Alabama

Last weekend I took a trip to southern Alabama.  While I am sure that Alabama has much to offer in terms of culture, history, and tourism, this particular area of Alabama was not that mecca.  The area - Enterprise - is the largest town near Fort Rucker, an Army base largely used for aviation training.  The most exciting thing about Enterprise is the story behind the boll weevils' attack of the county's cotton crop in 1915.  While the bugs devastated the cotton, the devastation forced the town to switch to peanut crops, which were widely successful.  By 1917, the area was the leading peanut producer in the US.  In honor of the boll weevils, the town constructed a monument that consists of a statuesque Grecian figure holding up a black boll weevil.  Enterprise is a poster-child for making lemonade out of lemons.  In the town is also an old hotel - the Rawls hotel - and the old train depot that now serves as the historical museum.

We never got around to experiencing some real southern cooking mostly because by the time I was ready for southern cooking it was Sunday evening and everything was closed, but we did sample that staple of the south - Waffle House.  While I had been to a Waffle House once before, it was Andy's first time.  Nothing exciting except it was greasy and delicious; who doesn't love cheese grits?  What was exciting was the town's ice cream shop, Milky Moo's, where I had the Boll Weevil Special - a peanut butter ice cream with peanut butter chips, marshmallows, and Oreos.  It was a true representation of the farming history of the area.  Brilliantly, the shop puts a single marshmallow at the bottom of the cones to prevent leakage.  Milky Moo's also was Food Network's Alabama pick for their 50 States, 50 Ice Cream Treats list - a list that I can't believe I didn't know about sooner!

Hannibal, MO to Clarksville, TN

Today’s last day of driving was a mad dash.  We woke up before sunrise and hit the road.  We drove through more corn as we headed toward St. Louis then started seeing the markings of a large city – developments, strip malls then tall buildings in the distance.  Since we were in such a rush, we didn’t have time to stop in the Gateway to the West, but we did see Busch Stadium, where the Cardinals play, and the Gateway Arch from the highway. 

South of St. Louis was more of the same – corn – as we crossed into Illinois and Kentucky.  Finally, just before noon we crossed into Tennessee and were immediately in our new city Clarksville.  And so ends our long distance travel for now.  It is quite the rite of passage to travel across the United States, and I actually hope to do it again.  Driving every day for a week is not too bad as long as the day’s driving does not exceed seven or eight hours.  I don’t think I would want to do more than a week; I definitely had reached my breaking point by the sixth night.  I look forward to exploring some more of America’s smaller tourist attractions.

Sioux City, IA to Hannibal, MO

Today was by far the longest day of the trip.  We made several interesting stops, but that meant getting to our final destination much later than desired.  To top it off, when we got to our hotel in Hannibal, they had booked us in a smoking room and had no non-smoking pet friendly rooms.  They were nice enough to find us another hotel with a non-smoking pet room, but the new hotel was so dingy and smelled like mold.  I don't know what would have been worse - mold or smoke?  Despite that aggravation, we did see a lot in Iowa and Missouri.

The drive was mostly through corn fields.  Our first stop was the John Deere factory in Waterloo, IA.  We unfortunately couldn't take the 90 minute tour because the dog was in the car, but we did go to the gift shop.

Someone is excited about tractors!

After John Deere, we drove a bit further east and stopped at the Field of Dreams in Dyersville, IA.  Along the way, we listened to Shoeless Joe by W.P. Kinsella.  The movie Field of Dreams is based on the book, but basically everything that happens in the movie happens in the first chapter of the book.  I definitely prefer the movie.  It was neat to see a baseball field in the middle of a corn farm, but it was not the most exciting stop.

When we arrived at the Mississippi, we saw her might because the direct southerly route we wanted to travel was totally flooded.  We had to go further east into Illinois then swing back southwest before being able to head south.  It was a cumbersome detour that really cut the time we had in Hannibal.

Hannibal, MO was a bit of a dumpy town, but the downtown area where Mark Twain's house is was cute.  We ate at Lula Belle's restaurant, which is in a former bordello.  Afterwards, we took a quick tour of the street where Mark Twain lived, which has been preserved.  We saw several landmarks from The Adventures of Tom Sawyer including the white picket fence and the home of Sawyer's crush, Becky Thatcher.  I would have liked to be able to actually tour the attractions, but we were there way past closing time.

Twain's House

HIstoric Hannibal, MO

While this road trip has been a great experience, we are all ready for it to be over.  Six hours to Clarksville, TN!

Someone is ready for this trip to be over!

Rapid City, SD to Sioux City, IA

Today was a long day of flat driving.  For as far as the eye could see everything was flat.  There were the occasional herd of cattle clustered in a grassy field, but otherwise, flat grass and corn.  Before leaving Rapid City, we of course had to visit the South Dakota Air and Space Museum at Ellsworth Air Force Base.  It was an air and space museum not much different from all the others we have been to (Andy loves planes!).  They did have an interesting exhibit about the Berlin Wall and the Berlin Airlift since some of the pilots involved in the Berlin Airlift were from Ellsworth AFB.  This base was also home to many underground nuclear missile silos during the cold war, and the museum had a replica of what one of the control rooms would look like.  They also offered a bus tour to a silo, but we unfortunately did not have enough time to see that.

South Dakota Air and Space Museum

The other interesting thing today was the world's only corn palace!  The small town of Mitchell, South Dakota decorates the outside facade of their civic center with corn.  There are panels of corn cobs making different designs and sections of the outside walls shingled with hay.  They also have the hallways of the civic center busting with corn history and facts.  They use the space in front of the stage in the hall for a giant gift shop and some other exhibits.  The walls of the inside area are covered with corn cob artworks.  It is truly ingenious because it gets people into the town and utilizes the space in the civic center on a daily basis.  As if that was not enough, across the street is a little village of gift shops.  Definitely the kind of thing I hoped to see on a cross-country road trip!

Corn Palace - all decorations are made of corn

Wall panel on inside of building made of corn cobs

Display of everything that is made of corn

After a lot of time in South Dakota, we entered Iowa and soon stopped for the night in Sioux City.  Sioux City has undergone a lot of downtown revitalization.  There is a lovely park along the river and a rejuvenated historic district where we ate a great Italian meal.  Tomorrow there will be much more flat driving through corn fields and hopefully more kitchsy Americana to stop and see! 

Billings, MT to Rapid City, SD

First thing in the morning the dog and I took a lovely walk around Billings.  The area of the city we were staying in was flanked by a rim of rock that was probably seven stories high.  It was very picturesque with tree lined streets and a beautiful green park near Montana State University Billings.  Soon after, we hit the road and stopped at Little Bighorn Battlefield National Monument.  Being very ignorant of this aspect of American history - thanks Manchester school system - it was very educational to drive around the battlefield.  The whole situation is so sad and embarrassing for our country.  It is terrible that a group of people's whole way of life was canceled out by greed.  The landscape of the area is vibrantly green and hilly with very few trees dotted along the river.  I could just imagine the Sioux and Cheyenne peoples roaming the area on the hunt for buffalo.

Little Bighorn Battlefield

After this brief stop, we spent the rest of the day on the interstate traveling through Montana, Wyoming, and South Dakota.  Despite being on the interstate, there was quite beautiful scenery.  It isn't like driving on the interstate on the east coast where there is so much traffic and commercial strip after commercial strip.  The interstate we traveled on today rarely went through a town and if it did the town was teeny tiny.  Take for example Buffalo, Wyoming where we stopped for lunch.  This town was very picturesque with lovely little western buildings.  We ate at a pleasant city park along a creek where I saw the most amazing playground ever - three stories with six slides!!  After lunch we passed into South Dakota.  Our first stop in South Dakota was a rest area with some very informative signs about the Black Hills and two very friendly welcoming committee members.  We were soon on to Rapid City where we ditched the dog and headed to Mount Rushmore (again, the difficulty of traveling with a dog in summer).

I-90 in Wyoming

There is nothing much to say about Mount Rushmore except that it was cool and touristy.  It was a lot like traveling through Crawford Notch in New Hampshire where tourist attractions like Storyland, Santa's Village, and Six Gun City abound.  The towns just outside of Mt. Rushmore were like western towns on a movie set with lots of neon lights added.  I am glad we went though so now we can say we have seen it with our own eyes.  We rounded out the day with a very heartland meal of fried cheese curds, chicken fried steak, and lemon meringue pie - good thing I had a salad for lunch!

Mount Rushmore