Marathon Drive

Day one started way too early with a huge and loud storm in St Charles at 2:30 am. I was on the road by 4:30, got to Kansas City and called Iowa Dept of trans. to see if I could go up 29 like I wanted to. No dice, the Missouri River decided to take 29 instead. So I muddled my way around for a bit before I decided there was a road that cut straight north from Kansas to South Dakota. So I called a friend. Thanks Laura for doing some mapquesting for me in Cleveland. I made it to the Badlands around 8pm central time. If the river had cooperated, I would have been here by 5pm. At a rest stop in South Dakota (I was so happy to finally be in South Dakota), I met a family from Erie PA, who happened to people who live in POLAND (where I grew up in Ohio)! But I didn't know their friends.  We ran into each other in the Badlands and they helped take a picture of me, and I told them to pop into Grand Teton since they will be in Yellowstone. Crashed for the night in a cute and cozy motel in Wall (thats the name of the town, not what I hit).