July 7th - Monday

I'm on night shift again. The end of my shift usually happens just after dawn. Here it is...


We stopped in a little German town. It was great. I even found Kuchen (koo-gen) which is something my aunt makes on occasion (being as we have German ancestry).


I found a camp site and it turned out to have beautiful water falls near by. I should be sleeping but since it is mostly darkness on night shift we often stay up during the day to enjoy what we find. I found water falls...

July 6th - Sunday

Bess fulfilled a life long dream to go to a starbucks...? I don't claim to understand it but... Here you go...


We also practiced walking for a news woman who came to interview us at our host families house. Were we are all lined up and ready to walk in unison.

July 4th - Friday

So we did a little walking on the 4th of July before we cut down to Iowa to join a group of people for a BBQ and later to see the fireworks.

We drove out to our starting location only to discover that Liz was the first of us to forget her shoes. We made it half the summer without incident and we were faced with a challenge. We thought that walking in her flip flops would give her a blister between her toes so she opted for this solution... She cut off the strap and duck taped the flip flop sole to her foot.


Liz made it a few miles with the duck tape but it came off and she walked several miles barefoot. She is a super walking machine!

That night...

OK. Well I actually made it into D.C. last week and am now hanging out in Scranton, PA with my Bro and his family. I am obviously way way behind on my blog but I do plan on finishing so everyone can see what happened to me along the way...

More posting...

July 3rd - Thursday

At last we finished South Dakota and walked into Minnesota.


Windmills!


Here are a few pictures of the windmills to give you a sense of their immense size. The first is a picture of a windmill with Liz standing at the base. She can hardly be seen. If you click on the picture and see the full size image and zoom in you can see here standing at the base. The second image is an image of a fin from one of the windmills on the ground next to a semi truck. The fin is much larger than the semi truck.



So walking along the way, now in the state of 10,000 lakes Liz and I discovered a lake of algae. This is the greenest lake I have ever seen. It looked like a lake of Nickelodeon green slime.


Here is the sunset

I am so far behind. I will try...

July 2nd - Wednesday

So... walking again. As we were walking Bess and I walked past this monument to the unborn victims of abortion along the highway.



Later that same day Bess made another interesting discovery along the highway, a series of signs...

OK. So I haven't updated my blog in a long time. This is because I haven't had internet in weeks. I have also hardly had enough time to shower so I really haven't been able to update it. This weekend however I have had time for the first... time. I will update it this weekend.... I swear... after I've had a few days of sitting around and doing nothing.... Aaaah. Feels so good...

June 25th - Wednesday
So today night shift planned a strategic attack on day shift.
equipt with squirt guns night crew planned to ambush the day shift. This prank is not entirely cruel as it is very hot out and a little water fun would probably be welcomed by day shift. However as we approached day shift we discovered that they had discovered the fabled Faith sign. This sign points to a town named Faith but previous crossroads groups from past years have taken pictures next to this sign and they even have a postcard with the crossroads people in front of this sign. We had to get pictures.


Then the ambush commenced after we all got pictures in front of the Faith sign.
That night we stayed in the Rectory in Fort Pierre. They were very welcoming and we ended up returning to stay there a couple more times in the following week.

Here was a parish BBQ that was happening when we arrived. Andrew was enjoying a Smore and Bess gave the occassion a thumbs up.


That night when night crew went out to walk there was a crazy lightning storm. I tried to take some pictures but lightning is hard to photograph and I am not quite sure how best to take pictures with my camera in low light. This is the best I was able to get. You can see the telephone pole in the distance lit up by a lightning strike.


June 27th - Friday

So in order to catch up / get further ahead in our walk we decided to do a Friday night walk. Usually we walk Sun night through Thur night (5 nights) and Mon day through Fri day (5 days) but we did an extra night. So we were walking through Pierre on Friday night (through Saturday morning).

Around four in the morning (Saturday morning) Bess and I were walking through Pierre and we discovered a gas station with a dinosaur. We decided to take pictures...


June 28th - Saturday
We traveled into Sioux Falls for the weekend. Saturday morning we went to mass at the Cathedral and the bishop said the mass. Here is a picture of us all with the Bishop after the mass...


That day while we were praying at the local abortion facility a local man who came to pray with us offered us a place to stay. It turned out that he worked at a national organization for assisted living and they had a facility in Sioux Falls. This place was awsome. It was not currently being used and the inside was set up like hotel rooms. Apparently they use this building for national training meetings and such. So we basically got to stay in a big open hotel with rooms of our own and key cards, individually wrapped soaps, and plastic cups. The place was empty and they had a presentation room that we were able to use to watch a movie together. We decided to watch an old Bill Cosby standup comedy video. It was classic and awsome. I'm sorry I didn't get any pictures but lets say this was a very nice place to stay especially when we had planned to stay in an RV park for the weekend.

June 29 - Sunday
Back to walking. I'm still on nights and it's Sunday night so it's time to walk... I don't get many pictures on night shift so here ya go...

Here was the dawn on Monday morning toward the end of our walking shift. Night shift is pretty rough but it has it's benefits. Getting to see the dawn every morning is one of them.


July 1st - Tuesday - "Canada Day"
So our walk leader is from Canada and today is their "4th of July" that is their independence day or something of that sort. So today Andrew was very O'Canada-ish.

Again cooking in the moving RV. Aaaah, RV adventures.


Well I found random wireless to post these posts in some very tiny town in Wisconsin, but I gotta go for now. I have weekend planning to do.

So I am really way behind on my blog still. I keep posting in order just to avoid confusion but it is probably misleading too. I am currently (July 7th) in the middle of Minnesota. My blog has me as of this post breaking into Wyoming and South Dakota. So pay attention to the dates that I post in my comments so you don't get confused.

June 23rd - Monday
We are crossing the border from Montana into Wyoming. We actually only have 20 miles of Wyoming to walk because we are cutting the corner. We started in Montana this day, crossed Wyoming, and ended in South Dakota. We were on highway 212 for those interested.

I am on day crew. Yippie!
Here is trouble.



So about half way into our day we were parked on the side of the road and across the road was a man and his wife gardening. He invited us over to stand in the shade of his tree instead of in the sun at the van. We talked a bit and he told us he had a dog breeding kennel and invited us to see the dogs. There were some cute puppies.

Here are Erin and Liz admiring some dogs and puppies.



Wyoming was quick. Now to South Dakota.


We meet back up with Night Crew, have dinner, and then the zombies take over the night.


June 24th - Tuesday

We are just walking through and to the East of Sturgis, SD. That is the Sturgis with all the motorcycles.

The Highway 34 East of Sturgis was very very slow this day. The shoulder of the road was thick grass and steep so we decided to take advantage of the absence of traffic. These pictures tell it all.



Yes. I am sitting in the road on a camping chair drinking a Coke and Liz is likewise sitting and reading a book. It was a slow traffic day.

That same day (it was a good day) I found a broken sponge bob kite by the side of the road. Liz found the string for it on the other side of the road. A few sticks and some duct tape and it was fixed.



Then a few miles later we were interviewed by the Rapid City Reporter (newspaper for Rapid City). Here is the resulting article (link). Here is a picture of the news gal who interviewed us and the camera man. They drove way out on the highway to find us and interview us.


Then... (Like I said it was a good day) the local Sheriff stopped us while we were walking and asked us if we had a place to stay. I told him that since there were no RV parks along our way on that long stretch of highway 34 we were planning to sleep along the road at some turn out or whatever we could find. He said that his Baptist Church was right up the road about 20 miles and that this evening the doors would be open for us and his wife would have spaghetti cooked and waiting in the fridge. There was a shower too! Yah!

Here we are in the basement of the Baptist Church.


OK. I gotta go. I found a laundry mat and am doing some laundry and found internet but the laundry is done and I need to leave.

Finising up Montana almost, and breaking into South Dakota

June 19th - Thursday

A beautiful sunset. The end of a day.


When we got back to the RV for the day night shift decided to play one of the first pranks so far this summer. They taped several of our personal effects to sealing in the RV.

June 20th - Friday

It was a hot day. I prayed to Jesus to send me a cloud to shield me from the sun. Then a few minutes later... I was so grateful that I took a picture.


Bess and I discovered Siberia as we were walking past.


Bess discovered an interesting sign. I guess she is a warrior. We didn't find the trail however.


June 22nd - Sunday

By the weekend we didn't quite make it out of Montana but almost. We stayed in the rectory of the cathedral in Rapid City, SD for the weekend.

This weekend we picked up a "transient walker." That is what we call those who join us for a short period. Nate was with us for one week. Here is a picture of our transient, Nate, with Rosanne and Bess.


And then we went here...