Not the North Pole or Mall of America

Sometime in the past year or so we saw a show about the largest Christmas store in the world, probably on the Travel Channel. I remember saying to Skip, "If we ever go to Michigan, we have to go there." That was forgotten until I saw a billboard for Bronners, CHRISTmas Wonderland. We checked the website and found it was not out of the way, so we HAD to go.

Frankenmuth, Michigan is a vacation destination. There is a German feel to the touristy place. We went to the Frankenmuth Bavarian Inn for bratwurst and German style beer brewed just for the Inn. They had a glockenspiel that you could see from outside in the beer garten.

The main attraction for me was the Christmas store. It was overwhelming. It was like a Christmas Village, North Pole, Santa's Workshop, for acres and acres...well, I don't know really how big it is, but the parking lot reminded me of a mall lot only it was one store. I kept looking up at all the decorations and scenes. On the sales floor was every ornament you could want, personalized, themed, color co-ordinated....animal, vegetable, occupation or hobby. Every once and a while I had to stop and ground myself. I thought of my brother, Bill, who loves to decorate for Christmas. I sent him a photo from my cell phone and asked him to guess where I was. He first guessed the North Pole, then Mall of America. I sent it to Emily who guessed Santa's Workshop. Nope, Bronners... Google it.

For several years I have been collecting Christmas ornaments when I travel. On this trip I had already gotten a few from Kansas (ruby slippers), South Dakota, Yellowstone, Glacier, Lake Itasca, but to buy one here at the store of stores...how to choose....it was not as hard as I thought. A shopping bag with ornaments inside and the name of the store on the front of the bag...sold...and I bought an eagle from the animal section. I love eagles and we saw a few on our trip.

So if you are ever in Michigan, and can get to Frankemuth, stop for a beer and a bratwurst at the Bavarian Inn, and go to Bronners. It's an amazing place, Christmas 361 days of the year- closed only 4 days. Check out their web page...truly amazing. http://www.bronners.com/

Yoopie Soul Food

Driving across northern Michigan, this time admiring Lake Michigan, we saw signs for "Pasties." No, get your mind out of the gutter, this is food, not adult entertainment. We stopped for lunch at a place that had on it's sign: "Yoopie Soul Food" My curiosity is really piqued...I was about to discover what is a "pasty" but had a new question: what is a "yoopie"?

We ordered three, the original-a beef pasty, a veggie one and a pizza pasty. A root beer and a cream soda completed our lunch order. Back in the RV we set about tasting Yoopie soul food.

The beef pasty had lean ground beef, potato and rutabaga encrusted in a pastry crust. They were shaped like a half moon, smaller than a calzone, but bigger than a pirogi. It was baked, not fried and was more flaky than a calzone, it was not a yeast dough, more like a pot pie crust. A little dry, but tasty. The veggie one was similar but had carrots and celery. I didn't taste the pizza one. It just seemed wrong. If it wasn't yeasty dough, I wouldn't like it.

I took a flyer from the store that answered some of my questions. Pasties have a Cornish heritage, the Cornish immigrants worked the mines and often took pasties for lunch into the mines. The real mystery was solved, a "Yoopie" is a person from Upper Peninsula Michigan.

We stopped again to put our feet into Lake Michigan then drove around the upper peninsula and across the Mackinac Bridge. Lake Huron to one side and Lake Michigan on the other. I'm not into bridges, but this one WAS beautiful. As promised, I thought of our waiter in Oregon who haled from this part of the world. We stayed at yet another lake, Higgins Lake, but arrived too late to explore the area.

Land of Lakes

Northern Wisconsin is also full of lakes, passed Land of Lakes and stayed at Chain of Lakes. Most impressive was my first view of Lake Superior. It looked like an ocean with waves and you could see no shore on the other side. A young man said to Skip, "this is our ocean" and was so happy that it was clean and clear. He was from twin cities and hadn't seen either the Atlantic or Pacific Ocean. The Jersey shore certainly isn't as clean as Lake Superior...

Wisconsin was another drive through state and we wished we could have stayed longer. Traveling east I keep calling it, but it is really going home. I want to be home, but I want to see more of these states...

The Mighty Mississippi?

Our trip started with seeing what the mighty Mississippi could do to St. Louis in flood stage. We also planned to see the headwaters of the Mississippi in Minnesota, a state with more coastline than any other due to its lakes and rivers. As we drove to Lake Itasca we couldn't help noticing how many lakes there are! There are also beautiful forests with a huge variety of deciduous and coniferous trees in so many shades of green! We did not take the interstate, but traveled a state road that went through national forests.

Itasca is a state park in which you could spend weeks. There were lakes for kayaks and canoes, cabins and campgrounds (we stayed at a KOA nearby). We met people from the state who go there every year and stay for a week at a time and others who come several times a summer.

We walked a short distance from the visitor center to a marker of the headwaters to get a tourist shot. Skip offered to take a family photo of a group and they reciprocated. I posted the tourist shot. We dipped our feet into the water and found out from a local that you can wade downstream for a bit and the water only gets thigh deep (unless you are short...) then there are steps so you can climb out and get back on the path. It was a very hot day, the water refreshingly cool...who could resist? There were squeals of delight as children got in the water in their clothes. I think part of the appeal was getting your clothes wet, but there were many kids with bathing suits, locals I guess, who knew the drill. Another local told Skip that it takes 90 days for the water do go from where we stood to the mouth of the Mississippi and the Gulf of Mexico.

Foolishly I did not listen to Skip's suggestion to put on my Tevas and water shorts like he did....so I slogged through the water with my Island Pro Slippers (Hawaiian Flip Flops) gripping tightly with my toes to avoid losing them. Flashbacks of having one stuck in the muck of a stream in Reno last year were haunting me. It took great effort to locate and free it and I wasn't leaving it in Reno and the Mississippi wasn't claiming it either.

We walked the distance with some other people. At one point I almost lost my step and would have landed in the water, purse and all, but I managed to regain my footing. I felt a bit naughty getting my white shorts wet, and being short, I was wet beyond my thighs... The good thing about being in an RV was that there were clean dry clothes and a place to change waiting for me.

Another wonderful place that we left thinking we would like to come back some day....

Long Drive East

Shortly after entering North Dakota we saw signs for Theodore Roosevelt National Park. A woman at a visitor's center in Montana said it is one of the least known National Parks, but was beautiful. Needing a reminder why we took this trip, we stopped at the park for a while even though we had many miles to our campground and the sunlight was fading.

This was called the Badlands of North Dakota, not to be confused with those in South Dakota. Looking down into the Painted Canyon we noted it was different than South Dakota because there was a lot of vegetation, green grasses and low lying bushes. In South Dakota, there wasn't much growing. We enjoyed the view and remembered to stop to smell the flowers, figuratively. Or watch the play of light on the canyons...

I would have liked to spend more time in North Dakota, but there were only two KOA campgrounds in the state, the one near Bismark and one further north and way out of our way. A drive through state this time, but one worth a return trip.

Wheat Montana

One of the great joys in traveling is trying local food, wine and beer. I purchased one of the best whole wheat breads at a grocery store. Wheat Montana Healthy Loaf, Montana Multigrain was not too sweet, just right. What I didn't know until we ventured into Three Forks, Montana was that the farm and bakery was open to the public. SO we had to stop (it's all about the bread) and got lunch as well as some of the best sticky buns I have EVER eaten. Not whole wheat, not healthy, but totally worth the calories and cholesterol! It's a good thing it's in Montana and not in Quakertown, because it could easily be addictive....

I was also fond of Montana beer, Moose Drool was one of my favorites!

"Know the Power that is Peace"

While visiting our friends in Spokane, Doug and Gail talked about their trip cross country. (They recently moved there from West Chester, PA) One of the highlights was a stop at Little Big Horn National Park in Montana and a tour narrated by a student from Little Big Horn Community College. She was so passionate explaining the Native American fight for their way of life and the land they were promised that it opened their eyes to a part of history not often taught.

Since this was something that we were also interested in, we made plans to stay at a campground in southeast Montana when we left Glacier. At Glacier we met folks from Colorado who had just come from Little Big Horn. The father was a history buff and they spent several days there. We only had half a day to take in whatever we could.

The land looked much as it did when Custer was there. Few trees, prairie grasses, gentle hills and coulees. ( Our guide explained that a coulee was like a ravine with a U shape; a ravine has a V shaped bottom. Both carry water runoff during a rainy season.) Up on the hill it was eerie to see the white headstones that marked where men fell and died. The hasty shallow graves were dug up shortly after the battle and the remains were moved. Headstones were placed where they died. Among unknown Cavalry soldiers was the stone marking George Custer. His remains were moved to West Point.

The park was formerly known as "Custer's Last Stand National Park" In an age of political correctness it was changed to reflect a more "balanced" fight between the Native Americans and the white man. We displaced them to land we didn't want, not suited for their lifestyle. Forced them on reservations and tried to push our culture on them, stripping them of their own. Then gold was discovered in this area so treaties were broken pushing them again. Sitting Bull and some others had enough and pushed back. They won the battle, none of Custer's men survived, but they lost the war. Outrage over the "massacre" made people want revenge. It was the end of the culture for the people. Put on reservations, made dependant on the U.S. Government. The damage has not been undone by renaming this site.

Among the prairie grass are a few newer red granite stones. They mark the place that Native Americans lost lives. There are far fewer of those. They were recently placed there to show that it was not only the whites who suffered loss. Most of the white stones were on Last Stand Hill. Across from there was a modern kiva-like structure, a memorial to the Native Americans of all tribes who lost their lives at the Battle of Little Big Horn.

The National Park is actually on Crow Reservation. Students from Little Big Horn Community College give a fairly unbiased view of the war on their bus tour. Back then the Crow were scouts for the U.S. Cavalry. They were not traders to their people, the U.S. were fighting with Sioux and Cheyenne, enemies of the Crow.

Our guide was informative, but not as passionate as the woman Doug and Gail had. It was still a moving experience as I realized that it marked the beginning of the end of the Native American way of life. The culture of "the People" has always been of interest to me. I want to know more and would like to visit more native cultural sites. Crow Fair would be a fabulous place to continue this journey, but we were there a few weeks too soon.