Day 7: “So what state are we in now?”

After a big pancake and sausage breakfast, we pack up and head out. Carter sits in his stroller and eats his own weight in pancakes. Hannah and Dave do the outside stuff. Hannah is a pro by now. She can do all but the sewer dump. After seeing the movie “RV,” Dave is a bit leery of going there just yet. I crack up every time he pulls out the hose and ask him where his Y shaped connector is. You have to see the movie to get it. It’s total bathroom humor- literally. I’m laughing right now thinking about it.

From Owatonna, we head out to Manly, Iowa, where Jana’s family is from. We drive through Northwood, Manly and then to Plymouth. The kids are thrilled to see cows up close. We open the window and Jack calls out, “MOOOOO!”. The one closest to us shoots a dirty look and turns around to walk off. We find the family farmhouse based on our map, or at least narrow it down to two possibilities. The skies are looking a bit gloomy. Soon it is raining. We loop back through town when Hannah exclaims that we forgot to stop in the cemetery. Um…no, not really her parents think. It’s raining. I explain to Hannah that she can do it next time and it dawns on me that next time might be when she comes here with her children. We turn around and go back.

We grab an umbrella and head out. The cemetery is just like Jana has always described. On one side is the Oakdale Cemetery where the Strands and Rollas are buried. We’re thinking someone must have died and remarried, because the names and lineages are overlapping. Jana will have to clarify for us later. On the other side is the Bohemian Cemetery where the Peshayks are buried. There are a couple of really cool markers that are six foot tall trees with leaves and branches that intertwine. I’ve never seen anything like this and start to think how lucky we are that Hannah made us come back. It’s fascinating to the girls to connect with their history. I think how wild it is that a family in Iowa eventually intertwined with a family from Arkansas and planted roots in Arizona. I guess we could have cactus that intertwine?

Dave and our other little saplings catch up with us and we stop by the Strand Park to take a spin on the merry-go-round (the kind you don’t see anymore) and have a few stick sword fights. Dave is antsy to hit the road, so we eat sandwiches on the way. I make up a couple of iced lattes as we do 60 mph through acre after acre of farmland. We pop back up to Minnesota and head west.

The thrill of seeing a red barn has passed. They are all either white or red and there are a lot of them. Our travel guide says that just past the town of Blue Earth (now there’s a cool name for a town) is a 55 foot tall Jolly Green Giant overlooking pristine farmland. I pull out the big Nikon for this one. I wait and look. We see one road sign for it and then realize it is a mile off the freeway. 55 ft is the height of the treeline from this distance. He looks like the Jolly Green Dwarf and we zip by too quickly for a photo. The kids are in the back reading and watching movies, so I’m glad I didn’t hype it up too much.

I ask Dave to turn on some country music to go along with our farmland tour, but all he can find is old 80’s music. So I’m belting out “Hard for Me to Say I’m Sorry” and Dave and I can’t remember who sings it. I say Peter Centara and Dave says Boston. Does anyone know? We enjoy a mélange of melodies. Road trips are the best way to enjoy a trip down musical memory lane and I’m having a blast. By the time Reba Macentire is crooning about how her “the judge in the town’s got blood stains on his hands” and I’m singing it with feeling- Dave silently turns off the radio. We’ve driven almost 1700 miles at this point and I figure I probably should save the vocals.

Tatum is going through a growth spurt and is eating every 20 minutes it seems. Every so often she pops out and proclaims her hunger. Jack needs assistance to go potty in a moving motorhome and for some bizarre reason chooses then to catch up with mom during this time, so the whole ordeal is usually 15 minutes from start to finish. Carter is bored and Hannah is allergic to something in Minnesota so the Benedryl is making her lethargic. Our chauffer has fallen silent and the flight attendant is all out of wit. We’re ready for a break.


We roll into Chamberlain, South Dakota by six and head to Al’s Oasis Campground. We’re right off the freeway, but the gentle rolling hills feel like we’re miles away. I’ve decided that I love South Dakota, but it might be the beer I slammed while cooking up dinner, too. The kids run to the swings in the park as the sun lingers in the sky, basking everyone in a magical pink and orange glow. We have mac and cheese, yes, with yet more of that Wisconsin Cheddar. I think we’ll be cheesed out soon. The skies start to look ominous as the sun drops below the horizon.

Once everyone is tucked in, I crawl into bed, yet another day behind on downloading pictures. It seems to take some time and a good strong internet connection to match words with pictures. Dave had been checking the internet for the weather all day, to the point of obsession. He explains to me that he’s been told that a thunderstorm here is like no other. Quite scary, he says. By 11, rain is pelting our motorhome. He grabs my laptop and pulls up the weather. We are on the tip of a thunderstorm WATCH. I know enough about “watch” that it means reality as opposed to prediction. The winds rip about us, and I realize that we’ve chosen the campground up on the crest of a hill, as opposed to the one down on the river valley. Surely, we will be lifted into the air and thrown down to the ground in a heap of metal rubbish. I silently panic. Dave rolls over and falls asleep.
I do what all weak souls do with panic…I pray. I’m out on the South Dakota Plains with my four sweet defenseless children (and husband who is now snoring) and all that comes to mind is the story in the Bible where the huge storm creeps up on the disciples out in a boat, and they too panic. Jesus is below deck sleeping peacefully. The winds whip around them. They wake him and cry out in irritation that he sleeps while they surely will be overcome by the waves to their death. He all but rolls his eyes and calms the waters. I realize that I am not alone either. I am finally at peace. I fall asleep with the knowledge that I’m not alone on my boat either.