Road Trip 3rd Leg - South Dakota to Michigan

Last leg of our trip (click here for first to see the eclipse and second to Mt. Rushmore and Devils Tower) took us on I90 thru South Dakota - I planned to stop at Wall Drugs which is highlighted on the things to do in South Dakota list but when we got there and drove in front of it I changed my mind. There were SO MANY people trying to park and enter that I decided driving by counted as seeing it. Google it to see for yourself - it's got a cool interesting history (in a nutshell the family who owned this little store came up with a genius way to get travelers to stop by and it's now a huge added-onto store full of everything. Everything.). I didn't even take a picture I wanted to get out of there so bad.

Next place I planned to visit was the Corn Palace in Mitchell, SD. Then as we were getting close we start seeing all these signs about the "Corn Festival" being held - you guessed it - the date we were there. They shut down the streets all around the arena (really, the Corn Palace is an arena/convention center - not a palace!) and hold concerts, etc. all weekend. So we aborted that plan and kept on going...maybe next time.

Spent the night in Sioux Falls - after getting home I heard there is a new list put out of the "happiest places to live" and the top 10 are towns in California, except number 5 is Sioux Falls! I had no idea, the people did seem very friendly hahaha...

I took no pictures this day of driving - it's very pretty country tho! My favorite thing about the day is meeting a woman camping nearby that also has a mini RV like ours (it's a Travato if you're interested), she mentioned there is a Facebook group only about Travato's and I should check out what other people have done to customized theirs...Dave just looked at me with an "uh oh, here she goes" look. I immediately joined the site and was blown away by some of the changes others have done! As soon as I got home I got busy - here are a few of the things we did: (some I borrowed from other people, some I came up with myself once the creative juices started flowing!)

we added a wire shelf over the side sliding door. D will have to learn to duck and not hit
his head (!) but we picked up a ton of un-used space. I got a 6' x 1' wire shelf at Home Depot, which fits perfectly.

 Rolled up there now is all of the window shades that we used to jam into the overhead space over the cab, freeing up that area to store bedding which I fought with every morning and night before! I also have room now to store a very lightweight stick vacuum dust buster thing (I found at Walmart for $20!)  to help with keeping things clean - it's one of the few I could find that still have a cord, everything's cordless now, but I didn't want to have to leave it plugged in all the time to charge. The space is small enough that I can reach everything while the cord is plugged in. 

one end of the shelf is resting in the overhead space over the cab (we anchored it down with a piece of wood and some screws to keep it stable) and the other end is being held up with 2 command hooks. In the middle we supported it with a piece of wire wrapped around the shelf and hooked to one of the ceiling screws - just to give it a little more support so it hopefully won't sag.
Hanging on one hook is the dreamcatcher I posted here.

 

this change we made a while ago when we decided that the "wardrobe" closet wasn't really needed for clothes (it came  empty with a rod across the top) and had Mark install some shelves instead. It now holds tons of stuff like bags, pet food and supplies, nesting pans, cleaning and extra paper supplies, games, and it's the "liquor cabinet" as well! On the door I hung a mirror and plastic basket using Command strips, I can sit on the edge of the bed and fix myself up so I'm not fighting Dave for the tiny bathroom space. 

this one might not work if things bang around and rattle too much, but for now I've hung up a couple plastic coffee mugs and stacked the dishes in a lid organizer standing on a small wire shelf. Under the shelf are serving bowls and plastic containers. In a plastic basket stuck to the back wall (you can barely see it) I have disposable plastic glasses, can cozies, dish soap, etc. 

hung up a paper towel holder on the side wall over the kitchen area, decorated the space with battery powered mini lights, put up the orange magnetic board on the left (it's holding my new cork flower vase I posted here), and stuck 3 small photos in lightweight plastic frames on the wall using Command strips. 

We don't shower in our tiny bathroom so hung this wire shelf up to hold towels and a wire basket filled with things like sunscreen, first aid kit, eyedrops, etc. I stuck a small towel bar underneath it to hang small wet things like my bath scrubby and washcloths. 

This is the back wall of the Travato when you open the back doors (the bed is to the left behind one closed door).  It now holds quite a few things like a broom, flyswatter, umbrella, etc. and I mounted part of a hanging shoe holder up to corral a bunch of small things that were stuffed in a junk drawer before - bug spray, flashlight, small tools, duct tape, bungie cords, etc. 

Oh wait, I just remembered I took one picture in Blue Earth, Minnesota - home of the (ho ho ho) Jolly Green Giant! If you look closely you can see Dave posing with the giant :)

The last leg of the trip took us thru the Wisconsin Dells, we didn't see much because it was just a stop to sleep on our way home but my impression is there are a lot of kids there. A lot. Really, a lot. Maybe we'll revisit when it's off-season to get a better look at everything!

That's it for this road trip journal - 10 days saw us do a big loop from Michigan thru Nebraska to see the eclipse, northwest to South Dakota and Wyoming, thru Minnesota and Wisconsin back to MI. Good to be home but we had a great time and I'd do it again in a heartbeat! Thanks for reading about our latest adventure!


one year ago today: Pina Colada Cupcakes

Road Trip 2nd Leg - Mt. Rushmore

After seeing the eclipse in Nebraska (click here for that post) we moved west to visit Mt. Rushmore - I've been wanting to see it for years and can now cross it off the travel bucket list!

The drive from Kearney to Mt. Rushmore took about 6 and 1/2 hours, an easy day of driving. We saw wild buffalo herds and fields of prairie dogs - of course had to stop to take pictures! Sarge didn't like the buffalo and kept barking at them - they were so close to us tho and totally giving us the stink eye, I kept saying "great, we are gonna cause a buffalo stampede"! Yes, these are things I worry about hahaha! 

we pulled over on the highway to watch the wild buffalo

We were getting in pretty early so decided to stop off and see the Crazy Horse memorial on the way - it was going to cost $22 to enter and we could clearly see it from the road (and honestly, there isn't much to see!) so we snapped some pictures from the van and kept moving. They have been working on the memorial for like 70 years, the idea is like Mt. Rushmore - they are planning to carve Crazy Horse into the side of a mountain - but unlike Mt. Rushmore, it is very slow going. They have his face done and are working on his arm and pointing finger at the moment - Dave took this picture, it's showing the side of his face (at the top middle) with what will be his arm pointing straight out in front of him to the right (the equipment is sitting on his arm:

Anyway, since we didn't go in this was a very quick stop. Headed to the KOA at Mt. Rushmore for a couple nights - this is the biggest campground we have seen so far in our limited campground experience. It was a small city! It has multiple pools, waterslides, a rodeo arena, restaurants and stores galore - check out the campsite map:

We were up in the back by the rodeo arena (thank goodness there wasn't a rodeo then, I'm SO allergic!!) which was nice, away from the majority of the crowds but a long way from everything "entertaining" so didn't go explore much.

The next morning we headed a few minutes away to Mt. Rushmore; there isn't an entrance fee but you do have to pay to park. You can see it from the road (just like with the Crazy Horse memorial) if you don't want to enter but it was cool to go in and see it up close. There are trails you can walk around but it was really hot and Sarge was in the RV (we left the generator on but when it's so blasted hot I still worry - what if something happens and the generator quits? I don't like to leave him for long when the weather is like that) so we just took pictures, went thru the little museum and watched a short film on the making of the memorial (note: I totally didn't want to do this but D did, and it was worth it. If you get there and think you don't want to watch I recommend you do!).

We were only at Mt. Rushmore about an hour, so since it was early in the day Dave wanted to drive up to Wyoming and see Devils Tower (it's featured in the movie Close Encounters of the Third Kind). It's a little over 2 hours away and as we were driving we had the thought that we were then going to have to return 2 hours the same way and then the next day drive the same 2 hour route to continue our journey - that's a lot of doubling back so we made the decision to forfeit our 2nd night at Mt. Rushmore and relocate to Devils Tower. Turned out to be the right decision, the campground at Devils Tower was great, our site backed up to the tower and it's a beautiful area. The opposite of Mt. Rushmore, it's a small quaint campground (although they do have a restaurant and store which was nice) and the people are great. We ended up staying 2 nights here we liked it so much!

our view of Devils Tower from our campsite.

we took about an hour hike around the base of the tower

We were here on Dave's birthday so treated ourselves to breakfast at Cattle Kate's at the campground - it's hooked onto the store so I grabbed some caramel corn to give him as a little birthday treat and when I paid and told the register lady what it was for she said "oh I wish I had something nice to wrap it in!" Haha, so cute - I told her "it's just caramel corn and he's sitting right there watching me buy it so it doesn't need special wrapping " LOL.

My new favorite camping dinner is individual grilled pizza. I brought along small pre-baked pizza shells that we topped with sauce, chopped canadian bacon and canned mushrooms, shredded mozzarella. D put them on the gas grill for a few minutes until they were crispy and the cheese melted, doesn't take long. Oh man these were so good we had them again a few nights later!


one year ago today: wine cork keychain

2 Days In Amsterdam

Spring in Amsterdam - without even realizing it we happened to book a trip in time to see the tulips! Amazing, and an unexpected treat. It was a quick stop so tried to see as much as possible in a short amount of time - the first day we hired a local tour guide to give us a walking tour of the town. 

A couple things stood out: 1) the city was surprisingly dirty, trash everywhere and that really surprised us. Maybe there's a garbage strike or something? I wonder if that's how it always is? and 2) the architecture is so interesting and unusual - they have buildings that are actually crooked because of the foundations being so old and rotting away (they are built on wooden poles because the soil is so wet). Fortunately most of the houses are touching the house next door so they are sort of holding each other up - but some of them are so so crooked it looks like they should fall over! I wonder how they feel on the inside - if you drop something in one room does it roll to the other side of the house? I'm tippy on a good day so this could mean big trouble for me if I lived there...

The guide did a quick walk thru of the "red light district" - I didn't know what to expect (should have read up on it I guess). There are literally scantily clad women (all ages and sizes!) standing behind full length windows with a red light over each one trying to entice men (and women too I imagine) in. When they get a customer they close a curtain over their window indicating they are "busy". Wow. Just wow. And sad. And super awkward, I didn't know where to look! We ended the day with a canal cruise for a different view of the city which was a pretty cool way to see everything.

there are 7 bridges in a row that you can see thru looking
down this canal

pretty much every street looks the same with canals, boats, bikes, row houses...

Can you see how the house on the left is crooked? And the city's
 narrowest house is the little dark red one in the middle!

wait, I want the best croissant...

the front door of the house that Anne Frank and her family hid in
and where she wrote her diary -
now that I've seen where she lived I really want to re-read her story. 

dinner our first night was one of our favorites the entire trip -
if you get a chance go to the Restaurant Haesje Claes for
traditional Dutch food...especially the pea soup, Stampot (mashed potatoes
mixed with other veggies) and Beef Stew. Yum!


For our second day we hired a driver/guide to take us outside of the city - we went to Kukenof gardens to see the amazing flowers, stopped at a little village to photograph some windmills (don't you think of Dutch windmills along with tulips? apparently most of the windmills are gone now and they just keep a few for "the tourists". I was a little bummed to hear that!) and eat lunch,  and a visit to a touristy shop to see how cheese (my new favorite is a Gouda called "Old Friend") and wooden shoes are made...it was a little cheesy (no pun intended haha) but informative and we sampled lots of different locally made cheese - I didn't try the "hemp cheese" tho! 

my pictures of the gardens really don't do the flowers justice - they were magnificent!

lunch was "Mustard soup" - SO good!!! I have to learn how to make this!  seemed
to be a regular cream soup with the addition of mustard seeds, I will experiment and let you know...

I enjoyed seeing Amsterdam and am happy we had a couple days here, not my all-time favorite city but the food was great, people are nice, and it felt safe...After 2 busy full days we flew to Edinburgh, Scotland - more on that later!

Suitcase Divider

Before I tell you about our latest trip I have to show you what I just made, I'm super excited about this actually because the idea just came to me when I was posting about my packing list yesterday and I was thinking about how helpful a suitcase divider would have been. I googled and can't find anything like what I pictured so I just made it up myself - woohoo, Shark Tank here I come!

 Ok, ok, maybe you aren't finding this as exciting as am I...but I love the idea and it's going to be so helpful on my next trip. I took hollow core cardboard from some leftover packing material that hasn't made it into the recycle bin yet (D had to buy another tabletop grill, don't even get me started about that), measured and cut it to fit in my suitcase (one long piece the width of the suitcase and one shorter piece to divide one half vertically), then because plain old cardboard is boring I hot glued some old fabric around it so it's purdy. Before I take this idea to Shark Tank I will come up with a better way to cover the cardboard cuz I burned the shizzle out of my fingers stretching the fabric around the cardboard! Sigh. Wedged the inserts into the suitcase and now I have 3 separate spaces for organizing my travels - I'm imagining the bottom space will hold my shoes, one top part will have my clothes and maybe one of the packed cubes; the other part will hold toiletries, underthings, and accessories. I'm feeling like going on another trip just to test out my new invention!

As I mentioned, my bag got slapped with a "heavy" label so it was important to not make the divider out of anything that will add weight! This hollow core cardboard worked perfect, but I think regular cardboard will also work. I also chose the lightest fabric I had on hand, initially I was going to use felt but went with this super light cotton that doesn't match very well instead - I am my grandmother's granddaughter after all so just used what I had in the closet for instant craft gratification, when I sell this idea I'll make it out of fabric that matches the inside of the suitcase better ;).

Travel Packing List - Amsterdam, Scotland, and Ireland in Spring

Ok, I've talked before about packing light and really really thought I was doing good this time around...and yet I still took too much! Ugh. When will I learn...? We were very lucky with the weather this trip - I thought we would have lots of rain and it'd be chilly so everything I packed was thin and lightweight to be able to layer as needed, but it only rained a couple times! It was still nice to have the multiple light layering pieces so I did good there, but I just took more than I needed. Nothing like getting up to the baggage drop counter and having them put a "heavy" tag on your bag (I was a little offended on behalf of my bag, that's kind of a rude label if you ask me LOL!). In my defense I didn't have to use the extender zipper to fit it all tho, so there's that.

We were gone 16 days - I googled, researched, and studied other people's suggested packing lists for the areas we were going and they basically all said the same things...layers layers layers and lots of black/gray/white. I pretty much followed suit and took the following (I don't have the fancy app that lets you take organized nice clean pictures of everything you are packing like everyone on Pinterest does, so just use your imagination - "gray long sleeved t-shirt" is not hard to figure out without a photo). I kept the pieces basic so I could wear them multiple ways:

2 jeans (dark-wash straight leg, light-wash skinny)
1 black stretchy jeggings (a cross between black jeans and leggings - they look like jeans though)
1 black leggings
3 button up long sleeved tops (white, jean, black)
2 long sleeved t-shirts (gray, black/white stripe)
2 lightweight hoodies (cream, gray)
2 short sleeved shirts (cream, black)
red pullover light sweater with hood
black pullover light sweater
gray pullover light sweater
black cardigan
multi colored (brown/blue/cream/gray) cardigan
flowy dressy tank
short sleeve black button up dress with a little collar and tie belt
2 thin down vests (silver, cream)
2 scarves (both matched everything)
tall brown boots
black ankle high combat boots
brown/black ballet shoes
hiking tennis shoes
a couple tight tanks for layering
pajamas
swimsuit and coverup shorts
hip length black jacket
long black light rain coat/shell with a hood
knit hat, lightweight gloves

That equals 4 bottoms, 12 outer shirts (not counting short sleeve and tanks that I never wore alone), 1 dress, 1 flowy dressy tank in case we went somewhere "nice". All of the places we went are super casual, or if they were a little nicer no one cared what we wore so we still wore casual clothes. I wore the dress one time under the black pullover top with tights and tall boots - totally didn't need to take it. I wore the dark straight jeans with ballet flats one time, didn't need either of those pieces either. Only wore the multi-colored cardigan once, didn't need it. Did not wear the flowy tank or the short sleeve black t-shirt. The tall brown boots were an extra that I debated packing but I wore them all the time and am so glad I decided to bring. A couple of the hotels had pools but there was never time to swim so didn't need the swimsuit.  I didn't pack anything that was bulky or heavier-weight and didn't need them so that's good. Now that I've been I would pack a little differently if I ever go back to these places around this time of year:

dark wash skinny jeans
black stretchy jeans
black leggings
2 button up long sleeve tops (either white, jean, or black - didn't need all 3)
1 or 2 long sleeved t-shirts in neutral color (I never wore this without a shirt overtop, it's just for layering)
2 lightweight pullovers
1 long cardigan
2 lightweight hoodie/shirts (I wore these a lot!)
2 thin vests (1 down and 1 fleece)
1 lightweight fleece either pullover or zip up
scarves and jewelry to jazz up the neutrals
1 coat that has a hood and is water repellant that can be worn with everything. I took 2 different ones and layered them but one light- to mid-weight would have done it.
tall boots, ankle boots, hiking shoes
2 tight layering tanks
pajamas
knit hat

I could probably pare down even farther, and this amount of clothes will probably still earn me a "heavy" bag tag but there would be less to deal with which would be nice and this amount of clothing would still give me lots of mix and match options - and something I should have remembered is that you are pretty much wearing a jacket or vest over every outfit every day so what you have on underneath is really not seen all that much!

Some packing tips and ideas:
-I rolled all of my shirts and laid them in a single layer in the top part of my suitcase that has a zip around cover in the lid - when I unzipped it the shirts were all in order and functioned almost like a drawer. I could see everything and didn't have to move any shirts to get to another one. That worked great.

-I used 3 cube things to keep my bag in order: 1 big one for tanks, swimsuit, pajamas, etc. 1 medium one for under things and socks. 1 smaller one for hair accessories and jewelry.

-Put a shower cap over the soles of the shoes you are packing so they aren't touching your clothes, and for my boots I put them in a large plastic bag (or a plastic grocery bag). Pack a couple extra plastic grocery bags in case your clothes or shoes get wet from the rain and you need to put them back in your suitcase before drying out.

-If you are traveling someplace that is normally rainy, spray your boots, purse, backpack, etc. with water repellant spray before you go. I did this to my shoes and boots and never had wet feet.

-Bring along a piece of bubble wrap in case you buy anything fragile (I brought home 2 coffee cups and wrapped them up in the bubble wrap and placed between the down vests).

-Print out your name and contact info on a piece of paper and include it in your suitcase in case the outer tag gets ripped off.

Here are some photos so you get an idea of what we wore:

skinny jeans, tall boots, black cardigan, blue button up shirt with tank under, scarf. 

I'm wearing a tank, jean shirt, lightweight hoodie, thin down vest
with my skinny jeans and tall leather boots...too many layers, we were
all peeling off clothes in the warm sunshine!

yep, our guide Scott wore a kilt every day - even when it was cold!

skinny jeans, hiking/tennis shoes, black pullover with long sleeve t-shirt under,  down vest

it was cold and rained pretty hard the day we went to the Cliffs of Moher -
definitely a layering day. I have on my knit hat, and put my jacket under
the hooded rainshell, and wore my waterproof hiking/tennis shoes.
Stayed warm and dry!

If there are any guys reading this post, here is Dave's packing list:

3 jeans (black, gray, blue)
1 chico/khaki dressier pants
2 plaid flannel shirts
2 plaid cotton button up shirts
2 lightweight turtlenecks (tan, black)
1 lightweight pullover (gray)
1 short sleeve polo (black)
Nike lightweight lounge/workout pants and pullover (black)
1 swim shorts
2 short sleeve t-shirts (gray)
1 mid-weight hip length jacket with hood (gray)
2 pairs shoes (hiking/tennis shoes and loafers)

He didn't wear the chinos, black jeans, swim shorts, or the polo shirt. The Nike pants and pullover he wore on travel days. He says he didn't need anything other than what he brought, wouldn't change his packing list other than not needing that many bottoms.

I'm going to do a few travel blog posts for the next couple days if you're interested - stay tuned!