POINT A TO POINT B (continued)

We are now at Home #2 in Juneau. Finally made it here around 12:30 a.m. July 9. 3,120 miles door to door of driving and 3 days worth of ferry ride from Washington to Juneau.

--mixed emotions being back - when I saw Mendenhall Glacier from a distance, and recognized "home", it felt nice - but driving the car to the house, the full moon came over the mountains and I got sad missing my friends in NY :(
By the way, the it doesn't get dark til almost 11:00 p.m.

We basically boogied like hell to make it through the eastern states and the major traffic jam in Chicago until we slowed down a bit once we crossed the Mississippi. We didn't have much time for detours so while Sade shot photos of road signs blurred from speeding by them, backends of semi trucks, mustangs, and windshield mortality victims, I kept the speed at 80 and waited for all the stuff on the roof to go flying off. I kept wondering why people would tailgate so damn close when they saw all the shit I had on the roof. Are they oblivious fools?

One night we must have drove through a swarm of fireflies and glow-in-the-dark guts decorated the windshield. I said to Sade "Watch this" and put on the windshield wipers and we had bio-luminescent smear all over. Very cool.















We did manage, however, to find time to view the Jolly Green Giant and the largest Bull Head (not the catfish variety) sculpture in the world...the only bull head sculpture in the world?




The only planned stop along the way was Mt Rushmore - with all the traveling I've done, I've never spent much time in South Dakota and never saw the Mount. Badlands Nat'l Park was right on the way so we made a detour to go there. We got there at sunset - and the colors of the dunes - or whatever they're called, were awesome. We rented a cabin right in the middle of the park and spent the next 1/2 day hiking around. It was hot as hell and I really think we almost killed poor Rosie. Her tongue was hanging out of her mouth and her eyes were dazed for hours after.




The hills were like cement and climbing them was tough - easy place to scrape skin. It was a really nice place and well worth the detour!

One thing I noticed was that yellow vetch was growing along side every road and was spreading across the prairie. I'm sure this introduced plant must be considered invasive in this area - and it is very close to the National Grasslands lands--- DOT in their infinite wisdom.








<--- worth framing this one!

Had to include this pic - there were black cows with white babies. What kind of cows are they?? I guess the babies grow up to be black? How nice... no racism here.