day 19/20/21/22

WOW. it’s taken almost 2 months to finish telling you all about the final days of our trip?! That’s just sad. but life is busy so i’ll simply recap the end of our road trip for you all. we enjoyed one final day with the cousins simply relaxing and spending time together.

then the next morning it was time to roll out for home! we stopped in souix center and picked up donna to bring her to deadwood with us. we cruised into South Dakota making a quick stop at Wall Drug but we had bigger things to see! 

we continued on unto we came to Mt. Rushmore. here we stopped for a bit to view the landmark. 

just being normal. don't worry about it

from there we continued to Deadwood! we stopped by her friends house as they had gracious opened their home to us for the night before heading into town. we were treated to a delicious Chinese meal made specially for us before donna hustled us to where the re-enactment of Wild Bill’s shooting was to take place. tim and derek were the first to volunteer to be part of the re-enactment but when the gentleman came over to get them, he took brooke, tonka and i instead! something about better looking? not sure. so i was cast to play the role of Charlie Rich the man who was unwilling to give up his seat at the table because he was winning. brooke was the part of the bar owner and tonka was the old washed up military man who is hit by the bullet in the arm. 

we played a rousing game of go fish as the scene played out and did a great job of trying to chase down the killer.

after our stunning performance we moved down to the courthouse to watch the trial of McCall for killing Wild Bill. now the younger boys were enlisted to be jury members. there were also various people pulled from the audience to act as witnesses in the trial.

tonka was pulled up to play the part of a past employer. unfortunately his script was lost and he had to wing it.  

his first question was “How many years has McCall worked for you?” Tonka answered confidently, “19 years!” 

ummmm no. not quite. 

after slowly working to the correct length of time {5 months for those who are curious} *ta da* his script was found! however from there things only got worse for him. he was found out to be Shelby the Snake Boy! also known to be of an evil nature but not to be tried today.

mom was also pulled up to be a witness in this trial! the court clerk was quite smitten by her charming looks! 

he even fashioned a paper rose for her and tried to sit next to her in the audience. but do not worry dad was there to be sure that she was not stolen by any men missing a few of their teeth.

after the show we had just enough time to compete with each other on the go-kart track! 

tim was spun around a few times and derek was stuck with the slow kart so everyone passed him but it was a total blast!

that night we had our last shower of the trip and a nice warm bed before the last two days home.

the last full day of driving started at a decent time with everyone rolling out of bed and right into the rv. we quickly came to Wyoming, only stopping to snap a photo. 

then it was into Montana once again only stopping to snap a photo to round out our collection of state photos. 

we drove all day until we finally came to a stop for the night at a Jellystone Park themed campground. i’m sure many of you remember Yogi Bear and this camp certainly loved it!  we enjoyed ice cream and time together on our last night with good ol’ Abner.

LAST DAY of our adventure was actually quite unadventurous actually. we didn’t even stop to get out in Idaho and almost missed Washington because we are not conventional in our state apparently. 

instead of having the welcome to Washington sign on the right side of the road like every other state we entered it was on the *left* side! luckily we were able to pull off and take a final state photo with Abner. we made it home at a decent time and quickly cleaned out the rv from our wonderful trip. johnny had a friend waiting for him on the back door and eric even came to help. 

it felt good to be home but wow did we have a good time on the road!

day 18: sunshine and summertime

just another lovely lazy day. it was a hot one! 

i got to try out the moped and check that off my list! 1 down, 24 to go! 

we stayed inside to stay cool and dad needed the computer to do email. however he hasn't been on there in a very long time because he uses his fancy phone to do everything, so he didn't know how to operate the trackpad. after watching him struggle for awhile derek finally came over and helped out. 

after lunch everyone loaded up the cars and headed over to the van ginkel house to play for the afternoon. jordan managed to get tonka upstairs and a little while later he came down dressed like this...

so precious! 

we played plenty of card games and enjoyed tacos for dinner. we played outside while the fireflies came out and until the bats scared mom inside. 

then all the kids settled down to watch cinderella until it was time to head home. 

only a little bit longer until we have to leave 

day 17: water fight!

what a crazy day! 

brooke and i took the opportunity to head into town to drop some postcards off at the post office and then stop by the library. hehe. when we came back we were ambushed by nick and tonka with water guns!! we threw on our swim suits and all chaos broke out! what started with just a few kids and buckets of water being thrown around quickly moved to the dads joining in and unhooking the sprinkler to use the hose and then the moms joined in after a mastermind attack from emery on onita. it was parents versus kids and it was fun! the kids were constantly running back to the side of the house to fill up buckets and ambush the parents as the moms stood guard around the edges of the lawn trying {and failing} not to get wet while the dad used their hoses to get anyone within reach. 

it was fun and certainly helped to cool off the hot day. after everyone was tired out we left the sprinkler under the trampoline and just lounged and dried off before getting ready to go to derek's baseball game. 

he played a great game! 

ignore tonka - he still doesn't understand how to smile

after cheering for him we went home and a fun game of bs all around the dining room table. 

so far it's been a perfect vacation :)

day 16: take me out to the ball game

it's odd to spend a whole day relaxing without needing to drive anywhere. 

brooke and dad tried out the moped... 

neither of them crashed! we enjoyed a relaxing day and the Van Ginkel girls came over to play for awhile and had dinner before going to cheer at nick's baseball game. he certainly had the loudest cheering section when they announced his name! 

they did a great job and ended early because of the 10 run mercy rule. way to go nick! 

after the game the whole gang headed back and enjoyed sitting around the campfire again.

great way to end a great day.

day 15: we are family

we all bounced out of bed and took off the last few hour across illinois and then the 7 hours across iowa to get to Rock Valley to see family! 

it was a lot of driving and *lots* of cornfields. we were having withdrawals from being tourists so we had to take a few photos by the cornfields. 

then as we were kept driving we found this! 

of course we stopped :) we had to satisfy our tourists needs but they were closed so we just looked around and then hit the road.

we finally made it by 7pm to the Elgersma campground! they made a yummy hot dog dinner and the Van Ginkel family came over too! we all had a blast of a time playing, talking, and sitting around the campfire. it's so great to see family again!

day 14: chicago is my kinda town

last day of route 66! 

we spent part of the morning trying to find the memorials to President Lincoln including his tomb. but we didn't have good maps or even an idea where things were so we found a couple and then got out of town. we drove for awhile until we came to McLean the home of the Pig Hip Restaurant. unfortunately it burned down in 2009 so we took a photo of the house that was right next to the restaurant that the owners have lived in for years and years and years. 

the E is on the chimney because the owners name was  Ernie Edwards

after we saw the empty lot of what we wanted to see we drove past the Dixie Truck Stop that has been a stop for motorists since the early days of the route and we found this truck! 

this was our favorite gum as kids so we were pretty excited to see a whole semi truck of it! 

after a quick stop here we continued down the orignal route to Funks Grove where they make real maple sirup. in this case sirup is spelled with an i because it is made from pure sap from the tree rather than juice with added flavors like syrup. 

when we pulled into this farm we were snapping a photo with this barn when a group of people came out and offered to take our photo. they were doing route 66 just from chicago to springfield. it was a whole group of adults taking their parents on this trip for a christmas gift. we enjoyed talking with them and they loved our shirts :) brooke did such a great job with them! 

after talking with them we went into the shop and sampled some pure maple sirup. it was delicious! so we got some and then hit the road again. 

we continued past Normal and Bloomington into Pontiac which the group we just met told us had a great museum. it was a two story museum with the bottom floor dedicated to the route 66 hall of fame which included many of the key places along the route. it also included a whole section of Bob Waldmire complete with his vw van and his remodeled bus. the second floor had a war museum and a whole section with actual items from the 1940's. 

a small car covered in drawings from all over the route

Bob Waldmire's van he took on the route for years

his remodeled school bus - it was a cute little home complete with kitchen and sauna

after spending time in the museum we continued to O'Dell where we found an old underpass that had to be made because the road was too busy to cross. 

just down the road was a restored gas station. we stopped by but there wasn't much there and so we figured we just had a little bit left to go so lets get it done! 

we had to stop by Wilmington to see the Gemini Giant. we weren't hungry so we didn't eat at the Launching Pad Drive-In and left to head the last few miles to Chicago. 

we tried to stop in Joliet but we took a wrong exit and ended up in the wrong part of the town. we finally figured out how to get out of there and ended up at a gas station a little further east. dad talked to some guys and they gave him good directions to get back on route 66. with those good directions we got on the right roads and we quickly passed through the right roads of Joliet and then into Chicago! we had a good map of Chicago that pointed out where the route was. we passed the bakery restaurant 

 Lou Mitchell's where a lot of people would eat before leaving to travel the route but they were closed for the day so we kept going to find the begin route 66 sign. 

we couldn't be on the road that was indicated on the map because it was a one way street going to the opposite way we needed to. but there were signs that indicated the route on the next street over so we kept following those and surprise surprise we found an end route sign! we stopped at the stop light and put on our hazards while the kids and mom jumped out and snapped a photo before the light turned green. 

there were no places to stop out that were talked about in the book or in the map so we thought we might just head over to Iowa but we thought we would just turn down the street that was originally marked on our map. and *ta da* we found the begin sign! once again there was no where to stop so we just pulled over and all jumped out. there were a bunch of people trying to take their photo with the sign and it was finally our turn. surprisingly we didn't even get in trouble for stopping in the street!

WE DID IT! 

we finished route 66

from there it was time to start driving across illinois to get to iowa. we kept ourselves entertained in the back with chips. 

when we finally stopped for the night about an hour from the border of Iowa the kids played settlers of catan {i bet tonka} and then we thought we would take some funny photos. here's just one good one :) 

a cute normal family right?

still loving each other after two weeks stuck together in the box!