Our party had arrived in Montana on Friday, August 10. We left Glacier National Park in Montana on Tuesday, August 14 and headed to Chicago. At this point, the group had a critical decision to make. Would we travel the scenic route or the US interstate system?
A couple of things led us to our decision: 1. We had enough time to travel at a slower pace, and in a sports-wagon with 175,000 miles, this was the smart thing to do (No offense to Econ Professor Jake; the wagon is glorious, just heavily used like your favorite pair of old sneakers). 2. We admitted to loving the Dwight D. Eisenhower Interstate System, but it has a critical shortcoming in that it is extremely monotonous. The interstates can make someone insane if forced to travel on them for more than 2 days straight. May God bless tractor-trailer drivers. It seems like a miserable job to me. So the decision was made. We would take Highway 2 all the way to Wisconsin in hopes of discovering the heart of America, or at least some of the sites featured on those fantastic American State quarters! Those things are splendid. I collected them for a while, until I realized it was a hobby meant for retired folks and middle-aged men living in their mother’s basement.
A couple of things led us to our decision: 1. We had enough time to travel at a slower pace, and in a sports-wagon with 175,000 miles, this was the smart thing to do (No offense to Econ Professor Jake; the wagon is glorious, just heavily used like your favorite pair of old sneakers). 2. We admitted to loving the Dwight D. Eisenhower Interstate System, but it has a critical shortcoming in that it is extremely monotonous. The interstates can make someone insane if forced to travel on them for more than 2 days straight. May God bless tractor-trailer drivers. It seems like a miserable job to me. So the decision was made. We would take Highway 2 all the way to Wisconsin in hopes of discovering the heart of America, or at least some of the sites featured on those fantastic American State quarters! Those things are splendid. I collected them for a while, until I realized it was a hobby meant for retired folks and middle-aged men living in their mother’s basement.
Anyway, we found what were looking for: Large fields of grain, fields of corn (you may know these as cornfields), dairy farms, mills, and millions of sunflowers. The rest of Montana was fantastic. There’s a reason they call it Big Sky Country. Mountain ranges surround you in just about every direction and you could drive for 2 hours and still not reach some of them. North Dakota was similar to Montana with fewer mountains. Fields extended for miles upon miles, and we drove past lots of mill towns and farms. One thing that we didn’t expect was the huge fields of sunflowers that covered a good portion of the countryside. 
Another odd thing the crew didn’t expect was the anti-meth billboards that ran along the majority of Highway 2. They were graphic and intense, and apparently there’s a big problem with drug abuse in those parts. It’s easy to see why; there isn’t much to do at in rural Montana and rural North Dakota. I guess the beautiful scenery gets old out there, especially in the winter. One thing’s for sure; meth ain’t no joke, and it’s an extremely unstable process. If you mess up making that stuff, you could have a mini Hiroshima on your hands (non-nuclear of course).Neither Jake, Alex, Brad, nor I were impressed by Minnesota. The traffic pattern slowed down considerably and the countryside was nowhere near as enjoyable. The vegetation was thicker, and there were a lot more trees. We also went through what could only be described as marshy areas on the way to Wisconsin. If you’re from Minnesota, please don’t take offense to this assessment. We did not see much of the state, and I’m sure there are some truly splendid areas of your state. It’s just that the parts we went through were not them. The one place we visited in Minnesota that was awesome was the city of Bemidji. Bemidji is the mythical birth place of Paul Bunyan and also the home of Paul's majestic blue ox, Babe. You can see the fantastic statues at the bottom of this blog.
Wisconsin and Michigan were better. We visited Lake Superior and Lake Michigan. Lake Michigan had a very nice beach area on it in the town of Racine, WI. Delightful little lakeside suburban communities line the drive from Milwaukee to Chicago, IL. These are the kinds of little towns that you see on postcards and the kinds of towns where horror movies take place or originate from.We got to Chicago on Thursday, Aug. 16. The game between the Cubs and Cardinals was scheduled for 1:15 CT the next day. My experience at Wrigley Field during the game and in North Chicago post-game can only be described as shocking… I’ve already wasted enough precious minutes of your life with this blog. Holler back for the 3rd installment.
