Ohio, Indiana, & Home
We are back home now but its bittersweet. We’re glad to be back in Maine safely but sorry that our great adventure is behind us.
A last word about South Dakota. I failed to mention two other South Dakota highlights. First, Badlands National Park.
This geological wonder covers 244,000 acres and its mountains and valleys are mostly sand colored with streaks of red, orange, and brown buried in layers throughout. Ancient horses and rhinos once roamed here but now its mostly bighorned sheep.
On our last night in South Dakota, we stayed in Mitchell in the eastern most edge of the state. Its kind of a small nondescript town but it has one thing to recommend it- a corn palace. Not only is it a corn palace, it is the WORLDS’ ONLY CORN PALACE. Of course, we had to see it.
The first one was built in 1892 as a kind of gathering place for farmers to celebrate the end of harvest season. But it wasn’t big enough so they built a second and third one (in 1921). Today it is mostly an event center for weddings, proms and sports tournaments. If you feel badly that you havent yet traveled there, they do have a corn cam (live feed) so you too can experience this wonder!
We stopped in Michigan to visit friends who live north of Detroit for a two-day respite from the road. They live on a lake and have two dogs so we could relax and even get some bow wow time in. Then, it was on to Cleveland to visit the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame that sits right on Lake Erie.
The city has a great skyline and the Hall of Fame is beautifully designed as a roundish modern structure composed of six floors of R&R memorabilia ranging from the early history of Rock and Roll to present day.
Its fun to see Michael Jackson’s glove and Prince's guitar but we would have liked more videos and the sticker shock of $40 per person and the hordes of school kids visiting that day were discouraging.
The top floor is a changing exhibit but the day we arrived, Jon Bon Jovi made up the entire floor. I like some of his music, and he seems like a great guy but is not one of our favorites. Still, we are glad we went.
Next day, we drove to the zoo in Cinncinnati, which may rival the San Diego Zoo for beauty and large spaces for the animals.
Its also part botanical garden so its lush and colorful. There are lakes and waterfalls throughout. We saw eagles, gorillas, elephants and even manatees.
Our final drive was to Fairmount, Indiana, a town in the middle of nowhere for the sole purpose of paying homage to James Dean, the young actor who rivaled Marlin Brando for raw talent in the 50's but who died in a horrendous car crash at age 24 after making only three movies.
The town has two famous hometown heroes, James Dean and Jim Davis, who was the creator of Garfield.
Of course, we got lost in the middle of a cornfield crossroads when one of the main routes into town was closed. But eventually, we arrived in time to visit the James Dean Museum (which doubles as a Jim Davis museum) a Gallery featuring James Dean memorabilia, a gift shop and a 50's antique gift shop. All our grandmother's and great grandmother's china was there. We also stopped by Dean's gravesite and the farmhouse where his aunt and uncle raised him.
For those following this blog, I will do one more episode to kind of sum up our trip. Thank you for coming on this journey with us. Thank you to our friends and family who welcomed us along the way and to my niece, Julia, for diligently plugging in all the photos and for setting up this blog in the first place.