Retirement Road Trip #9: Scooping up National and State Parks going to AirVenture, Oshkosh, WI, July/August 2021
Photobombed in my own selfie
The entrance to the Oshkosh Air Show
Janet had flown in to the Oshkosh Air Show (formally the Experimental Aircraft Association AirVenture 2021 at Wittman Regional Airport in Oshkosh, Wisconsin) a couple of years earlier with her friend and flight instructor, Liz, and her tales of the sheer number of WWII airplanes on display (and in the air) convinced me to give it a go.
In our planning, we decided to make it a near-cross-country hotel-only road trip from Incline to Oshkosh and back. We basically routed ourselves east on I-94 and back west on I-90, where we could pick up a ton of National and State Parks, and states neither of us had been, like Idaho, Wyoming, Montana and the Dakotas. My baseball trips have taken me to some of the fly-over states, but those five states were missing on my checklist (and as of our Alaska trip in 2023, I now have seen all 50 states, and it only took me 68 years to do it!) And we'd make the trip in my six-months-old 2021 4Runner.
We thoroughly expected this trip to be a Cluster, traveling across so many states, trying to see so many National and State Parks, all during the height of summer no less, but the trip turned out to be mind-bogglingly amazing and beautiful, and we'd do it again in a heart-beat. Our low expectations were smashed to bits, most wonderfully!
The first day, July 21, 2023, was a long driving day, covering almost 700 miles from Incline via I-80, then heading north on US93 through Jackpot, NV (a town name that always amused Janet's mother) to Idaho Falls, ID. As this was the high-season, we planned for this to be a "scoping trip" for Yellowstone in particular, so on Day 2 we took US20 in to West Yellowstone (which wasn't as crowded as we had assumed) and gathered some information from the ranger station and continued north on US191 that followed a gorgeous river gorge until we arrived at the Museum of the Rockies in Bozeman, MT.
Here I was assuming the Museum of the Rockies would be some geologic-focused museum, but it turned out to be a very cool dinosaur-forward place, with room after room of full fossil skeletons--a lot of triceratops and some tyrannosaurus--I do have too many silly selfies of me and T-rex after my initial one of Sue at Chicago's Field Museum the first year Karen moved there.
 'One T-Rex Inside |  One Outside of the Museum of the Rockies |
We hung out in Bozeman, which had a cool downtown, for dinner then continued east on I-90 in a pretty good rainstorm, to our hotel in Billings.
Day 3, July 23: Billings was picked as a good starting point for today because in planning out the trip, I found Pryor, Montana...seriously! The correct spelling, even. My dad's side of the family had the surname spelled "Prior" in the Bath region of Jolly Old England, but was changed to "Pryor" at some point. There was a Sgt Nathaniel Hale Pryor on the Lewis and Clark Expedition, who Clark called “a steady valuable and useful member of our party” and “a man of character and ability” and had some towns and creeks and other landmarks named after him. I had the baseball gang take a slight detour to Pryor, Oklahoma on our Arkansas/Oklahoma trip. So many Pryors!
 Proof: Pryor, Montana does exist! AND, there's a Pryor Road and a Pryor Gap Road, and a Post Office |  |
On the brown sign above pointing to "Chief Plenty Coups State Park" we couldn't help ourselves but to find out who the heck Chief Plenty Coups was... he was actually a pretty cool dude. At downtown Pryor, MT (what little there was of it), we took a right at Pryor Gap Road, then a right at Pryor Road, then a right in to the park, where this really chill dog sidled on up to us and we immediately made friends by giving him a great belly rub.
After ingratiating myself with that world-class belly rub, he followed Janet back to the truck and seemed ready to jump on in and join us for the rest of the trip. He followed us around as we walked around the park...we were almost ready to grant his ride-along wish!
Chief Plenty Coups had Whitey figured out early
Reluctantly leaving the doggeroo behind, we took the Pryor St. Xavier Highway/MT91 backroads to MT131 and MT1 to the Little Bighorn Battlefield National Monument, where the local team won for once. After getting the scoop at the Visitors' Center, we drove the loop that followed the flow of the battlefield, which was much less of the Lakota and Cheyenne riding in circles around Custer's dwindling troop and more of excellent generalship of the Lakota and dumb of Generals Reno and Custer. It was very cool to get a feel for the whole scope of the battle and the ebb and flow in the fog of war. Truly a must-see if you can, and don't miss Pryor, MT when you are there!
We had lunch at the "Custer Battlefield Trading Post and Cafe" run by the Crow Nation. Janet had an Indian Fry Bread Taco and I had a bison burger on their patio. We hopped back on I-94 and spent the night in Dickenson, North Dakota, giving us access to both Teddy Roosevelt National Parks, the south unit and the north unit (which is about 100 miles north).
Day 4, July 24: This turned out to be an incredible day, definitely the highlight of the trip and one we'll remember. After stopping at the Visitors' Center at the southern unit of the Theodore Roosevelt National Park (and getting another stamp), we headed out the park road, the first stop being a massive prairie dog town. From there, you descend down to the Little Missouri River and we parked in a 8 car pullout after we spied a large herd of bison by the river, at that point being about 100-150 meters away. As we sat there, the herd started leisurely moving towards us, and within a half hour or so, they were clustered right in front of us--huge bulls wallowing in a pit 10 meters away, cows with their red dogs in tow! These are impressive animals and our first close-up taste of them in the wild! We ended up staying there at least 90 minutes, continually amazed that these wild animals, some that can tip the scales at a ton, were that so close to us for so long.
The herd, at first view, safely in the distance. From there they starting coming at us at a leisurely pace. I have several videos as they came right up to our cars, but me and Google's blogging tool aren't getting along for popping videos in here.
Fortunately, no one in the pullout pulled a Touron (tourist-moron) move and try to get a selfie with the fuzzy cows, but a ranger did come along and announced over his loudspeaker for everyone to get back in your cars, as some had pulled their tripod out and set themselves up between the cars. The herd eventually kept on the move, crossing the road and heading up the hill behind us. We saw an amusing standoff with a bull going up the hill on a side road, and a Subaru Outback coming down the hill. The Outback kept hoping the bull would move, but the bull won and the car backed up the road out of his way.
We kept heading out the loop road (which was an out-and-back because the road was washed out towards the end of the loop), hiking out to the Skyline Vista over the river, then back in the hills to the road's end, catching this bull just chillin' in a wallow just off the road. This day was definitely a buffalo-a-palooza!
After our bison-forward visit, we rolled in to Medora, which is the touristy-cowboy town close by the south unit. We had dinner at Boots Bar and Grill on their patio, and I had their Beaver Creek Stout, brewed in Wibaux, Montana...how local!
Day 5, July 25: After yesterday, we figured the 100 mile detour north on US85 to the Theodore Roosevelt National Park north unit was worth it, and we weren't disappointed. The geology of the north unit was more impressive here, as the Little Missouri River has cut a deeper gorge here and from the lookouts we could see several bison, but much farther away as they hung out at the river.
We had a nice conversation with the Ranger there in the background of this main overlook at Teddy North Unit. We backtracked the 100 miles back to I-94 and continued east, dining at a Cracker Barrel--where everything is gray but tasty (I had the breakfast sampler for dinner)--before rolling in to Fargo, ND for the night.
As we were on the highway heading to Fargo, Janet got a ping on the phone from our front door camera--"Ahhh, a man in a red shirt just left a dead animal on our porch and there's a trail of blood!" The video was rather pixilated while pulling 4G on the road, so at our next stop, I reloaded the video and had to have a laugh, "Janet, it's Olina (our housekeeper) with her husband, and their little white dog with a red leash. She's just checking on the house like you asked."
Day 6, July 26: today was another big miles day, as our hotel reservation at Fond du Lac, WI started that night, crossing the 540 miles across Minnesota and Wisconsin. We stopped for lunch at a massive truck stop complex in Clearwater, MN, the Nelson Brothers Restaurant and Bakery, and after lunch we scored a massive apple fritter for the road. We rolled in to Fond du Lac at 7pm and had dinner at the 18 Hands Alehouse featuring a lovely jazz band to accompany a pub forward menu.
Day 7 & 8, July 27 & 28: AirVenture--Karen, living in Chicago at the time, took a couple of days off and joined us for two days at EAA AirVenture at Oshkosh, WI.
As you can see behind these two knuckleheads, or maybe what you can't, is the Wittman Regional Airport is HUUUUGE with runways long enough and numerous enough to bring in and out jumbo jets and hundreds of private planes along with World Warbirds and "experimental" planes. Planes of various vintages were coming and going, and despite going to several air shows, I've never seen a P-38 Lightning or Britain's Spitfire or Hurricane "flyable in the wild."
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And a fully loaded B-25 Mitchell medium bomber and a C-47 Skytrain.
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Airshows and fly-overs were constant, all day, and the organizers did a great job handling the parking and the crowds. Janet was chatting with a woman on one of the parking shuttle rides we took, and she told us of the fun SPAM museum out in the middle of Minnesota--we filed that one away for future reference. The airfield also has an impressive museum, which we only had time to take a quick spin through. Maybe for the next time...
All in all, a fantastic show and event for a "small, regional" airstrip!
The second night, the big night airshow was scheduled, but a huge storm came through complete with tornado warnings, so rather than meeting Gerry and Sue, our Peewaukee friends, at the show, we opted to grab dinner together--Gerry being Karen's Fairy Godfather from our days together in New Jersey.
Day 9, Thursday, July 29: after bidding Karen adieu to head back to Chicago, we started back on our way back west, following I-90 this time. Remembering the SPAM museum suggestion, we stopped into the "company town" of Austin, MN to see just what the SPAM museum was about. Wow, what a fun place, and that block of greasy tasty pig parts is near and dear to us as the beloved "prime rib of the Pacific" and we have it all the time when we are on Kauai. SPAM Musubi, anyone?
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The museum has little areas representing how SPAM figures in to the history of various countries, with screens looping the crazy commercials in each--anyone for dancing SPAM cans in Japan? The Monty Python SPAM bit...it was there! I talked it up so much that my baseball tour group visited it on our 2023 Dakotas-to-the-Twins trip.
The best display: from the 2023 baseball trip, shows me as 21 SPAM cans tall.
As we were making our way west on I-90, Janet remarked that she had never been to Iowa, so we found a little country road off I-90 that dipped south in to Iowa before arriving in Sioux Falls, SD for the night.
Day 10, Friday, July 30: Today was another long-dish drive, where we crammed a swing in to Badlands National Park (impressive layered geology while spying pronghorn sheep in the wild), dropped in to the Nike Missile Site (properly the "Minuteman Missile National Historic Site") Visitors' Center (mostly for the stamp), and wondering what the big deal is with Wall Drug (nothing whatsoever), then stopping at Mt Rushmore. I was half expecting a certain amount of cheesiness but the site was very well done and we ended up taking the loop hike, pausing at the model of the proposed site along the hike. Canadian wildfires were raging, making the sky rather hazy for our visit, but the mountain was still very impressive, especially as you got up close to the base of the mountain on the hike. It was interesting to see Washington in the model with much more of a coat than what he ended up carved in to the mountain. The haze made for uninspired photos...
 The National Park Service app has a fun feature where it will take one of your pictures and make it a "postcard" with their logo on it |  |
We stayed in Rapid City, SD that night, running out of time to swing by the Crazy Horse mountain carving just east of Mt. Rushmore--I caught a Rushmore revisit and Crash Horse on that 2023 baseball trip.
Day 11, Saturday, July 31: Today we swung south on US79 to take in Wind Cave National Park and Custer State Park. As we were heading south on US79, there was a large herd of bison just off to the side of this major road, then as we headed back west to Wind Cave NP proper, there were pronghorn sheep munching their way along just off the road. As we headed to the Visitors' Center, hoping to get cave tickets, we saw a couple more small herds of bison for which Wind Cave is famous. There was a long line for tickets with times going late in the afternoon, so Janet got her stamp and we continued our driving tour of Wind Cave.
 These are my iPhone picture loaded in to the NPS "postcard" tool |  |
Amazingly, once we popped in to Custer State Park from Wind Cave, there were bigger bison herds, and once we parked, a large herd came over a hill and walked right by us, with many cows with their red dogs following along. I recorded many videos sitting in the car with the herd running along the crest of the hill, then deciding to head right for us, calmly passing us by to the other side of the park. there must have been 100 bulls, cows, and red dogs in this herd. Amazing, and another highlight of the trip much like Teddy south unit's experience.
From the state park, we continued on to Custer, SD and dined at the Blue Belle Lodge, a log cabin with many mounted heads "adorning" the walls.\
I always wondered what the attraction was for Sturgis, SD, so we detoured up there mixing it up with groups of Harleys on there way there. There ain't much, unless you own and ride a Harley to the "gathering." We spent the night back in Rapid City.
Day 12, Sunday, August 1: We left Rapid City to drive the 100 miles to Devil's Tower, made famous by Spielberg's "Close Encounters." It was a good thing we left early; we arrived at 9:30 to relatively few crowds, then after our circumambulation hike and cold pizza lunch while parked there, there was a line of about 100 vehicles waiting to get in as we left early in the afternoon.
Ooof, another amazing site and visit in a trip crammed with mind-boggling sites. You can't see it on this side, but there were a couple of climbers well up the east face of the monument (it is allowed by the NPS, but you really need to know what you are doing). My rock climbing days are over; in fact, they actually were never here!
After taking US14/MT24 from I-90 to the monument, we continued out west on US14, picking up I-90 again at Moorcroft, MT. It was another long driving day, as we were staying in Cody, WY that night and scoping out Yellowstone on Monday. We stayed on I-90 west and then hopped off at the appropriately named Buffalo, WY, and took US16/US20/US14 to a funky little western-themed motel on the western outskirts of Cody, We popped back in to Cody and we had a hankerin' for a nice big piece of meat, so we stopped in to a crowded Cody Steak House and were seated quickly despite the crush of diners in the back by the kitchen doors, giving us a front-row seat for a young woman opening the door without announcing she was going in and crashed in to a young man coming out, dumping a couple of steaks on the floor. Ugh, a crime against beef!
Day 13, Monday, August 2: As this trip was strictly a "scoping" trip for Yellowstone, meaning we knew it was high season and we knew there would be crowds but we just wanted to get a "lay of the land" for a subsequent visit.
As we were heading in to Yellowstone, we say a big tour bus and several cars just stopped as we came up to a small bridge over a creek..."what the heck are they stopping for!?" then we saw the moose standing on the bank of the creek. Our first moose sighting, in our lives! But, I didn't stop, thinking "we'll see a lot more moose in Yellowstone." WRONG! That was the one and only sighting, but we made up for it in Glacier NP in 2024, with multiple moose sightings, including a moose carcass being munched on by a grizzly...a Twofer!
We headed west on US16/20 around much of Yellowstone Lake, then made our way to the massive parking lot at Old Faithful Lodge (only walked through so we can't check that one off the Bucket List but it's another absurdly priced NPS lodge ($500/night!)) and sat alongside those waiting for the Old Faithful launch...yup, pretty much right on time! We then hiked along the boardwalk among the fumaroles and other amazing geologic curiosities.
As we made our way around Yellowstone we encountered a few bison traffic jams and had an amusing sight as we made our way into the Grand Tetons NP. We all know one of Ansel Adams' iconic photos, "the Tetons and Snake River," so we stopped at the exact spot he caught the photo in 1942, as opposed to our present day shot...Just a wee bit of growth in the ensuing 80 years hiding the bend in the Snake River below...and he had better clouds!
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Janet scored another Marriott property in Jackson Hole, WY with its iconic antler arches.
Day 14, Tuesday, August 3: Our "scoping out" of Yellowstone and Grand Teton complete, we faced another big miles day as we were headed out to Elko, about 475 miles away. We stopped at an overlook above the Snake River just outside of Jackson Hole, we chatted up an older couple in a Subaru Outback, they pointed out that we just missed a moose and a grizzly down at the river. I then noticed their huge bear sprays on each of their belts, and now that we got our $50 canister for hiking around bear country at Glacier, I get it. I thought it was a bit excessive at that time; not now.
Our routing took us south on US191 then on to the Teton Pass Highway/MT22, then in to Idaho on ID33 then ID31, where at some point we had lunch at a little boat launch on the Snake River at Swan Valley, then on US26/20 in to Idaho Falls where we partook of a milk shake that couldn't be beat at a local dairy farm. We continued on to Craters of the Moon National Monument and Preserve, a fascinating pumice strewn landscape right in the middle of Idaho prairie country. At one of the stops in the park, we saw a woman carrying out a football sized pumice stone and later we pointed her vehicle out to the ranger but she said, "we really can't do anything about it unless we see them do it." Ugh...why do people have so little respect for nature in general, and our National and State Parks specifically? I attribute it to kids no longer participating in scouting in the numbers we did--the Boy Scouts pounded respect for the natural world in to our heads, and it stuck, obviously; similarly with Janet and the Girl Scouts.
There were a couple of cool cinder cones that we hiked on, so much easier than the Lassen Cinder Cone hike that was "two steps up, one step back" in loose pumice all the way up a steeper trail. Craters of the Moon was a fascinating place.
Day 15, Wednesday, August 4: our routing this day took us on I-80 from Elko to Battle Mountain, NV to fuel up, then south on NV305 to Austin, NV (sorry, no SPAM museum there) to pick up US50 west (we prefer crossing Nevada on US50: the World's Loneliest Highway to the crushingly boring I-80) to a burger joint at Middlegate Station, then back to Incline to conclude the trip.
Trip Totals: 5,268.9 miles, leaving from Incline Village, NV and back
National Parks, Monuments, etc.
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