all gone to look for America

So far I've been through Virginia, West Virginia, Kentucky, Indiana, Illinois, Wisconsin, Minnesota, and am currently typing to you from South Dakota. Miles and miles of corn fields? I've seen them. Wind farms? I've seen them, too. Crazy roadside attractions typical of small town America? Check. And I kind of love it. So far we've seen The World's Largest Pheasant (a statue) in Huron, SD, and we passed through a town celebrating their "Wild West Days," another celebrating "Box Car Days," Tyler, MN (pop. 1143) honoring their Danish heritage with "Abelskiver Days" and a plethora of Danish flags lining the street, and one with the largest county fair in the state!

The House on the Rock is probably the trippiest place I've ever visited. There are three sections-- the House, the Mill, and the Distillery. The House is an odd, carpeted, low-ceilinged, winding monstrosity of a place balanced on a rock. The Infinity Room is a long triangle-shaped windowed room that juts out over the valley below. At the end of the room you can feel it swaying in the wind. Scary, in my opinion. The Mill is filled with "The Streets of Yesteryear," a crazy, dark, diorama-filled 19th-century street. We put in a token to watch "The Dying Drunkard," which Shadow talks about in the book, I believe. It was a creepy 19th-century diorama that apparently once sat in a British railway station; the drunkard lays on a bed and skeletons jump out at him. Really, anything involving 19th-century dolls is creepy. Once you exit the street, you come into a room with a three story whale and octopus fighting. The surrounding walls are filled with naval/ocean related artifacts, and at the end of that is a "Streets of Yesteryear" foodcourt. We did not get anything to eat. I felt a little like Persephone in the Underworld.

Past that is the carousel. This is really, really impressive. It's huge, has 296 carousel figures-- not one a horse-- and is worth nearly $5 million. It's covered in red and white lights and chandeliers. I've never seen anything like it in my life. After the carousel room comes the Distillery, a twisting red and gold fairyland of ramps around big steampunk looking clocks and dolls and fully furnished doll houses and smaller carousels. It was a sensory overload.

We left the House and took 14 up to La Crosse, WI and into Minnesota. On the way we stopped at our first Culver's, a true fast-food delight. They don't have Culver's on the East Coast; this place has THE BEST malts, onion rings, and burgers. Everything tastes fresh (made with Wisconsin Dairy!) and it was sooo amazing. Better than In-N-Out OR Five Guys. That's saying something.

We stopped for the night in Owatonna, MN, and then in the morning headed out to Mankato, MN! Mankato is the home of my beloved Betsy-Tacy series (a book series about a girl growing up in Deep Valley, i.e Mankato, at the turn of the 20th century), so we got to see Betsy's house and Tacy's house, the Sibley's house with it's sweeping side lawn, the site of the high school (now a parking garage, sadly), and Lincoln Park, that little pie-shaped slice of land. I was in Heaven. I love Mankato. I love that Carney's house still has a sweeping side lawn where everyone could hang out. I love that there's a bench at the top of Hill Street.

From there we took 14 into South Dakota; that part of 14 is known as the Laura Ingalls Wilder Historic Highway. We passed over Plum Creek and through DeSmet, by Silver Lake, before turning down to Mitchell, SD. Today-- the Corn Palace! A palace made almost entirely of corn! God, you gotta love America.