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Michigan 2022

May - October 2022
A 146-day adventure by Katboz Read more
  • 65footprints
  • 1countries
  • 146days
  • 356photos
  • 4videos
  • 5.4kmiles
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  • TravelerMichigan 2022
    1
    Day 129

    The rest of the day in Independence

    October 1, 2022 in the United States ⋅ ☀️ 75 °F

    So after museum we actually returned to his home. Technically Bess's family home, Truman came from a relatively poor background and had no college education. However he was a great reader. Tour was interesting, this family (includes daughter Margaret) was very frugal. The home was beautiful, but very traditional. As in very few updates. It was surprising to me how old the style looked, he died in 1972 and she in 1982 and she had bequeathed it to the NPS upon her death, so everything is in place as it was at her passing. The style looks like early 1900's. (The house was originally built in the late 1800s.) When he left office Truman effectively was in a poor financial position. No pensions at this time! About 5 years later the government started putting pensions in place. Also no security service. He left office and went back to his home which he loved that sits right in there middle of a regular neighborhood, back to his morning walks. Enough about Truman, although I am convicted to find a book about house life and presidency.
    The rest of the day we just did some drive-bys. Vaile mansion, Bingham- Wagoner Estate, the old depot, relocated log cabin....we could do thses fairly easily because they are all within a 5 mile range. Both places needed a little TLC. but like Meux home in Fresno, they are so costly to maintain. I want to jump in and do a little weeding and pruning! Just a little elbow grease! Back to the RV to give Charlie some outdoor time!    Read more

  • TravelerMichigan 2022
    Day 130

    Kansas City "peek'

    October 2, 2022 in the United States ⋅ ☀️ 66 °F

    Before heading north we went into Kansas City to just have a peek at it. Independence is east of the downtown. It was a little butt if challenge negotiating interstates and parkways to finally get into the city. Tom needed to take a couple of deep breaths once we got in and we were parked.
    I wanted to see a couple of places, but we knew we only had the morning so had to keep it short.
    We decided to go to the WW1 Museum and Liberty memorial and Union Station. We knew we wouldn't have time for the museum but we did want to do the Liberty Tower, to get a great view of KC. To get Tower tickets you still went into the museum. It looked fabulous, like they all do!
    In this one once your but your ticket you cross a wide see through to the floor below. The floor below is cover with 9,000 red poppies (fake) planted in a "field" of grey dust. Each of these poppies represent 1.000 service men that lost their lives. Very visual reminder of the loss of life.
    Almost forget, Kansas City is also home to Hallmark Visitor Center! But it was closed on Sundays....I really would have enjoyed going in!
    We went back out to the plaza and went up the Liberty Tower. It is about 13 stories high and you are able to get out and walk around a little landing to get the view of the city. Beautiful! I had wanted to see Union Station and because of time my compromise was to see it from the top of the tower! Not quite what I wanted, but hopefully will be back to KC to see this museum and the Money Museum. We both were disappointed, the MM is only open during the week, it's supposed to be a great tour.
    Headed north again on I-35. We wanted to get to Madrid, Iowa to go on a bike ride in the morning. Found a cute little city park with electric on the out skirts of town.
    Ended the day with a Red Cross dispatch event so we pretty much snacked for dinner.
    Nice drive through corn and soy. Good roads.    Read more

  • TravelerMichigan 2022
    Day 131

    The beginning of fall in Madrid

    October 3, 2022 in the United States ⋅ ⛅ 57 °F

    The evenings are definitely getting cooler and the days shorter! We have seems quite a bit of gold in the forest, but are now beginning to see little hints of orange and even red! I love fall trees!
    Left Tom in bed, and took Charlie for her morning walk. It was cool and he was warm in bed. Spent some time wandering this little campground, maybe two dozen sites, but with showers ( the type you have to keep pressing the button for water) and toilets. Came back to RV and some how the door had locked behind me!? Arrrgh. I want my coffee. Started banging on door to wake Tom up. Nothing was stirring, not even a mouse... So got in storage bin to find something harder then my fist. I must have banged on every window and the door, again. Nothing! Finally decided to get the ladder out and had to crawl through front driver window. Thanks goodness the windows was open and screen slides easily.
    When Tom finally came out I asked him "how could he sleep through all the banging??"
    His answer: "I thought you were killing some bugs that were on the RV".
    Needless to say, we ALL needed some coffee.
    On the way out of camp I did take some pics of the trees and the prairie grass.    Read more

  • TravelerMichigan 2022
    11
    Day 131

    High Trestle Trail, outside Des Moines

    October 3, 2022 in the United States ⋅ ⛅ 61 °F

    Drove into Madrid where they had a large parking area for this ride. It is a 25 mile ride, point to point, but we are doing about the middle 6 (out and back) that includes the bridge. This is a "rails to trails" ride, in other words converted railroad to trails for walking, jogging, biking, etc. Oddly enough Iowa prides itself on the over 700 miles of trail they have for biking. This particular ride was completed in 2011 and had to include replacing the old Trestle bridge with this new pedestrian bridge that is actually half a mile long!
    We really enjoyed the ride! Perfect weather. For those who don't know, railroad grades are typically 5% or less, so are very easy rides. Only drawback, they can be straight as an arrow! Regardless, this was a well maintained, 6' wide concrete trail, with a beautiful tree canopy over most of the stretch we were on. We ended up in Woodward, just in time for an early lunch! (How does that happen?) At at this very cute little restaurant, split a burger and some of the best onion rings we had ever had. The thin ones that are actually dipped and cooked in the kitchen!    Read more

  • TravelerMichigan 2022
    Day 131

    Air in Woodward

    October 3, 2022 in the United States ⋅ ⛅ 72 °F

    So on our ride out to Woodward, I noticed my front tire looked a little deflated, more so than when we started. So I got a little anxious about having to walk the trail at some point going back. During lunch we googled for bike shops, none. But I did see a hardware/toy store on the map. I called the store and he said that he was no longer a hardware store, just a toy/hardware museum. (?). But he volunteered that he did have a compressor. We biked on down and he was able to fill my tires. But then he offered to shower us the museum. Turns out this guy is a serious collector of various things, but mostly toys and hardware. He has built and arranged thousands of items into his "museum". Why? Because he just loves collecting. Two wives later, he is a bachelor. Not sure why?! Any way, we toured all 3 levels of his place. Just crazy, incredible amount of stuff; all organized and carefully placed in cabinets and shelves he has made.
    He was a really fun guy to talk to. And we appreciated the air!    Read more

  • TravelerMichigan 2022
    Day 131

    End of day in Forest City, Iowa

    October 3, 2022 in the United States ⋅ ⛅ 72 °F

    Still had some driving to do after the ride. Only about 120 miles due north. Gad is back up in this part of the state to about $3.60. nice drive, not to much traffic. Lots of corn, some soy, and lots of, something like maybe chickens.... We see those long low buildings. Guessing these are not free range. But we always like the rural drives, just rolling fields, bits of forest that still remain, blue skies, and interestingly enough a number of wind turbines. Iowa can get pretty cold and windy, apparently in the minus 20, plus wind chill!
    Our destination, the Winnebago factory, in Forest City. We will be touring tomorrow. We were both surprised to see the brands that after under the Winnebago industries umbrella!    Read more

  • TravelerMichigan 2022
    Day 132

    Winnebago factory tour

    October 4, 2022 in the United States ⋅ ⛅ 75 °F

    Started our day with the factory tour. Winnebago started right better in Forest City in 1958. Currently they employ at this campus approx 2000. They have another plant about 15 miles away that makes the camper vans. And at this time they also own Chris Craft, Grand Design, Newmar, and Barletta platoon boats. We were actually really surprised about the other companies. We were here just after the 500,000th RV came off their production line. It's really quite a story. The visitor center has a very small little museum about the company.
    Tour was interesting, no pictures allowed. 200 acres with various buildings completing various items that ultimately get installed on the production line. Upholstery, working, chassis modifications, plastics... The tour included a couple of these stops, but mostly had a view of the assembly line at two points of production. Everything is made to order, so the units on the line vary based on dealer orders. Class A and Class C, including the Ekko come through. You see the modified chassis come in, floor gets dropped and they start building up from there. Really was interesting to see.
    Spent the rest of the day doing some bookkeeping, shopping at the visitor store and the parts store. Beautiful day to walk Charlie around.    Read more

  • TravelerMichigan 2022
    Day 132

    Dinner in Thompson

    October 4, 2022 in the United States ⋅ ⛅ 70 °F

    Since we weren't leaving until the morning we decided to go out and have dinner. I had heard some visitors talking about a steakhouse about 10 miles out of town in a small farming community of Thompson. Tom loves a good ribeye!
    Nice drive out, country roads; lots of harvesting activity. So much so that there was a little haze in the air from all the dust in the fields. Interestingly enough this seems to be almost exclusively corn, unlike Missouri which seemed to be both corn and soy. The landscape was just as you would imagine, fields of corn, clumps of trees with farm houses and silos, ands then the big grain bins and silos that are probably part of the cooperatives. And those low, long buildings that we thought were poultry, are for the hogs!
    Sadly Thompson is liked so many of these little farm towns, many buildings seem boarded up, and some still busy and making a living. We ate at the Branding Iron, original owner and cook for the last 45 years. I had some good steak tips and Tom had a 14 oz. ribeye. Well actually he ate about a third and had to call it quits. Definitely tender and tasty, and we plan on getting a whole second dinner from it.
    Just a nice drive and evening out in Iowa.    Read more

  • TravelerMichigan 2022
    Day 134

    Drive to Lincoln, Nebraska

    October 6, 2022 in the United States ⋅ ☀️ 59 °F

    We picked up a couple of the parts we had ordered at the service center and eventually got on the road. We pretty much had to re-trace our drive back to Des Moines and then head west to Nebraska.
    Again beautiful weather, 70% and blue skies. We chased some rain a little bit in the morning, but did not get much.
    Pretty much drove straight thru, we wanted to be in place at the RV park because Tom had a video conference with his primary physician. He is fine, but with some prescriptions, the physician needs to have a regular check in.
    Got here just in time to complete call and then I got to go have a nice long shower vs. an RV shower. Park is a little old, right in Lincoln, nice trees, but has an on-ramp or highway on 3 sides. Road noise a problem, I actually changed sites and it didn't help. Well we do have air conditioning so we can close the windows. But they have a very large, enclosed dog park, so Charlie is happy. Lots of ball chasing time and new dogs to meet.    Read more

  • TravelerMichigan 2022
    Day 134

    Nebraska State Capital

    October 6, 2022 in the United States ⋅ ☀️ 68 °F

    Wow, this building is beautiful! We saw in from the interstate on our way OUT to Michigan, but didn't stop. But had read about it and didn't want to miss heading home.
    Just breif history, this the 3rd building on this site. First 2 were not built well. This one was literally built around the old one, old one demolished and this one was completed. The state decided to move away from the conventional design with the columns and one large done and go for the modern, skyscraper look. Built from 1922 to 1932. Cost, 10 million. In today's dollar, over a billion.
    Can't really describe it decently, but it has huge barrel arches, marbles mosaic floors, gorgeous tile mosaic ceilings, solid marble columns, bronze hardware, lots of sculpture and it was all united with history of Nebraska theme, native Americans to the current time.
    Our free tour happened to coincide with a 4th grade class ( actually 3 classes) so it moved a little more slowly, but still fabulous. Google this state building, top notch design team. Ceramic tile murals completed by a young 20 something that has done other notable installations with this particular architect.

    PS I forgot to mention, I don't ever remember seeing security. We just walked in! Also our tour guide recommended we peak in the Governor's waiting room and office to see the wall murals. She told us where to find them. We found it and walked in! The secretary looked up and we told her we just wanted to see this area. No problem!? The door was open to his office...I can't imagine the access to Newsom would be this easy. I never saw security folks....    Read more

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