Weekly Recap: Badlands (SD)

Sunday was another long travel day, though thankfully one with nice weather.  We drove from Minneapolis to Badlands National Park, which was primarily hours of heading directly west on I-90 through corn fields. Of course we saw the notorious "Wall Drug" signs, a series of billboards advertising a store in Wall, SD that started out as a drug store and now covers an absurd variety of stuff. Our first sign helpfully told us that we were "only" 335 miles to Wall Drug, and we passed by dozens more along the way. They did a pretty good job breaking up the monotony and keeping the ads humorous. Near dusk we got to the national park and had to drive a few miles through it to get to our campsite. This gave us a beautiful sneak peak of the scenery the park offers.

Sign #57

The bulk of the drive

The weather on Monday was kind of wild; we woke up to 55 degrees and it was 98 by the afternoon. With the heat we decided not to do anything too ambitious, so we worked and planned to run some errands to the nearby town of Interior. Unfortunately Google was a bit out of date on the town, and one of the two bar/restaurants had closed and the general store hours had changed. With these things closed, we only managed to gas up the truck and pop into the now undisputed "Best Bar in Town" to cool off for a minute.

#1 place in town by default

We got an early start on Tuesday, sticking to east coast hours, so that we could finish up work by early afternoon. Then we took a very scenic drive towards Wall, aiming to get groceries, dinner, and a look at the fabled Wall Drug. The drive to Wall took us along the Badlands Loop Road, which is the primary path through Badlands National Park. The 40 minute drive took us 3 hours from all the stopping we did at the scenic overlooks. In addition to the beauty of the Badlands wall, we also saw hundreds of prairie dogs, a few deer, 3 bighorn sheep, and a bison.

Bryn in the Badlands Wall

Bryn in the Badlands Wall

A canyon in the Wall

Enjoying the incredible views

A bison grazing near the park entrance

Once we left the park and made it to the town of Wall, we checked out the giant dinosaur statue advertising for the Wall Drug exit. Next we did a grocery run before this store closed as well. Then we finally made it to Wall Drug. We explored the store for about 30 minutes before they closed. It is a very eclectic experience, and every room feels like a separate store. Finally we had dinner at a nearby restaurant and heading back to the camper. On way back through the park, we saw several people doing night photography, so we stopped at one of the overlooks and stargazed ourselves. The Milky Way was super vibrant this far from significant light pollution (though we didn't have the cameras necessary to capture it).

355 miles later

Wednesday we worked out after work (Bryn with an erg test, and Shawn with a bike ride up into the closest Badlands pass). After dinner we played the next scenario of Jaws of the Lion.

Thursday we did a couple of short Badland hikes, focusing on the eastern end of the Badlands Wall (our previous drive was on the more western section). The Notch was about a mile long and started by walking into a canyon. This hike included a small ladder section to climb out of the canyon notch, and at the top an incredibly windy view out over the lower plateau. The Window is a very short walk along an accessible boardwalk to an overlook of the Wall's primary dropoff into canyons. Finally we did the Door, which is a half mile long walk out into the Wall. It ended in a great vista surrounded by canyons. Our favorite was the Door, but the Notch was also a very cool hike as well (though a bit harder).

The Notch ladder

Halfway through up the Notch hike

The Notch view

Climbing back down

The Window

The Wall

A view past the Door

Past the Door, in the Wall itself

Friday we worked an early day, getting off work in the early afternoon Mountain Time. Then we went to the Minuteman Missile National Historic Site, checking out the exhibit halls and watching a ~30 minute video. The Great Plains region held many ICBMs during the Cold War (and still holds a smaller number of newer ones). The Badlands area has a decommissioned missile field, and you can separately view the visitor museum (which we saw this evening), a missile silo itself, and the launch control center (with a prescheduled tour). After the museum we drove over to Wall for dinner.

Defunct Cold War ICBM Facilities

On Saturday we had a short travel day. We relocated from our Badlands campsite to one about an hour and a half away in Rapid City, SD. With such a short drive, we were able to add cardio workouts, some shopping errands, and a stop at the Delta-9 Minuteman Missile Silo. During that stop we let Percy explore the Badlands grassland (while on a leash). He was incredibly happy to hop around in endless hay. At night we went out into Rapid City to get drinks at Firehouse Brewing (who had been advertising for miles along I-90 with antique firetrucks) and dinner at Que Pasa Cantina. Bryn said we had to go because of their clever I-90 ads.

The actual silo itself

Percy eats Buffalo Gap grass

Weekly Recap: Wisconsin and Minnesota

Our next long travel day was unfortunately also very wet again. (If you happened to watch the Bears-49ers opening weekend game, we drove past Chicago in the middle of that storm). Percy was much more active during this long trip. We drove all day and traveled through a total of 6 states, ending in Wisconsin. For the second time we set up in the middle of a soaking downpour, but at least this time we were better prepared to do it. This spot was our first back-in site, but it went smoothly despite being dark and wet.

Morning after the rain in Wisconsin

We wanted to be close to Milwaukee, so we chose Cliffside Campground as our home for 3 nights. It's an easy drive to downtown Milwaukee and is south of the city, which helped shorten our already long drive there. Monday was a trailer day. We set up Starlink, worked, and ate leftovers for lunch. Bryn erged and then we went to Walmart to pick up some groceries and other small items we felt we needed. 

Tuesday we had a full day in Milwaukee. We woke up early to go to Planet Fitness, then headed to a laundromat close to a cafe in East Side. Our morning was spent working and popping over from Colectivo Coffee to East Side Maytag to check on our laundry. We switched to Good City Brewery for a late lunch and stayed there for the rest of the work day. We liked all these places. The coffee shop had delicious breakfast and lunch options and the brewery was an awesome find--great wifi, food, and beer selection. Of course, we got cheese curds.

 

After we finished work, we headed to Great Lakes Distilling for some cocktails. They have a wide selection of alcohol and the drinks were delicious. For dinner, we walked down the street to Zocalo Food park. They have a group of food truck gathered so we could pick whatever we were craving! Shawn got pizza and empanadas, Bryn got sushi. This was an awesome find and we highly recommend it if you're visiting Milwaukee!

 

The next day (Wednesday) we drove to Minneapolis, trading off driving and working in the car. Our campsite setup was pretty quick and uneventful. Bryn went on a nice sunset row with Lake Phalen Rowing.

On Thursday night we went into Minneapolis to have dinner and catch a Twins game. We got seats for $7 (and the stands were still mostly empty). The difference between a decade old baseball stadium (Target Field) and a century old one (Fenway) was very noticeable. The weather was great and we had a blast despite the lack of any interest in the two teams playing.

We spent Friday night in the camper due to forecasted rain (which didn't really materialize). After work we did another Planet Fitness workout and then cooked dinner at "home". We didn't realize it at first, but our entire dinner was from Costco. We played another scenario of Gloomhaven: Jaws of the Lion and went to bed early to prepare for our big Saturday in Minneapolis. We are about a quarter of the way through a campaign of the main Gloomhaven with some friends back in Boston, so we've decided to play through the smaller Jaws of the Lion with just the two of us while we are on the road.

Saturday was a packed day. We started with an early workout. Bryn did a Row House class and Shawn ran outside. Next we checked out the Mall of America. We did a little window shopping and walked around investigating the ridiculous size of this mall. We got a snack at the food court and debated doing some of the roller coasters in the indoor amusement park. Eventually we decided to just do the Fly Over America "4-D" experience, which was enjoyable.

After the mall we drove to Minnehaha Falls to have a picnic lunch. It turned out that the river is currently dried up so there was no waterfall to view. At least a plaque informed us that we were in good company: the same had happened when Lyndon B. Johnson visited in 1964. Though the city pulled out all the stops (literally!) for him and temporarily flooded the riverbed from some hydrants. Despite the lack of waterfall, it was a very nice park to eat our lunch in.

For our afternoon activity we visited the Minneapolis Institute of Art. We didn't realize that it is free entry, which was a pleasant surprise. It had a great and diverse collection. Shawn's favorite were the "period rooms" (whole rooms designed in a certain style/time period), Bryn's was "Halloween" and Percy, if he appreciated art, would surely love "Peeling".

After the museum we met up with some friends who had moved to Minneapolis a couple of years ago for med school. We had dinner and drinks with them at O'Shaughnessy Distilling Co., Surly Brewing, and Indeed Brewing. It was great to catch up with them, who we haven't seen since pre-COVID besides a chance encounter at the Chicago airport. Fingers crossed for a Boston-based residency!

Weekly Recap: New York (Cooperstown, Buffalo, Toronto)

Our first longer travel day was unfortunately very wet. There was steady, pouring rain from upstate Vermont all the way to our campsite in Cooperstown, NY. When we arrived, we set up in the rain and got soaked through. 

Arrived in Cooperstown

Bryn had to miss most of our 3 night stop in Cooperstown, New York. She had a work visit to do nearby and then had to drive to Connecticut for another work visit. This did give us an opportunity to see how one of us traveling without the other will work. Shawn drove the camper from Cooperstown to Buffalo alone, including tearing down and setting up camps, giving us confidence that we can handle these solo when needed. While in Cooperstown Shawn took the opportunity to check out the Baseball Hall of Fame as well as the disc golf course at Ommegang Brewery.

Baseball Hall of Fame

We got a campsite about 20 minutes from downtown Buffalo and stayed for 3 nights. We used the first two to go into Buffalo. The Bills happened to be playing the NFL season opener on our first night, so we went to a bar to try out their buffalo wings and watch the game. The fans at the bar were very enthusiastic about the game. Our second night we used Planet Fitness for the first time then went to dinner at the Southern Tier taproom. Afterwards we checked out the nearby Pearl Street Brewery as well, which had a very cool fan system that felt almost steampunk. We liked their pumpkin beer so much we grabbed a four pack to go.

The next day we did a day trip to Toronto, stopping at Niagara Falls on the way there. They were definitely worth the visit and reminded us of Gullfoss in Iceland (Horseshoe falls at Niagara is definitely larger, but you can't get as close). We skipped all the tourist activities around the Canadian side except for seeing the falls themselves to save more time for Toronto (about an hour and a half drive away).

In Toronto we walked along the waterfront and then went to King Taps for lunch. After lunch we checked out the Hockey Hall of Fame. They had a special "9/99" exhibit on Gordie Howe and Wayne Gretzky. We also got to see all the NHL trophies, including the Stanley Cup.

After the Hall of Fame our next stop was the Museum of Illusions. This was a fairly small museum with a bunch of optical illusions. It was very cool and a great way to spend an hour. Our favorite illusion was a  stationary walkway through rotating tunnel walls. Despite being on a solid walkway we both felt like we were going to fall over.

Finally we grabbed a poutine appetizer and headed to dinner. We ate at Pearl Harborfront Chinese Cuisine. Bryn loved the dinner dim sum they had. Once we finished there it was time to head back to our Buffalo campsite to get ready for our next travel day (and to see Percy!).

We decided to make a big push west after Buffalo, so our next drive was long! Stay tuned for our next recap.

So many climates, so little storage!

Our camper has, thankfully, a generous amount of storage. However, we have opted to take some bulky items due to how long we’ll be on the road and the activities we plan on doing. Both of us packed snow gear for super cold climates plus skis/snowboard which are large, then we also brought snow shoes, Shawn’s golf clubs, and Bryn’s erg. Our snow gear is stowed in a plastic tote in our “basement” (aka the area in the front of our camper, accessible from doors on either side), alongside our snowshoes and ski and snowboard bags. This takes up a majority of this space, unfortunately, and the rest is used for the camping components like power cord, water lines, and towing gear.

Percy's Cabinet

The pantry and kitchen cabinets of the camper are more than enough to fit our needs for this trip. We have everything we need and it comfortably fits without feeling cramped. We have a section for cleaning supplies, first aid, miscellaneous office supplies, and Percy's things like hay and treats. We are very lucky that the built in storage is so ample.

We turned a cabinet over the toilet into our dirty laundry area, as there is minimal floor space and definitely no room for a laundry basket. On the other wall is a cabinet with back up toiletries, toilet paper, linens, and laundry supplies (detergent, stain removers, laundry bag for laundry days, iron/steamer, etc.).

Linen closet/Bathroom storage

 

Dirty Laundry Cabinet

The next space things DO get a little hairy in is the personal storage in the bedroom. We've split this down the middle so we have a small closet for hanging clothes, two shelves above the bed, and half the under-bed storage area. Each side of the bed has a nightstand with a good-sized drawer. We purchased small baskets that we've velcro'd to the corner of the nightstands as a catch-all so that we don't have to struggle to corral knickknacks when it's time to move. We've both opted to use the under-bed storage for casual clothes, workout clothes, and shoes in bins to compartmentalize. We plan on hanging shoe storage near the door for shoes we are actively wearing while keeping the rest under the bed.

A hiccup in our storage arrangement was the discovery that the hanging rods were loose at their attachment to the outer wall of the trailer (worse on Bryn's side, but we remedied both). Shawn cut plywood to size and reattached the rod to the plywood for SO much stability.

For extra storage, we brought along 3 large plastic totes (the same type of tote in our “basement”) which will live in the truck bed for easy access. Currently, two of these totes are empty. One holds our heated blanket, nice winter coats, thick sweaters, and winter shoes. The totes are stackable, so the empty ones don’t take up any room and are good to have, just in case!

The biggest challenge of packing was deciding what and how much to bring. We don't want to run out of clothes before we can get to a laundromat, we want to be comfortable, we want to look nice occasionally, and we need to be prepared for any weather. Our travels will takes us through South Dakota, the Tetons, Yellowstone, and Montana in the fall, PNW, Idaho, Utah, and Nevada as winter sets in, then California in January, Arizona in February, New Mexico in March, finishing with spring skiing in Colorado. We'll be changing climates and weather every few weeks, so we need to be flexible. It's certainly a challenge. Bryn already left a bag of clothes at Shawn's parents' house before our official departure (because she overpacked). We'll have a chance to ween down more when Shawn returns to MA for Thanksgiving, if we need to.