Minnisota

We wanted to avoid Chicago area so went through Joliet and visited my 94 year old Aunt. She is doing great and so good to see her again. She was so surprised to see us. Than we were off to Minneapolis for a few days. We are staying at Mystic Lake Campground called Dakota Meadows. We are parked side by side with our doors facing the common grass area. Riley(Pats cat) and Buddy have enjoyed being outside with us when we are home. The weather has been in the 80's and not so humid so we can sit outside. The casino although not new looks like it is and really nice inside. We ate in the buffet and one of the restaurants and both had good food. We spent yesterday at the Mall of America. It is a huge complex of stores although most have fall clothes out and didn't find much to buy. Pat was able to get some shoes and so did John, clothes and shoes don't have sales tax. What a buy! We plan to go back later while we are here and see a movie. We have decided to stay here a few more days as we have a really nice camp spot and weather is bearable and lots to do and who knows when we will be back to see this area.

Tall ships & wines

These are last few days here in Traverse City and then heading west. We are nestled back in the tall trees=John thinks some of them are 100 ft tall. We went into town to the farmers market and got some good tomatoes and peaches which aren't ripe yet so will see how they are. The Michigan cherries are ripe so we have been eating sweet dark cherries. Came back to motor home for lunch and back into town again. We went on a tall schooner ship named the Manitou for a 2 hour sail around the bay. What a fabulous experience! The crew was mostly girls, 2 guys and fun to watch them put the sails up and down and we got to help. The water was calm and wind OK but they know how to work with the winds they get. We ate dinner at Olive Garden and came home after a full day. Sun July 31 We had a leisurely morning=Pat did laundry and we did some grocery shopping and just enjoyed sitting. After lunch we drove up the Old Mission Peninsula and did some wine tasting. They mostly have white wines here and a lot of fruit (cherry in particular) wines. We are spoiled being from Calif where we have good red wines and so we didn't get much here in Michigan. We had a nice dinner outside on the picnic table tonight and did some travel planning for the next few days. Tomorrow is up early as it is a drive day.

Traverse City

Arrived here at Holiday Park, just south of Traverse City and our spot wasn't ready yet so we parked by the office and had lunch and by the time we finished our spot was all ready with new gravel put down. Pat & Elmon are across the way from us. We are nestled in the trees which are really tall. This park has alot of airstream owners that own the lots and when they aren't here they rent the spaces. Thursday was a relaxing day to read, I did laundry and we BBQ dinner together. Friday we went to Cracker Barrel for the first time on this trip and had breakfast. The pancakes were really good, John & Elmon said. After that we headed for Sleeping Bear Dunes National Park. Stopped at the visitor center first and got our maps, watched a short movie and off we went to explore. We went to Coast Guard Maritime Museum. We toured the crew quarters and boathouse where we saw the boats they used to rescue the many people who were ship wrecked along the coast. We also watched the kids climb to the top of the sand hill. Next was a ride through the forest to see Lake Michigan and the sand dunes along the coast. You just can't imagine how steep and long it is from the top of the dune down to the water. The water is so clear and blue and we could see along way today on the calm Lake Michigan. It was a beautiful day today with a slight breeze, not too hot or humid for me. We stopped at a local farm on the way back and got cherries (this is Cherry Capital of Michigan) and some cherry turnovers which we had for dessert after dinner.

Waterfalls

Our last day here in Mackinaw City, we went into town and had a buffet breakfast=I think our first breakfast out since we left. We drove through the countryside but like most places back here you can't see anything because trees line the highway. Our first stop was the shipwreck museum at the Whitefish Point on Lake Superior. It was interesting again to hear about all the ships that lay on the bottom of Lake Superior close to the Whitefish Point. We also got to see the light keepers house and the lighthouse. We walked out to the Lake Superior sandy beach. Than we drove back to Tahquamenon Falls State Park to see the Upper & Lower Falls=the same names as the park. They were beautiful=the root beer color again is from the tanic in the trees that color the water. John was thrilled to finally see them. We ate lunch in the park and headed home with sprinkles following us home. After dinner we went downtown and walked through some of the shops and bought a few souvenirs. We've had a good time up here and leave tomorrow to go down further to Northern Michigan's Traverse City.

Mackinaw, Michigan

We arrived here a few days ago and have been doing the tourist thing. We had a nice drive with spurts of rain along the way. We drove over the big Mackinaw bridge with road construction so was slow but didn't cost us a leg & arm with motor home and car. Shortly after we got here, we had a good thunderstorm go through and quite a bit of rain so cooled off nicely. John and & Elmon did a few fix it jobs and we ate in and had spaghetti. Today we had a quite morning and than took off for the ferry to get us over to the Island. This time we took the hydro jet that has a big rooster tail of water behind us and gets us over faster. We also got to go under the bridge before going to the island which is new since the last time we were here. We got our tickets and rode through the city tour on a cart drawn with horses. We had lunch in town and Pat & I tried the pasties (meat, potatoes and vegetables in pastry) which are famous here as miners and loggers used to take them for lunch. They are like a pot pie and ours came with gravy on top and were real good. We have also tried the Lake Superior whitefish which was pretty good and tonight I tried the perch which was excellent fish. We also tasted a lot of fudge today which Mackinaw Island is famous for. The weather has been in 70's here, so is quite nice. Tonight we went for a walk along the Lake which looks like an ocean and saw a lady walking a lop eared rabbit. He was on a leash with a harness and was 7 months old and so soft. He was quite a hit with everybody. Tomorrow we go in search of waterfalls.

Ishpeming, Upper Michigan

Isn't that quite a name for a town. But this is iron ore mining country. Today was a lazy day and it has cooled off considerably. We spent the morning at the Cliff's Shaft mine and museum. What a place to see all the memorable things from mining in this area and travel down the tunnels to see things. The shafts covered by these amazing buildings that are in our pictures. The ore truck is SO BIG as you can see. Then we went down to Lake Superior which looks like and ocean especial today with the waves and white caps. There were 2 tall ships visiting in the harbor and we took a look at them. Had lunch in a restaurant called Hudson's. A lot of old Hudson cars around. Food was good, service slow. We also tried a little locals restaurant last night and had some fish=cod,perch and walleye. We haven't tried the Superior white fish yet. This afternoon we had thunderstorms and rain. Tomorrow will be cool again and chance of thunderstorms again. Tonight, we are grilling hot dogs and going to show, to see Captain America.

Waterfalls & Eddie Lake

We have spent the last few days here in Sunday Lake Campground. We can look out our window to Eddie Lake. The spots aren't level and sewers are hard to get to but we have air conditioning which we do need. The satellite TV won't get signal as a tree is in the way and no cable TV so we are on a quiet 2 days. We took off to see the first waterfall called Root Bear Falls and found ourselves down a tiny road which had all kinds of bugs flying at the windows to get us. Arrived at a ditch with water in it and couldn't go any further. The water here is mostly root beer colored because of the acid from the hemlock trees in the ground. Next we went to Gorge & Pottawatomie Falls. The first one in our pictures was the best and highest. We could get to them via a path and lots of steps. Next stop McDonald's for a burger and then we went to an American factory that makes Stormy Kromer hats. We are not familiar with them but a big thing in Michigan and cold country. The factory makes these hats and does sewing for a lot of other companys. They sew dog and cat beds, boat and awnings, fishing pole rod holders, beautiful wool coats, jackets, pants. They are a very diversified company and have a lot of people sewing on machines, special machines to cut fabric and canvas. It was quite interesting. After that John had to have his Dairy Queen strawberry shake. We had a great cool day and even got to grill Elmon & Pat's trout from Mammoth. Tomorrow we travel a short distance and sit for 3 days. Crossed another time line today so now we are 3 hours different than home and in our last time zone. It is 9:30 as I write this and still really light outside.

driving days

Well these past few days have been mostly driving days. We left N. Dakota through Minnesota, and Wisconsin and have arrived now in the upper peninsula of Michigan. We are at a small camp ground on what is called Eddie Lake. There have been lots of little lakes all through Minnesota and around this area. We drove around Lake Superior a little to get here. We hit a detour but we ended up getting on the right road but wasn't much fun going through Duluth which is on border of Minn. & Wisconsin. It has been very hot these last past days in the upper 90's and high humidity so that you just feel wet. This morning is a bit cooler with a nice breeze so we hope the heat wave in this part of the country has gone a way. We drove through a lot of roads that had water along side and had barriers to keep water off the road but in a few places it was leaking on to the roadway and we had to go slow.

Theodore Roosevelt Nat. Park

Sat July 16th, We are in Medora, ND. This park is packed with RV's and family's. Who knew this little place was so popular. After breakfast Pat & I packed lunches and we all headed for the National Park. We stopped first in the visitor center and watched the movie. We had a beautiful drive through the park. The park has a thin line of coal through it that sometimes catches fire with lightening. We did come across a herd of buffalo right along side the road. They were playing and drinking in a little puddle of water. They had a lot of babies and fun to see them up close. We saw a lot of prairie dogs and a herd of wild horses so were happy campers. Pat fixed us a turkey dinner and John washed the motor coach when it cooled off.

Sun July 17th It was cloudy when we got up and a nice breeze but then clouds went away and now it is just hot and muggy. We first went to Bully Pulpit which is the golf course here. It is just beautiful and they had a lot of signs about area to read. Next was a visit to Chateau de Mores. It is restored summer home of a rich Frenchman that came here in the 1880's to make his fortune. It had 26 rooms, 10 bedrooms and most of them where furnished from that time. We had lunch in town and at a little cafe which ended up being full of people so we picked the right place. Tonight we are going out for pizza since Pat & I need to stock up on fresh produce and stuff. We went to the North Dakota Cowboy Hall of Fame. It was interesting to see about the ranches, rodeo and Native American's and horses. The guys were interested in the gun collection. Kind of a lazy afternoon. Tomorrow we leave for Bismark which is the capital of N. Dakota. It promises to be a hot week.

Winding up in Medora, North Dakota

We finally have a nice campground with lots of space in between, grass for the cat and dogs. The first RV park, we drove in the drive way and said no way it looks like a dump. So we turned around and stopped across the street the motel RV park. Then we BBQ pork chops and had a really good meal. We could see dark clouds coming in and one of the park trailer guests came over and told us strong winds, hail and such were coming. We barely got things picked up and inside when the thunder and lightening hit and started to rain. We had such a storm and with wind, rain but no hail and no damage. We have crossed the entire state of Montana and now are in North Dakota. We stopped here in Medora, which is in the Theodore Roosevelt National Park and it is such a great place, we are staying for 3 days. The first night we went to dinner called Pitchfork steak fondue. They put rib eye steaks about 6 of them each on a tine and cook them in hot grease. They have a nice salad bar with baked potato, BBQ beans, coleslaw, Veggies and fruit to go with it. It was a good steak and afterward we went to the Medora Musical. It is in outdoor amphitheater that holds lots of people. It was a great western type play and this is Theodore Roosevelt country and some about him in the play, too. Got home late again and slept in the next morning.

Lake Louise & Banff

We have had rain in the evenings and cool temps. So glad we didn't have any rain for the rodeo.Today we have a nice big tour bus and left around 9:oo for our tour. Our first stop was Lake Louise where we had a great buffet lunch in the new part of the hotel. Afterwards we walked around the hotel. They have blocked off where we took pictures before. We went outside and saw the beautiful flowers, glacier and Lake. It is always a spectular view. Then we drove to Lake Morene where the water is just as blue as you can ever see. Next was a trip down the hill to Banff. We had a drive through the town and drove out to Bow Falls. We have been to Banff before but never at the falls. All the lakes and rivers are full and rushing. We had a catered dinner of roast pork, rice, salad, vegetables and chocholate cake to top it off. It rained again when we got home. Max and Buddy are going to miss not walking along the river. Buddy loves to meet all the other dogs and just run around.

Tues July 12th Our Good Sam Leaders fixed us a pancake breakfast this morning. It was nice to relax, seep in and have a good breakfast. Did some laundry, walked around town and had a happy hour time with those that are left. Tomorrow we hit the road and head for the US. We have enjoyed our Calgary time but have found things expensive here. Cost us $3 to wash and $3 to dry a load of clothes which is about double usual in US. Tomorrow we will be in Montana and be able to use our phones again.