This Wild and Wonderful Adventure is Winding Down...

Today is the 8th of October, marking the beginning of the 6th month that we have been "on the road". It seems like a very long time ago that we left Flagler Beach - on May 7th - but, concurrently, it has been the MOST exciting and fascination experience of our lifetimes!

We are still wending our way back to Florida and expect to pull into our driveway some where around the 25th. There are a few more stops to make along the way; we're visiting Pat's Great Aunt in Humeston, Iowa for a few days and then on to Moscow, IA to have the jacks worked on, and then to Oshkosh, WI to visit friends, and then to Nappanee, IN to stop at the Newmar factory to pick up some items for the RV, and then to Tennessee to visit a friend of Pat's Mom and a last stop in Atlanta to visit some friends. As long as we're up here it makes sense to do these errands and visit these friends on the final leg home.

During the last couple weeks we have continued to visit some interesting places and see some fascinating sites. In Montana we stopped at the Little Bighorn Battlefield which memorializes one of the last armed efforts of the Northern Plains Indians to preserve their ancestral way of life. It was here at the Little Bighorn, in June 1876, that more than 260 soldiers and attached personnel of the US Army met defeat and death at the hands of several thousand Lakota and Cheyenne warriors. Among the dead were Lt. Col. George Custer and every member of his immediate command. Although the Indians won the battle, they subsequently lost the war against the white man's efforts to end their independent, nomadic way of life. We also went to Pictograph State Park and Pompey's Pillar. The latter is a rock outcropping that rises 200' above the Yellowstone River . In 1806 Captain William Clark carved his signature and the date in this stone. Along the entire Lewis & Clark Trail there is just one spot where you don't have to imagine the famed explorers having been there. It was kind of neat to see this early graffiti.

Next stop was Wall, SD, home of the world-famous Wall Drug which earns much of its fame from its self-promotion. Billboards advertising the establishment can be seen in all 50 states. In addition, many visitors of Wall Drug have erected signs throughout the world announcing the miles to Wall Drug from famous locations. Wall Drug promotes "Free Ice Water" to parched travelers and gives away 20,000+ glasses daily during the height of the tourist season. The facility, located in a small plains town, 60 miles from Mt Rushmore, is a sprawling shopping mall consisting of a drug store, gift shops, restaurants and various other stores and tourist attractions. Unlike a traditional shopping mall, all the stores at Wall Drug operate under a single entity and is still family-owned by the original founders from 1931.

Also in Wall, SD we went to the Wounded Knee Museum, a narrative museum which tells the story of a small band of Lakota families who became the focus of the last major military operation of the US Army in its centuries-long effort to subdue the Native American tribes. Exhibits and photographs provide a vivid picture of the events surrounding the Wounded Knee Massacre. The museum presents a carefully researched, thoroughly documented history of the flight of Big Foot's band of Minneconjou Lakota through the wintry South Dakota landscape, their capture by the 7th Cavalry, and the horrors of the morning of December 29, 1890, when up to 300 Lakota men, women and children died in a hail of bullets. It was NOT one of the proudest moments of our nation's history. But it is a story that must be told and NEVER forgotten.

And lastly, in Wall we also visited the MinuteMan Missle National Historic Site. This location consists of three facilities: a main office and two significant Cold War-era sites, a Launch Control Facility and a missile silo/launch facility, formerly operated by the 66th Strategic Missile Squadron. The facilities represent the only remaining intact components of a nuclear missile field that once consisted of 150 Minuteman II missiles, 15 launch control centers, and covered over 13,500 square miles of southwestern South Dakota. The sprawling missile complex remained on alert for nearly 30 years, until the site was de-activated following the signing of the Strategic Arms Reduction Treaty (START) by President George Bush and Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev in 1992. Minuteman missiles held the power to destroy civilization. Yet the same destructive force THANKFULLY acted as a deterrent which kept the peace for three decades. At Minuteman Missile it was possible to revisit the Cold War and learn how nuclear war came to haunt the world.

Our next stop was Pender, NE where a stop at Blue Ox enabled us to have some preventive maintenance done on our hitch and tow system and then it was on to Iowa. We stopped in Des Moines to have lunch with several of Pat's cousins and then came on into Humeston where we are spending several days with Pat's 97-year-old Great Aunt Maxine.

Here is the link for the pictures from Montana and South Dakota.

http://share.shutterfly.com/action/welcome?sid=0Sbs27hoxZMZe

Since we are ALMOST home there will probably be just one more entry to this Post as our ALASKA 2008 ADVENTURE is, indeed, concluding.

Stay tuned for the FINAL installment,
P&J