Life After Cows...Part Eight...

On to Chicago!

It's hard to believe it's been over three months since we're back from our trip, and I still have two posts to go!!

We spent the day after visiting Rock Creek Park, travelling across Iowa and spent the night just west of the Illinois state line.  This was the day that I think we would both say was the least exciting, and the day that we got really tired of being in the car!  We had hoped to make a couple of stops that would have been fun, but they didn't work out.  We did stop at the world's largest truck stop for supper!

Early Thursday morning, we crossed the Mississippi River, and here is where we saw the most evidence of the flooding that affected the midwest...

We don't know what it looks like normally, but this certainly has to be much, much more water than usual!  Powerlines with water covering the bottom few feet?  I can't imagine how devastating the flooding must have been to so many people...

We had planned to stay close enough to the city, so that we would easily be able to reach my sister's house before rush hour.  We made it by mid afternoon...

Jim and I had been here for Marge and Hermann's wedding, and I had visited with our kids and my Mom when the kids were 6 and 3!  We were so happy to finally be in Evanston, to see family, and to relax for a couple of days!

My sister's family lives about a ten minute bike ride from Lake Michigan.  There's a nice bike path along the lake, and Jim and I enjoyed several hours on Friday, riding around and seeing the sights from a different perspective...

One of my nephews participates in a sailing club, and I rode along to pick him up after.  Marge and I took a stroll on the beach...in the wind...

Such a different kind of beach than we are used to!

At the sailing club.  All the boats have been put up for the night...

That evening, Marge, Jim and I took the El downtown,

...where Hermann met us after work.  While we waited to connect with him, we visited Millenium Park, and "the bean"...

After Hermann arrived downtown, we found a coffee shop and enjoyed catching up some more. This is one of my most favorite pictures from the whole trip...unhurried and relaxed...

We began walking...just to see what there was to see.  The Chicago River at night was beautiful, with all the lights reflecting on the water.  There was just something fun about being in a large city on a Friday night...

Try as we might, we couldn't get a good selfie, so we traded favors with another group...

On the way home on the El...almost an hour's ride...

Jim was the only one who wasn't on his phone doing something...surfing, reading, or taking a picture! (my self included...see my reflection in the window?!)

We are so glad that we were able to spend time with family on this trip...it was definitely one of the highlights!  Thanks, Marge and Hermann, for welcoming us and taking time out of your already busy schedules to show  us around your neck of the woods!!

Next stop...Lancaster PA...with a few pit stops along the way!

Life After Cows...Trip Part Four...

Finally, another post.  I'd better get this documented before I forget details!!

*Warning...lots of pictures ahead in these next couple of posts, as this was some of the most beautiful country that we encountered this time around!

Early Friday morning, we said good bye to Jenna and headed west on Route 70 through Kansas on our way to my Aunt Alice in Fort Collins CO.  The day started out rather dreary, and we drove through some rain, but by late afternoon some blue sky appeared.

I think desolately beautiful would be one way to describe eastern Colorado!

Grain bins in every town.  I might have to do a collage later, of all the grain bins I took pics of on this trip...

We arrived at my Aunt Alice's house around supper time on Friday.  It was so good to see her!  She is my Mom's younger sister, and has come to Pennsylvania many times to visit us.  (I was named after her and my great Aunt Alice, with whom I share a birthday!)   So many times we wished we could visit her, and finally it happened.  She had a yummy supper waiting for us along with a delicious apple pie for dessert...

She says that she has two cats...but I'm not sure that I believe her.  We only saw one cat the weekend we were there.  Here's Muffin...

Smokey didn't show his face even once.  The only sign I saw of him was a gray streak as something flew up the stairs when I opened the front door after one of our outings.  He apparently hid under her bed the whole time "strangers" were there!  Aunt Alice, you know I'm just giving you a hard time!  :)

On Saturday, Aunt Alice took us up to Estes Park and Rocky Mountain National Park.  It was a cloudy day and we couldn't see the beautiful Colorado skies and the high mountain peaks, but it was still beautiful!

Here we are heading up into the foothills...

Devil's Backbone...

 About to enter Thompson's Canyon on our way to Estes Park...

At every turn (and there were lots of them) we were surrounded by beauty.  It's so different from what we see every day!  We kept our eyes out for mountain goats on the rocks, but our eyes weren't sharp enough to pick any out...

 As we entered Estes Park, we saw herds of Elk lounging around enjoying their weekend...

At the entrance to Rocky Mountain National Park we were happy to hear that the road to Bear Lake was open.  I remember being there when I was ten years old.  Of course it looked quite different then because it was summer time.  I vaguely remember hiking around the lake.  This time however, the lake was frozen over and snow covered so we walked across it rather than around it...

Frozen water falls...

These baby pine cones caught my eye...

The photo-opps were many, and do you see that?  Blue sky peeping through those clouds!

We ended the day being hosted by my cousin Eric and his wife Xioma and family. I hadn't seen "big Eric" as we call him :) since "our Eric" was about two years old.  It was so nice to see him again and to meet his lovely wife and daughters!

This trip was about so much more than just seeing the beautiful sights across the country!  We were happy to spend time with family and friends along the way!

Next up...Colorado Springs and Garden of the Gods.

Life After Cows...Trip Part Two...

Last time I think I left you in West Virginia, where Jim and I enjoyed our first weekend away with my sister and brother in law. 

On Monday morning we packed up our car and headed into the "unknown".  We knew that our next destination would be Hesston Kansas, where our daughter is in college, but we didnt' know exactly which route we would take or where all we might stop.

We wound our way through the mountains of West Virginia, and ended up on Route 64 in Charleston, where we began our trek west towards Jenna.  There were lots of hills and lots of hairpin turns on those roads for the first hour or so!

Kentucky was the first state that we entered that we had never been in before...

What I remember the most, was the amount of steel bridges that we saw and crossed!  It made me think of Eric, who will soon graduate with a degree in Civil Engineering.  Steel structures are in his area of interest...

We found a motel just east of St Louis, where we spent the night.  We hoped to go up into the arch the next morning, but were unable to purchase any tickets online.  Bummer!  Or so we thought.  We decided to stop anyway, and were pleasantly surprised that we could still buy tickets on sight.

It was a gorgeous day!

I must say that if you are at all claustrophobic (which I am) the ride to the top of the tower is a bit of a stretch.  You sit in a small pod with up to four other people, your knees all touching and your shoulders a bit hunched so that you don't bang your head for the 4 minute ride to the top.  The view however, was worth it...

Looking east.  That's the Cargill grain elevator in the front center of the picture, with a barge apparently loading some grain.

Looking to the west.  The St Louis Cardinals baseball stadium is on the far left side of the picture...

The Mississippi River was quite muddy and very high.  I have never really seen it up close before to be able to compare it to "normal", but there were several docks just below us that were partially under water.  There was also a lot of debris in the water that had been caught up in piles near the shore.  A lot of the water from the flooding upstream was clearly making it's way south...

After we came down from the arch, we found a place to grab some lunch, and hopped back in the car for the rest of our trip towards Hesston.

We stopped at a car museum that we saw along Route 70 in western Missouri...

...and made our way southwest from Kansas City just before dark.  If you enlarge the picture, you can see a line of fire on the hillside in the distance.  It's the time of year that farmers burn their fields...

...a beautiful Kansas sunset...as beautiful as it could be from a moving car window anyway...

Finally, look who we found!  We haven't seen her since Christmas!

More next time on our adventures in Kansas and beyond!