam train in South Dakota - so we had to check it out! The train travels through the Black Hills from Hill City to Keystone, and passes through really interesting mining history. It was really neat to ride on a turn of a century train, the kids were really excited about it (especially Ryland who is rather obsessed with trains these days!) - though by the end of the return trip it was definitely becoming too long for them!

We made our way to the Badlands, where we camped in the hot sun and entertained the kids with buckets of water and mud puddles! Once it cooled off a little, we went out for a bike ride and explored the gorgeous grasslands (staying close on dad's heels in fear of rattlesnakes!) and the surreal landscape that makes up the Badlands!









And then as we drove across the rest of the state, we stopped at the Missouri River to swim and cool off - and learn more about Lewis and Clark.

buffalo and presidents....

One of may favourite things about a road trip is the ability to find a beautiful spot on a sunny day, and just decide to stop for a couple of hours to picnic, swim and explore. Hot Springs has a beautiful river flowing through the town, and the kids were amazed to find a billion tiny black ocean shells on the bottom!



Neither Jamie or I felt a compelling need to go out of our way to see Mount Rushmore, but since we were in the neighbourhood we figured we might as well drop by! And you know, it's pretty impressive - we couldn't get over the level of detail in the carvings, they're well done. And we really enjoyed the museum, the history of the FOURTEEN years it took to build it, how they worked on it, and also learning about the maintenance! Of course the girls were excited to yet again become junior rangers!!!!!!!


We spent a couple of days in Custer State Park, and when we arrived in the campground it was SOOOOOOOO windy that the door of Bartha got blown right off and broken into pieces. THAT was fun! No option of leaving the door off as it was so windy and cold, but there was no way the door was going back on as is. Obviously I have no photos of the process of us putting it together - but you can well imagine a good hour of cursing, banging, not enough hands, getting blown around - and in the end, able to fix it, feeling rather McGuiver-like:-) Here's a photo of Jamie with the 'new' door after another half an hour of fighting the wind in order to get it back on the hinges!!!!!



And then the wildlife - wow, the wildlife. We had antelope and deer eating right next to our campsite at night, and in the morning there was even a buffalo nearby. We saw mountain sheep, marmots,wild burros and so so so many buffalo, all close to the road!

On the road again......

So, we drove from Denver in South Dakota, on our way to DeSmet at the recommendation of friends (THE Little Town on the Prairies of Laura Ingalls fame!) We really had low expectations of the state, as really, who's heard of amazing things to do in South Dakota? But as it turns out, we were AMAZED at all the things this state had to offer, and could have easily spent much more time exploring it!
We'd randomly picked Hot Springs to aim for the first day, and were thrilled to discover that there were actual hot springs to swim in! We also discovered Wind Caveswith their unusual boxwork formations throughout, and the Mammoth Site which was really fascinating to tour through! They've found so many different mammoth skeletons there, it really is impressive - and both Columbian and wooly mammoths. It's an ongoing dig as well, so we were able to learn a lot about archaeological digs, and then there was a museum with information about early people and ancient animals. The girls were amazed by the size of the bones, and also had a blast playing in a house made out of mammoth bones!

Back at Bartha......

And then we were back again - it was sad to leave Vancouver, after seeing so many wonderful friends and enjoying one of the best times of the year in the city, but after so much go go go, it WAS rather nice to nestle back into Bartha! We'd booked a couple of days at the KOA, but in the end, spent a full week - sleeping lots, resting up, doing nothing, inter-mixed with cleaning, sorting and getting ready to go back on the road again!

We were camped out in a small community outside of Denver, with beautiful train culture all around us - Ryland was in HEAVEN, and every sunset we all went for a big bike ride to enjoy the great views - there's something about industrial buildings that is so beautiful!





We also did a couple of day trips, into the Denver Art Gallery, one of the best I've ever been to for kids - so many interactive activities all over the gallery, it was easy for Jamie and I to really enjoy the art! And Kea and I also took a tour of the Celestial Seasonings Tea Factory, which was quite fascinating - I grew up drinking this tea, so it was rather nostalgic for me, and I learned a lot about tea! I had no idea that white, green and black tea were all the same plant, just picked at different stages! And white tea has the least caffeine but the most anti-oxidents, while green tea is more in the middle with black tea having the most caffeine and very little anti-oxidents - fascinating!!!!!!!

One month of a whirl-wind trip to B.C.!

As it turned out, though, we didn't have to wait long to see them again. As I described before, we decided to fly up to BC in order to have a month visiting everyone - my mom was going to be in town and we really wanted to make it there in time to meet up with her, we were hitting colder and colder weather and did not relish driving over the mountain passes in the next month or so, and we were starting to feel ready to start settling down in the Ottawa Valley, so cutting out the Canadian portion of our travels for this trip - BUT we didn't want to miss out on seeing all of our loved ones in BC. SOOOOOO a cheap flight out of Denver, Colorado was our compromise! We parked the RV at a KOA for the month, and rented a car in BC - played with friends, visited family in Princeton, made our way up to Prince George and Terrace, and even in a month we STILL didn't manage to see all the people we wanted to. Luckily my cousin is getting married in Sept, so we'll be back then, and will head over to the island and spend more time in Vancouver! Here's a very small sampling of photos from our time there, including Sky with her new pet Coco (who unfortunately we were helping bury by the end of our trip), playing with Uncle Alex, hanging out in the trees enjoying spring, Daphne with Raychel and Sasha, Dana with Roan, and of course, Ryland getting onto the plane - he's turning into a super traveler!

Two weeks in New Mexico with the Sangha's

From Tucson, we drove all the way across to southern New Mexico, where we were very excited to be meeting up with our friends, The Sangha's! They took a couple of weeks of holiday in order to fly down and travel through this amazing state with us, and we really enjoyed our time with them!

We spent a day in the sun, visiting the White Sands National Park where Jamie showed off his surfing skills!






We travelled out to see Billy the Kid territory, and visited the Smokey the Bear Forest (including a trip out to the real bear's grave!)





We stayed in the Earthships just outside of Taos, a highlight for all of us!


We visited Bandalier in northern New Mexico, we did a lot of wandering of the streets of Taos and Sante Fe, and we all fell in love with New Mexico!
We also spent a lot of time just playing, hanging out and catching up - it was so nice to hang out with other people for a while, and there was a lot of sadness when they had to return home :-(