Friday, July 31, 2009

Saturday, Aug 1

Hi all, just an update on my arm...I got a call from the orthopedic doctor at the hospital earlier tonight, (Friday) and he told me that I may have a hairline fracture in my arm somewhere, so they want me to come back in to have my arm put in a splint, then he wants me to have it re-checked in about a week. I explained that we travel in a motorhome and we don't live in a stick house. So, guess I will go to the Naval base when we get to Chicago and have them check it. So, guess we'll be going back to the hospital in about an hour to have that done and whatever other instructions he has for me.

Okay, I'm back and oh boy, I feel like the one armed girl, this is going to be annoying, only able to use one hand for a week or so. Won't be writing too many emails, (or the blog for that matter), for awhile, just too tedious doing it with one hand. But, I don't want to injure it anymore than it already is, so I'll be a good girl for awhile....

Thursday, July 30, 2009

We are currently staying at Minot AFB until Saturday. We arrived yesterday, Wednesday, afternoon and after getting all set up, went down to wash the Jeep at the car wash on base. While Ron was washing the car, I was following him around so I wouldn't get wet. The timer started going off, so I got some quarters from Ron to go put some more in the machine. I was in a hurry, but, on the way, tripped over the hose and went crashing down on my left arm and left cheek on the very hard wet, cement floor. I just laid there in agony, my arm was killing me. If I hurt anything else, at the moment, I didn't know what it was. Ron ran over and picked me up off the ground and while he finished what he was doing, I just went over to the car and sat inside.

Once he got done, we went to the hospital on base and found out it doesn't have an emergency room. So, we had to go downtown to the hospital there. They took all kinds of ex rays of my shoulder, arm, wrist and neck, nothing broken, thank goodness. But, I did have a severe strain or sprain of my arm. So, I've been laying low ever since. I can finally type with my left hand, but, I'm icing my arm three times a day and taking an inflammatory, plus doing some exercises.

I can do little things, but, it hurts to turn my arm or wrist in a certain way, plus, I'm not to lift anything heavy with my arm. Not to worry, I am taking it easy for now. We hadn't planned on staying more than one day, and now we're staying until Saturday. Maybe tomorrow, if it doesn't rain too hard, and I feel up to it, we can go to the state fair that is in town. That would be fun...

Our next stop will be Grand Forks, ND, to stay at that air force base and then it's on into Minnesota.

Lake Sakakawea, named after the Indian who helped Lewis & Clark

The endless road towards Minot, ND

Back on the highway and more beautiful country

The bus and Jeep don't look that bad from a distance, but, trust me, they were filthy!

The final road out of there

Some nice flowers along the roadway

It was beautiful country to drive in early in the morning

Like I said, we were covered in dust, and that night, it rained all night and into the morning. It didn't really improve matters that much, but, the good thing about it was there was no dust to speak of on our way out. Now, I said it was 13 miles into the campground. Somehow, we drove 26 miles just to get out of there, as we went a different way, since it was heading in the same direction to get back to the highway. Ron had his GPS set up to guide us and all in all, it was giving pretty accurate directions, until we turned on this one road instead of going straight. If we'd gone straight, it would have been another four miles to the highway, but, we turned left....when the GPS told us to turn at the next right, and there was no road, Ron knew we might have to turn around. So, we pulled up to a farmhouse, he got out and started walking up to ask how to get out of there. A guy was standing in his doorway and casually asked Ron, "are you lost?" He proceeded to tell Ron that all we had to do was drive down to the second road, turn right and it would eventually get us to the highway. So, we followed his advice and a few miles later we found the highway once again. While we were in that nowhere land, that we managed to drive out of, there were signs directing us all the way, except for that last turn. There were also street signs posted even though the "streets" were just dirt roads or trails. It did seem odd...

This is what we looked like when we got there, covered with dust!

!!

Now, we just drove 13 miles into the campground, and we get there and it has a little piece of paper on a post saying, "campground closed". Now, what do you think we did? We parked there anyway!! It looks like they are improving the sites with camp fire rings, maybe they will add picnic tables, too, who knows. The sites were all nicely graded and we parked up where the machinery was. Hopefully, this does not mean they are going to start charging fees...it was certainly nice and quiet all night.

The road just keeps going and going, 13 miles of dust...

Cows on the roadway...

We had been wondering where we were going to spend the night. I had read in the Days End that in the National Grasslands, you could camp for free, just like in the national forests, but, you couldn't just park anywhere, because there is private property all over the place. We had asked at a tourist info center about this place called Burning Coal Vein and she said she thought it was a primitive camping area. The only downside is it is off the road 13 miles on a dusty road. We decided, what the heck, it should be a pretty drive. The following pictures show that it is indeed a pretty drive, because we are basically driving into the badlands and the grasslands. There were free ranging cows all along the road and some of them just did not want to get out of the way.

They even utilize the sides of the freeway to grow their alfalfa

that houses cold drinks

An antique refrigerator...

These bins in back of the counter used to be used for dry goods in the old days

This general store in Aladdin, population 10, is over 100 years old

A closer view so you can read it better

The history of it

The famous rock

When we left Rapid City, I expressed an interest in driving back into Wyoming, so we could see Devils Tower, so we did. When we saw the Welcome to Wyoming sign, I felt that we were going backward...didn't we just leave that state a week ago?

We were looking high and low for big horned sheep, these were standing near the visitor's center

These trees aren't brown because of fire, they are dying because of the bark beetle

Here we go....

Look at that very small tunnel! Believe it or not, the tour buses can get through it...

I took this close up so you can see the detail on the glasses on Roosevelt

Good forest management

This herd was right on the road, with several females, babies and older males. Two or three of them were VERY testy already, and we thought two of them were going to fight each other around a small mini truck that was on the road in back of us. A lot of snorting going on, it was very exciting.

This encounter was more exciting than the herd we saw offroad.

Doesn't this little guy look like you could just cuddle him?

Whatcha doin, dad?

This guy was interested to see if we had anything for him to eat

On our way into the park, we met up with a herd of burros

We caught up with this limo that looks a lot like a 1957 Chevy Nomad