North Central, on the road

[kelpie]

Spent our first night at Kankakee River state park in Illinois, very nice setting, quiet except for the families who allowed their children to scream until after 10 pm and starting at 6:47 the next morning. Yesterday we went to Iowa and arrived at 2:30 so decided to go ahead and tour Amana. We had planned to stay at a COE campground called Corallville Lake but it was 20 miles back towards where we had just come from so we decided to try a private park right there in Amana. we were NOT impressed with either. Amana was cute and had some nice shops but the merchandise was not much different than any other place. We thought the people would be in period costumes and maybe have demos of things like blacksmithing etc but nothing like that. Campground was big open field, no shade, spotty electric, no TV reception and stinky water. This morning we decided to head north to MN where we will have an extra day to explore the St Croix scenic byway and Bemidji. Tomorrow we rae are going to briefly visit the Mall of America(so we can say we did) then ride either a bus or the train downtown. Mt MIL has turned out to be a great traveling companion and we are having a wonderful time so far.

[cpatinjones]

Happy you are enjoying your trip. Any pics?

[kelpie]

Check out my facebook page, I posted some today. Don't have patience right now to deal with photobucket. We went to the Mall of America today, briefly, since neither of us are shoppers. We loved the Lego store though. And rode the train downtown. Minneapolis had less noise, people and traffic of ANY city I've ever seen. Tomorrow we head into the "north woods". Don't know how good our internet will be but will try to keep you all posted.