North Dakota Badlands and More

Yesterday and today we've been in Hibbing, MN, near the center of the Iron Range in MN. (More about that in a minute.) We're heading towards Grand Marais, MN tomorrow to meet our kids and grandkids for the 4th of July weekend.

From Gillette, WY, we headed north to Montana and then east to North Dakota. Since we were in the South Dakota Badlands, it was only fitting that we went through the North Dakota Badlands in Theodore Roosevelt National Park. We decided to brave the South Loop Scenic Road with the RV (and the car behind it). There were a few narrow spots, but none that got us hung up.

North Dakota's Badlands are completely different than SD's. They seem a lot more like the Grand Canyon. And, we were struck by how much greener things are in ND. Again, I'll let the pictures do the talking.

The one buffalo we saw in the park. 

Our route took us along I-94 in North Dakota. Like I-90 in South Dakota, much of the drive is boring. But, we were able to see the world's largest sandhill crane in ND. (Andy was looking forward to seeing a big operating crane so was a bit disappointed to see this.) 

After spending a couple of days in Fargo (my old stomping grounds) and seeing my best friend Mary, we headed towards Hibbing. After seeing coal mines in Wyoming, Andy's interest was piqued with the mines of the Iron Range. After we parked at Walmart, we headed to the Hull Rust Mahoning Mine. Described as the "Grand Canyon of the North" it is the world's largest open pit iron ore mine. 

The mine is operated 24 hours a day (12 hour shifts). The mine will be moving in two years so they are filling places right now. 

One of the fun things about our travels is that we run into things we never knew were there. On the way to the Hull Rust Mine there is a Greyhound Bus Museum. Who knew that Hibbing, MN was the birthplace of the business that would become Greyhound Bus Lines? We had fun touring it today and looking at the old buses. 

This is a mannequin, not a real agent!

1950's Bus Drivers Uniform

The Hupmobile, which ferried miners back and forth from Hibbing to Alice, MN 

a 1956 Greyhound Bus

More adventures to come! After Grand Marais, we will be in MI to get some things fixed in the RV. Seems that taking a house on the road wrecks havoc on all sorts of things!

Last Day of Tiffin Rally

Wow! The week has gone fast. Tonight is the farewell dinner for the 300+ attendees (number of motorhomes) here for the rally. We've met lots of people, shared lots of stories, and attended seminars and even learned a few new things! Also, we successfully had our mail forwarded here, and I did an online order which also arrived on time.

Rows and Rows of Tiffin Motorhomes

Our friends Barb & Roger 

Stage in ballroom at Tiffin Rally 

We're onto ND and MN next with meeting up with the kids for the 4th of July.  Hoping for more mild temperatures! (We had a record of 103 in Gillette this week.)

Day One of the Tiffin Rally

We were up early to move from the Walmart parking lot to the Camplex Arena for the rally. Apparently we weren't the only ones as cars were lined up as early as 6:30 a.m. (ahead of the 8 am time). Parking the RV was easy with the help of the volunteers. We got settled and hooked up and then went to register.

For a quiet day, we had a lot going on. We were able to schedule maintenance on our Aqua Hot, and factory personnel for our air conditioners were checking on everyone's RV. We learned a little more about how they should operate and that we need to regularly clean our filters. (They were very dirty!) We also scheduled maintenance on our tow bar equipment. That is one of the advantages to going to a rally as these vendors regularly travel the "rally circuit" to provide  maintenance for people like us.

We had a welcome ceremony and dinner tonight. There was also a tribute to veterans. Entertainment tonight was drawings for prizes - none of our raffle tickets won, and Bingo, which none of us won either. There's always tomorrow!

New States Added

Today we traveled from Rushmore Shadows Resort (outside of Rapid City, SD) to Gillette, WY. We chose to travel on Hwy. 16 instead of I-90. It was more scenic, especially on our way out of SD. Wyoming is our second new state that we've added to our list since leaving MN. 

We stopped for lunch at Remy's Diner in Upton, WY. It's always a crap shot when we pick a place out of the blue (truth be told, there weren't a whole lot of places to choose from) but we lucked out and had a nice lunch. 

Yesterday in Deadwood we stopped in at one of the casinos. I was up $30 in just 5 minutes so I decided to call it good for the day. That doesn't happen very often!

Tomorrow we hook up with our friends Barb & Roger and on Monday we head over to the Camplex Arena for the Tiffin Rally. 

Kudos to Andy for helping me figure out to combine the blog with our Google photo account. It wasn't easy but it should make it a lot easier for me going forward to share our pictures and videos in the blog. 

Here's a selfie of us in the Badlands....

For the grandchildren....

We found Nemo!

South Dakota Tourist Attractions

Well, we've seen a lot since we've been in South Dakota. Tuesday we traveled to Rapid City and the Black Hills area of South Dakota. Since arriving, we've gone to Mt. Rushmore (even though we've both been there before), the towns of Keystone, Custer and Hill City, and have driven past the Crazy Horse monument. Tomorrow we're headed to Lead and Deadwood for the day.

I convinced Andy to stay for the night time program and lighting of the monument at Mt. Rushmore. We were glad we did. At the end, the park ranger asked veterans or family members of veterans to come on the stage to retire the flag and be recognized for their service. There had to be at least 75 people who went up, including many children representing their parents or grandparents. It was a moving finish to the evening. Thank you, veterans for your service!

Sunset picture of Mt. Rushmore 

Selfie with the President's 

A little blurry but you get the idea of the monument lit at night 

Back tracking a bit...

I'm trying to keep these posts in order. However, I was having trouble with uploading photos and took a break for a while. Needless to say, I missed posting about our first guests in the RV- our granddaughters Emily, Mira and Kirsten. They visited us while we were in Sioux Falls.

All went well until about 4 am. Mira woke up because there was "rain" coming from the ceiling of the RV.  The rain was actually condensation from our air conditioner that leaked on to the hide a bed and Mira. Well, that woke everyone up! We did get a repairman out to check out the air conditioners and we've ordered the parts we need. (We'll have techs fix it when we're at the Tiffin rally in Gillette, WY.) 

Glaser girls on the hide a bed.