We Have Driven A Lot.

Like, a whole lot of driving.

When I told some of the folks I know about this trip, they told me that the drive through the middle of the country might be super boring.  They said that there was nothing to do and et cetera. 

They are dunces. 

The drive through the middle of the country was pretty great.  While there may be not much to do, the drive is an experience in and of itself.  I have not traveled all that much in my life.  More recently, I’ve done a bit, but for the most part, I played too many sports to travel much (I always had other obligations/we didn’t have the money to feed me while traveling).

As a result of my lack of childhood/adolescent travelling, I can’t say that I’ve seen much varying terrain.  That’s precisely why driving through the middle of the country is not boring.  I have never seen anything like it.  Iowa, South Dakota, Wyoming and the like have all offered different sights while driving.  From endless golden fields to grassland to hard scrabble aridity, there is much to take in and most of it is fascinating.

Also, it helps that you can drive 90 miles an hour for hours on end without seeing anyone in your way on the road.  That’s kind of nice coming from the traffic of the East Coast.

Waxing aside, you probably don’t much care about all of that.  You probably care about pictures.  I’ll get to those soon.  I promise.

Once we left Iowa for good, we wanted to eat something.  Along some strip of civilization, we happened upon this place:

I know when I think of Boston, the first thing that comes to mind is gourmet pizza.  Not white people or the Kennedys or Irish pubs or racism.  Nope.  Gourmet pizza.

At any rate, we ate some food and it was serviceable.  I had a turkey burger, which was, again, not great, but good.  One interesting little quirk was they way that Boston’s prepared the cheese:

It looks like they bake it or torch it or something.  It looks kind of cool and isn’t something that I’ve seen before.  Interesting.

After leaving without tasting what pizza from Boston is like (because it’s probably covered in potatoes and Ivy League students), we headed for what we hoped would be a highlight of our trip: The Corn Palace.

The Corn Palace is this weird building that is covered in corn.  Corn cobs, husks, leave and etc.  We had only seen pictures of the facade and assumed that it was this shrine to all things corn.  The outside of the building did not disappoint:

It’s one of the weirder structures in the world.  All of the ornamentation is made from corn, and very strange.  Again, we assumed that the interior of the building would be much of the same; corn stuff.  Basically, a big corn museum with corn stands and corn history and corn facts. Here’s what we got instead:

Yup.  It’s an auditorium.  Basketball hoops.  Stage.  Tables.  Bleachers.

Disappointing.

Corn Palace setback behind us, we headed to another American oddity.  There are signs lining the highway advertising Wall Drug, literally hundreds of miles before the destination, each sign unique.  It may have been the first invasive advertising in the history of the US.

Either way, we went there:

The building itself is full of things to buy, obviously.  Milk shakes, cowboy boots (lame), electronics, trinkets and the like.  It also has a chapel:

If you look closely, you can see Amanda in the front pew.  She probably forgot to genuflect, but I think Jesus will let it slide…

After we left, we drove for a few more hours and looked for a place to sleep.  Rapid City was the winner.  We picked Rapid City, South Dakota mainly because they have a curious attraction:

Big fake dinosaurs at the top of a hill.  These western folks are really into fake dinosaurs.  It’s very strange.  Who else loves dinosaurs?

Amanda does.

There’s not much to see at the dinosaur park, as there are only a few dinosaurs erected there, but luckily, it has a pretty killer view of the surrounding, and surprisingly sprawling city:

Once we made our way back to the hotel, we walked and got some Subway (boring) at the adjacent strip mall and called it a night.

The next day, we had plans to drive clear across Wyoming to Yellowstone.  We made it:

I’m really taking a lot of panoramic pictures.  It’s kind of crazy.