Road Trip Diaries Day 8: 750 Miles of Mostly Corn

     Hello! Today was by far the most driving of the whole road trip- glad to have survived. Driving from Hill City to Iowa City requires driving a very long, very straight route across the entirety of the state of South Dakota, about 2/3 of the way across Minnesota, and then a turn south into a whole lot of Iowa. And Minnesota has terrible roads, so we couldn't even drive faster than 75 mph. There is a lot of corn out here, along with quite a few giant windmills. We could instantly tell that Iowa was more exciting than Minnesota because the windmills here were actually turning. That's some big stuff right there.

In a Nutshell: Overview of Day 8
Route: Hill City, SD to Iowa City, IA
Miles traveled: 756 today, 2,971 total.
Hours in car: 12 today, 50.5 total.
Coffee Consumed: Caitlin: 1 cup today, 11 total. Cortney: 1 cup today, 5 total. Combined: 16 cups.
Food highlight of the Day: Breakfast at Bully Blends cafe and pub in Rapid City, SD. They make a strong latte, have a large cafe selection, and they have a bar where they keep Guinness on tap. This place wins at everything, which is why after 4 years I still remembered it and made sure we stopped. I had a cinnamon raisin bagel served with peanut butter, and Caitlin got a pasty with some very carnivorous filling. I don't remember what it was, but it kept her going most of the day. This is probably the coolest place in all of South Dakota.
Quote of the Day: Cortney: "Two hours to go! Let us power through with enthusiasm born of vegetables!" A Subway sandwich can go a long way in making a 12 hour drive more manageable.

Miles and Miles of ...  uh........ 

     The Circle B singers perform a song called "Miles and Miles of Texas." We're not going to Texas, but we sure saw miles and miles of other flat parts of the country. It's interesting how places seek to distinguish themselves out here. The little things become so very important, and will have billboards for hundreds of miles. Wall Drug, for instance, has populated about 50 miles of the area immediately east of Rapid City with so many billboards that we got virtually hypnotized into going there. I have never seen so many billboards for one place- it has to get you wondering. So we pulled off I-90 and followed the signs to Wall Drug. It is so important that there are even signs to tell you there are signs ahead- "Slow! Arrow ahead!" The arrow pointed us into a parking lot- if only all attractions were this well marked. 

     Frankly, Wall Drug was worth it. It is a giant complex of stores that take up most of the tiny town of Wall, South Dakota. You can buy coffee, cowboy boots, and stickers that say "Yay cheese!" You can also buy the heads of various animals, including the rather creative jackalope. 

     Caitlin and I hypothesized that Wall Drug is kind of like that spirit village in the Hayao Miyazaki movie Spirited Away, and we soon grew concerned that we would never be able to leave. There were Stetson hats to try on, and beautiful hand-tooled boots, and carved or polished rocks of all sorts. There was even this handsome cowboy: 

     Eventually, though we did make it out of there, and I had bought nothing more than a rather useful little mortar and pestle.  We were not done with odd, hyped up attractions however. Not in the least. We still had the Corn Palace. It is a good couple hours east of Wall, but still in South Dakota. Billboards proudly proclaim that it is the world's only corn palace. What a great honor. Originally built in the late 1800s, it used to be a building made entirely of corn. It has since become modernized and somewhat less cool, as it is now a rather normal basketball arena that is decorated with corn. The corn decorations are still pretty impressive though. All the artwork on the building is done with corn cobs, while some of the other decorations are done with hay, rye, and other local crops. 

OMG! Corn! It's so exciting! 

A lot of corn on the outside.... what wonders can possibly be within? 

A basketball court... turned market

     So, the corn palace wasn't as remarkable as hoped, but it was free, and it was part of what made the 12 hour drive not feel like a 12 hour drive. When you're driving across the middle of the United States, you have to get your kicks somehow, because most of it looks like this:

 Or maybe this: 

    

     The windmills get to be pretty exciting after a while! They do make for some nice scenery, or at least they gave me something to take way too many photos of. Caitlin had a pleasant herd of windmills waiting for her on her memory card by the end of the day. 

    We did get some excitement in Waterloo, Iowa when we pulled off for gas. It seemed to be a sleepy enough little Iowa town, and we filled up and went back to get on I-380, only to find police cars blocking every onramp. We drove around, Caitlin rather miffed and me trying to convince her to ask for directions while I used my phone to look up what was going on. Were we stuck in some terrible small-town crime? Was a rural crazy coming to get us? Why could we not get back on the Interstate?

     Turns out it was President Obama. We had gotten there exactly 10 minutes before he was to give a campaign speech. 

     Oh the people you encounter on the road. We eventually did get back on 380, and had to go the speed limit the entire rest of the drive because of the police cars on every single overpass. I hope you enjoyed Iowa, President Obama!!! 

I nabbed this one from Google Images.