24 Hrs in Jackson Wyoming

We took an Amazing Race-inspired 24 Hr Mandatory Rest Stop when we woke up in Jackson the next morning. I was just too tired to do any more traveling and I wanted to see what was around us. I had no expectations for Jackson and was very pleasantly surprised with the pretty mountain view I woke up to. I've never been to Aspen, but Jackson reminds me of a mix of what I imagine Aspen to be and a fancy beach town. High end retail stores, bustling coffee shops, and lots of retirees. 

We didn't do much in the town itself, but we did have burgers at MacPhails and started a Cafe Genevieve habit two mornings in a row for a fantastic bacon egg and cheese and some coffees. While I was waiting for our order one morning I was looking around the shelves and saw that they sold tea from Bellocq. I really wanted to tell someone that I used to live 2 blocks from the actual Bellocq store and that the guy that mixes the teas by hand is an awesome mellow dude with an awesome beard but I figured no one cared and I suddenly felt sadder for leaving Brooklyn for good.

But a trip to the Elk Refuge revived me.

Surprisingly, most of the trails in and around Teton and Yellowstone don't allow dogs, but at least we could take her down the main road here at the Elk Refuge. The elk only come in the winter, but we did get to see a coyote.

And Caly loved lunging at these squirrelly things that we had originally mistaken for prairie dogs. 

At least we got to enjoy some really spectacular views. 

Afterwards, we dropped the dog at the motel and headed out to the Laurance S. Rockefeller Preserve for a humans-only hike. The land used to be used for the Rockefellers to camp or summer or whatever, and now its this gorgeous set of trails a few miles off the road in Grand Teton National Park. We didn't see any more coyotes, but we did see some cool ducks. 

And found a way to set the camera to take a picture of us at Lake Jenny.

The water was clear as glass, and you could see little frogs scrambling around the pebbles at the bottom.

The trails were really nice, especially as the sun was setting. It incorporated a quiet stroll through fields, bridges across streams and waterfall views. 

That night we treated ourselves to dinner and a beer sampler at Snake River Brewing. Great steak tacos, refreshing beers, and a nice chat with the bartender about making big life moves like ours. After going days talking to no one else but each other, it was nice to get some perspective from our local barkeep of the day.

The next day we had to get going to Yellowstone, but we had a nice, unexpected visit in Jackson Hole. Would I recommend going? Totally. Just, you know, look out for bears. 

Badlands to Jackson Hole

When I think back to that day we packed up our tent in the Badlands and ended the night in the fourth motel we tried in Jackson, I can't believe it was all a single day. We (well, mostly Rob) got a little bit ambitious in the amount of things we'd get done. If every day was this fast-forwarded intense version of a road trip, we probably could have done the whole thing in like four days. But I'm glad we didn't, because it was exhausting.

First stop was Wall Drug for breakfast. Which is really just a manufactured town of fake old West decor (which became so apparent when we saw those REAL towns way off the i-90 beaten path). There were roadside signs for Wall Drug for literally 500 miles, so that gives you an idea as to how far away we were from anything worth stopping for. They had all kinds of weird things here, like an empty travelers' chapel, souvenier shops, a post office, big plastic dinosaurs, giant restaurants, and a million little kids running around.

Next came Mount Rushmore! Which was actually a good long ride off the highway. Isn't it magnificent?!

 

You wouldn't know it from that first picture, but we never made it into the actual park. They don't allow dogs for whatever reason. So I told the guy at the parking booth that was gonna charge us a boatload -- just to park! -- that we wanted to turn around. He said go in through the parking lot, since its the end of a long road up a hill, and exit that way. No stopping, no taking pictures.

No problem.

 

And now you get the real view. Real America, with an RV in the background. Turns out a lot of people in this country have RVs, but that's another discussion for another day. Or another blog post.

Those nice straight-ahead pics are over-rated, anyway. When does anyone ever take this just-as-breathtaking comin'-round-the-mountain shot?

Or this oft-forgotten Washington profile shot?

After we got back in the car and outsped the parking guard on a golf cart, we had this nice little drive through the trees to Crazy Horse.

Someday, it will be a big magnificent rock carving that will look something like this: 

But right now, it only looks like this:

There's a lot more work to be done here than I thought. Oh well. "History in the making," as my mom says.

Leaving Crazy Horse and navigating to Jackson was the turning point in our trip, as we veered really far from the highway. We stopped outside a motel nearby to grab enough wifi to guide us over towards Casper, Wyoming. It was a really long ride along one or two very long roads. And this is when we got away from the touristy cute things and into actual old midwest towns that with really low population signs. One actually said Population:10! There was also a sign on a gas station that said "Enjoy the Redneck Rally," but I didn't want to stick around long enough to find out what that was.

Here's one of the larger towns in Wyoming. Note the covered wagon on the motel.

The land sloping out of South Dakota and into Wyoming got really flat really quickly. One moment we're at Rushmore with tons of trees, and then treeless farmland. And a storm you could see coming in for miles. It was really pretty, and one of those things that I think you just have to see with your own eyes to really understand the vastness. 

When the rain cleared, there was just the hint of a rainbow in our rear view mirror. 

We should have stopped for the night in Casper, but Rob wanted to push ahead to Jackson. So another quick wifi stop outside a town hall or something, and we grabbed directions to get us there. Which were really hard to follow with the limited amount of street signs, and we took a wrong turn here in this little town of Shoshani.

As the sun was setting, I worried about getting lost in the dark in the middle of nowhere. It was a very valid fear. And as we moved along, and saw dozens of deer darting across the street, we realized we had even more to be afraid of. But we forged ahead.

We reached Jackson at about 12:30 that night. The first four motels we checked were completely full.

We finally snuck the dog into a smelly smoking room at a lodge-y motel. It was all they had. 

I slept as though a deer had just run me over.

Sioux Falls to the Badlands

Once we left Sioux Falls, we didn't have cell service again until Jackson, Wyoming! That was about 2 days of travel and made it a bit difficult to navigate, since we were dependent primarily on our cell phone maps to get around.

Luckily, it was easy getting from Sioux Falls to the Badlands. We just took 90 West the entire way. Which means a whole lot of nothing except the Corn Palace! The next best roadside attraction since Wall Drug (which was saw after the Badlands). We had to take turns going in, with the dog and all. It just looks like a high school gymnasium with lots of corn deco and souveniers. Weird stuff. Glad we stopped?

Anyway, the Badlands were really a highlight of the trip. It's unlike anything either of us have ever seen. Miles and miles of caked mud piled high into crazy formations that look like rocks. When you get up high enough, you can see so many miles of nothingness you feel like the only person in the world.

Even though it rained and was buggy both times we'd camped so far, I decided to give it another go while we were in the Badlands. There was no rain, but we were subjected to to new extreme elements: heat and wind. When we got at our site, it was 103 degrees outside. Add a panting dog to the mix and it's easy to worry about dehydration.

As the sun set, it began to cool off and I felt a lot better about sleeping outside. We had a few beers from Wisconsin on our picnic table and enjoyed a nice cool breeze.

Until we woke up in the middle of the night with the wind blowing our tent in from all sides. Amazingly, the tent didn't rip and it stayed grounded, but the frying pan we stuck in the corner might have something to do with it.

It was intense, but don't take my word for it. Let's hear from our guest blogger, Calyer the dog:

Ramping in the Radlands was rarry!! The rind was rippin' reary roudry! I was rupposed to ray on my roggy bed, rut it was roo rarry!! I rawled onto the rair rattress in retreen Rob and Rauren! I was ro rared I was raking! Whooaaa!

And there you have it, folks. The Badlands. I'd totally recommend going. Just, you know, look out for rattlesnakes.
  

Rushmore

I know im falling behind on updates here, but with limited internet access, its been hard. I'll just leave you with this pic of Mt Rushmore for now. Crazy Horse, Wyoming farmland scenery and Jackson Hole to come!

Hello from the Badlands!

That's all I've got time for now!

Today's Journey: Wisconsin to South Dakota

In hopes of making up for a bit of lost time, we sped across Minnesota today, right on 90 West the entire way. We were originally going to loop down through Des Moines for a music festival and meander back up through Omaha, but since we're about 4 days late for that, we just wanted to get to the stop: Sioux Falls, South Dakota.

Quick backtrack: our quick jaunt through Wisconsin was great. We started at Mars Cheese Castle in Kenosha. Which, turns out, has a great beer selection. We got a six from New Glarus Brewing Company. Haven't tried 'em yet, but we have the cooler ready.

Other than the good beer selection, they have lots of touristy stuff. Including cheese shaped like beer mugs.

We had to stop to take this very Wisconsin-ish picture here.

Then it was onto Milwaukee. We took a quick walk through the Third Ward, which is the nice part of town with shops and restaurants with patios and things.

 I got this great hummus sandwich from the Hudson Business Lounge. 

Then it was off to Madison. We had a great night at Ale Asylum, we loved all of their beers. I think they're a new favorite brewery of mine. The Bedlam! IPA was one of the best. We had a great pizza too, and a side salad with bits of cheese curd, cause cheese curd is big in Wisconsin. But the best part was the bartender! Nate must have done about 10 magic tricks just for us. He had us laughing all night. If you're ever in the Madison area, I can't recommend this place enough.

This morning we barely dipped our toes in Madison proper for a breakfast to-go at The Old Fashioned. Here's a pic of the (I'm guessing?) Capitol building in the square, which reminded me of Rittenhaus Square in Philly, only that little circle was most of the center of Madison. We looped around a full time and had a tough time getting right. When I saw this building again I couldn't help myself: "Big Ben. Parliament." I'm a great travel companion.

Then we hit the road. But we had to stop for cheesy photo opps like this.

And then again in Blue Earth, Minnesota for the World's Largest Statue of the Jolly Green Giant. I mean... why WOULDN'T we stop for that.

Leave it to Calywags to be willing to ham it up with us.

And now here we are in Sioux Falls, South Dakota! We got there in time for a sunset walk around Falls Park. Then some dinner and a few interesting brews at Monks House of Ale Repute. This is turning out to be an American beer tour of sorts and it's pretty awesome. Food is good at breweries and it seems cheaper and faster when we're sitting at the bar. There's no more Brooklyn Brewery or Six Point on tap this far West (or really, past Cleveland) but it's interesting to see how far certain special local beers stretch. We're still seeing lots of Chicago's Goose Island. And Great Lakes is pretty popular around the center of America. NYC was missing out on more than I had expected!

Tomorrow, we head to the Badlands for more camping.

Let's hope it doesn't rain.

Chicago Recap

Hello from Madison, Wisconsin! This morning we got the call that our car was good to go, so we grabbed some Moons Over (Our?) Hammies from Denny's and tried to make up for lost time. We made a quick stop at Milwaukee and now we're here in Madison for the night. I'm so super excited to be here. I've always wanted to go to Wisconsin, since my third grade project at least, and here I am in the land of beer and cheese and you know what? It's seriously all I thought it could be! I also did some soul searching and remembered that mayyybe a big part of my drive to see Milwaukee came from this clip about 20 years ago. Does anyone else remember this?

Well, anyway.

We obviously spent a lot more time in Chicago than we had planned to. But it gave us the opportunity to see more than we would have otherwise. First, a stop at the Museum of Contemporary Art, which I gotta say I'm really impressed with. After a few years of a membership at the MOMA in NYC I thought I had been spoiled, but really, this was a lot more fun, less crowded, easier to digest and set up even better. There was live music and a few interactive exhibits, including a functioning nail salon! 

Which I really could have used but opted for self application in the room with Dr. Waggin's.

We have been eating cheap and on the run for the most part, but we did make time for a nice meal at Quartino. Including this goat cheese ricotta, some amazing broccoli raab and an incredible pork ravioli.

One night we went to this music club, the Underground Wonder Bar. Saw a few good acts. The beer was generic but the music was fun, and the downstairs area was... weird.

We also went on this awesome architectural boat tour. I really wanted to ride along the channels and have one of those My Best Friend's Wedding moments, but I guess I also wanted to learn about the city's history. So The Chicago Architecture Foundation it was. These 90 minutes were probably my favorite in all of Chicago. Go ahead and ask me the defining characteristics of art deco and we'll see how well I was paying attention.

It seemed only right that our next step takes us way up to the highest point of the Sears Tower. Which I guess is called Willis Tower these days. I've never seen a building this high! And the glass bottomed area was fun to check out.

We were too late to get a tour, but we took a detour and gave ourselves an outside tour of the Frank Lloyd Wright house. And we may or may not have seen the cutest bunny hopping around out there. 

Yesterday we headed back to Indiana be to nice and close to our car in case it decided to be ready soon. We went to the Indiana Dunes Lakeshore while we waited around. Such a pretty beach, it was quiet, the water was a light, Caribbean blue, and Waggin's loved sniffing around the sand.

They wanted our car for one last day to make sure it was good to go, so we camped nearby the lake at the Indiana Dunes Lakeshore Camground.

It was pretty until it rained. I don't think camping and I were meant to be friends. I'll leave it at that. (mosquito deathcount: at least FOUR inside the tent alone; countless casualties beyond that).

To make the most of the night, we drove back to the shore to watch the lightning storm before the rain started up again. On our way back to camp we saw this pretty, creepy swamp scene.

The whole thing made me think of that Muppets movie where Kermit brings his friends to the swamp and they're all miserable... until they find out Disney World is right around the bend. (Here's a clip... you're welcome).

I think we found our Disney Worlds here in Wisconsin, with a cheese castle and a brewery with a bartender that does his own magic tricks. This place is even better than I imagined! More on all that later. It's late and I'm tired from NOT SLEEPING IN THAT BUGGY AND MUGGY TENT. G'nite!