August 30, 2011 – September 7, 2011.    Leaving “Hurricane or Tropical Storm Irene”
What a way to start our first cross country trip and in “Old Bessie” to boot!. For those of you that don’t know, Old Bessie is our 20 year old motor home. David purchased Old Bessie for me to go camping with the kids. By now I shouldn’t be surprised that David and I would be doing something crazy like taking her cross country, but here we go again. David has her title in his pocket and if she poops out along the way, que sera, sera. We’ll be on a plane headed home and Old Bessie will have found her final resting place.
August 30, 2011 9:41 a.m. We leave a devastated Connecticut headed west.
First challenge finding a gas station that is open.
I691 west exit 4, Hubbard Park Elevation 411 feet.
First destination “Indy” (NHRA Drag Racing Nationals) approximately 850 miles, our favorite Honeymoon destination, celebrating #4.
I84 west Exit 26 Pit stop and gas. Old Bessie has a 25 gallon gas tank. We’ll be stopping a LOT.
The Promised Land Fuel Stop we would have checked out the Promised Land State Park had we not sat in “accident” traffic for 1 1/2 hours in Waterbury,Ct. I did do 10 laps around the gas pumps.
Gas again I80 west exit 173 Flying J
First night stop I 80 west exit 111 Rustic Camping
S.B. Elliot State Park
28 Fairview Rd
Penfield,PA 15849 – 9799
814-765-0630
www.visitPAparks.com
Eddy our campground host said check out parkerdamsp@state.a.us about 4 miles away, for not so rustic. S.B. is a pretty, very clean, nice stop over campground. Emily, Zach and DJ would like to ride bikes on the paved, flat, zig zaggy roads around the 25 or so sites. No showers, has flush toilets and a poop dump. Fees are $19 for PA residents, non residents add $2, seniors minus $4.50. We paid $11.50. Figure that one out! We let Eddy do the math.
Next Stop Indianapolis, Indiana
August 31 – Sept 5 Six days of drag racing!
Barb says “It’s kind of neat being able to enjoy 6 days in a row of fun and not have to travel anywhere. Like 6 concerts, 6 baseball games or 6 amusement parks.”
David says it’s his version of Disney World.
Sept 6 I 74 west
Through Indiana into Illinois, mostly farmland, corn and soybean. The driving is easy mostly flat. The neatest thing we saw, about 35 miles south of Peoria, were windmills. There were several hundred. It was a pretty windy day, 25 – 20 knots. They were the coolest things to watch.
I80 west exit 106
Des Moines West KOA
34308 L Avenue
Adel, IA 50003
515-834-2729 800-562-2181
The people here were ice. Pool was heated, but we didn”t get a chance to swim. Too much laundry!
Sept 7
We biked the Raccoon River Valley Trail in Adel, just 7 miles from the campground. It was GREAT! All paved. We started biking toward Des Moines and it was beautiful, but hilly. We turned around and went the other way, which was flatter. We were glad we did, we rode by the neatest Brick Factory. I wished they had offered tours.
On the road again headed to South Dakota. The scenery is beautiful. Sometimes you can see for miles in every direction. The farms can be so isolated. David said “What do you do if you need a loaf of bread?” I said “Bake It!” It’s a whole different perspective on how people live.
We crossed the Mississippi River in Iowa yesterday and crossed the Missouri River in South Dakota today.