The forth of July

After one final push, and our longest day of driving we made it to the Salt Lake Valley in 8 hours.
Our stay in Utah began with working in Grandmas backyard in Rose Park, Utah. We got really dirty and really stinky and had a blast, pulling weeds and putting down a little porch for her! Im pretty sure we were just glad to be out of the car.

After all the hard work we did some eating, that was some good corn on the cob.

And we decided that the best way to end a long road trip is by playing with fire and blowing things up. Its a good thing it was the forth of July!

Mt. Rushmore: the west side of SD

on the otherside of SD we found Mt Rushmore, which was strangley disappointing

turns out the actual Mount was much more impressive

and we took some time to take it in

Corn Palace, South Dakota

i dont even know what to say about this place, after 7 thousand miles, we come to Mitchell, South Dakota, and we find this

corny doesnt begin to describe it

not even close

in the 1800's, Lincoln paid people to settle the SD plains, they found it was well suited to growing corn, they build up this "Corn Palace" to house civic events, over time famous entertainers came there to perform. every year they redecorate it inside and out with corn murals, this hallway has photos dating back a hundred years.

i guess there's so much cheap, government subsidised corn that they started making murals out of it. it hurts me deep down to my libertarian bones

otherwise, SD was a nice drive, it was good to be away from the east and all those trees.

Baraboo Wisconsin: the circus lives on

past Chicago, at the beginning of our long push toward home, we came across a gem, Baraboo Wisconsin, home of Barnum and Bailey Circus, where you can see clowns, and wild creatures like this one - yikes!!

they've been in this small nowhere town for 120 years. can you imagine the scene that must have ensued as the talented and freaks of the world decended on this unsuspecting little place.

i contented myself with the fat lady

we wandered aground the ancient and hallowed circus grounds and admired all the well travelled artifacts. we saw how clowns are born

we saw the stupidest animal in the jungle, with an apparent attention span of about 3 mintues

and one of the smartest and suprisingly talented, we actually watched these elephants walk on a ball, and skip!! honest to Pete - skip! it was really wierd
after a while i was genuinely wierded out and we had to be on our way

i think it was really getting to Jenn

on our way out of town we stopped and got some Wisconsin Squeeky Cheese and were entertained for miles and miles

Chicago: Land of Giants

I was not prepared for Chicago. its a world-class city filled with famous architecture here's me under Frank Gehry's monster amphitheater

and Jenn in front of the giant jelly bean

it was all i could do to keep her from trying to eat it
there was nothing to do in this town but take an architecture tour, here's our old guide, he was great, always flapping his arms with enthusiasm

chicago is the birthplace of the skyscraper, and remains the skyscraper capital of the nation (except for new york, of course). heres an old building thats getting scrubbed clean of the decades of soot, most of it from the early 1900's when chicago was blackened by the soot of coal fired power plants

and inside one of the buildings is this famous mural made by the Tiffany company, it depicts the friar that settled this land before he died of influenza

after taking in all the grandeour, the only thing left to do was to eat a deep-dish chicago style pizza. we happened to be there during The Taste of Chicago festival, where all the restaurants set up a booth in the central park, so we had the whole town at our disposal. the verdict? give me Barro's pizza anyday!

Detroit: Sign of the Times

I'm fascinated with Detroit.

the car industry collapse left it an empty shell

its row after row of abandoned industrial buildings

and houses I heard that there are some 12,000 abandoned homes in detroit, 50,000 in foreclosure, and the average selling price in 2008 was ~$18,000. if you want to see 100 very poignant examples, check this out http://www.100abandonedhouses.com/
even the churches are abandoned
the decline of detroit is a stunning visual of the car industry collapse, I'll be keeping my eye on this town.

On the lighter side, Uncle Bill arranged for a personal tour of Kinny's garage.
he's worked for years making concept cars for the big automakers

its a huge and impressive operation with warehouses filled with old industrial age equipment like this one, and the most state of the art, computer controlled millers

this is Terry showing me all around the place, teaching me the secrets of the trade. you can tell these guys are doing what they love

well i'm ready, when do i start?

Niagra Falls: Up the creek without a Barrel

After Palmyra, we headed up to The Great White North, well, almost, as we were stopped by these unpassable falls. the view from the top is pretty cool, but we decided we needed to take a closer look...

the "Niagra Falls In A Barrell" tour got discontinued for some reason, so we had to take this boat instead

here's a picture of me when i was still dry and still thought this was a good idea

and here's some of the great views you get from the water

then it got pretty intense

have you ever seen a sadder sight?

and then, randomly, is tesla