Day 35

Beginning of the end

We hadn’t planned to end our trip today, but that is what’s happening—today we were really on our way home. Before, we knew we were heading home but still had more to see on the way. Now, the only things left to see would be from the car.

We got up around 8 a.m. to the noise coming from Butch and the kids next to us. Those kids whine a lot and mother likes the always threatening, “I’ll give you three seconds to give that to her; One… Two…” I guess it worked because I don’t think I heard her scream “THREE!!!” at all.

Our plan was to get to Illinois and find a place to camp there, getting as far away from these people as possible. We were leaving the west behind, and by tonight we would be back east, not something that excited me, although both of us were pretty anxious to get back home again and see our friends and family.

We got on I-90 and headed east. Unfortunately, we had to take interstates most of the way home because, for me, school starts in a few days. I am entering my final year at Villanova. We crossed into the Central Time Zone in Murdo, South Dakota, the line splits the state in half. There were about 260 miles to cover in South Dakota alone.

We crossed the Missouri River again—another sign we’re leaving the west behind. Near the crossing are two reservations with several forts left from the westward expansion days. I would have liked to go visit them, but time does not permit this. Passed through Mitchell, South Dakota, home of the Corn Palace. The only reason I know about this is because my grandfather always stopped in when he was in the neighborhood. Why he did this, I do not know. I suppose it’s because he grew up on a farm.

It was a nice, clear day, a good day to travel. Around 1:30 we crossed the line into Minnesota. We stopped in Luverne, 12 miles inside the border, and got lunch and gas—we all need to be fed. From here, we turned south into Iowa on US 75.

Iowa

The landscape appeared to change dramatically as soon as we crossed into Iowa. Now all the roads were squared off, no diagonal or curvy roads here. We stayed on this road until we entered Le Mars, the ice cream capital of the world. They have a factory here I guess.

We turned east on IA 3. This road was a straight, 305-mile shot to Dubuque on the opposite side of the state. The landscape and odor of this state is such that if you fell asleep and woke up three hours later, it would be as if you hadn’t moved. I swear, the entire state is one big farm.

We passed through towns like Pocahontas, Humbolt, Goldfield, and the big one… Waverly. This was another town with old churches and store fronts. A lot of old people as well. As we approached Dubuque, we watched a large thunderstorm before us in the distance. The sun was low and the thunderhead looked spectacular in the setting sun’s light, people were pulling over and taking pictures of it.

We were getting closer to the Mississippi River and the land was becoming a bit hilly. We picked up US 52 which goes directly into Dubuque. The road was even curvy and there were trees—a lot of them. It was getting dark now and the storm was looking like more of a threat since we were driving into it.

Catching up to the storm

By the time we were in Dubuque, it was very windy and the rain was coming down. We got gas and kept going. This town is very blue collar and industrial. There was no sign of prosperity in this place, with run-down, empty stores on every block. We crossed the mighty Mississippi on US 20 and into the very top of Illinois, a stone’s throw from Wisconsin.

It was about 9 p.m. now, and the rain was coming down fiercely. As we continued east, the road was under construction and there were no lane lines. This did not help. The road was covered with water and the rain was coming down so fast and I couldn’t see the road. There were even periods of hail now and then.

I wanted to find a place to pull over, but I couldn’t, and even if I had, we would have had to drive through the storm again. This was one of the reasons we decided to continue on tonight and drive as long as we could. This was the same front that hit us in South Dakota Tuesday night, and if we stopped we would have to drive through it somewhere between here and home again. So, we continued on…