Day 74: Home again, home again, jigidy jog!

North Carolina! (((sigh))) Look at that sky!Dipping down to South Carolina...I love this ivy, it was everywhere! For those race fans out there we passed by Darlington...

We went through this little town and I spotted this brightly colored house, I couldn't resist taking a picture of it.
I've posted pictures of corn fields and other farms across country, so here are some from the Carolinas.This is a true southern farm...tobacco.

And I believe this is a cotton field.

Here are some Carolina pine trees.Here are the palm trees I've missed so much!

Back into North Carolina. Notice the small sign to the left...Brunswick County! We're getting closer...

14 miles...this seems like the longest part of the trip!7 more miles...

3 more miles...

entering town...Home...We pulled into our spot to find our wonderful friends here at the campground had left a bunch of festive balloons welcoming us home!

Thank you for taking this journey with us...it has been great sharing some of our summer with y'all.

Day 73: Back in the Carolinas! ;>)

485.6 miles from Illinois to Tennessee to North Carolina!!!Look how green everything is in Kentucky!
Nashville, TNAfter we went through Knoxville, the bottom dropped...

The winds were so strong and trees were falling onto the highway so we had to stop for the night just after we entered North Carolina. We stopped at Creekwood Farm RV Park in Waynesville, NC...look at this place! We took a nice walk around the park after the storm let up.

Good night!

Day 72: Missouri & Illinois

Another 478.1 miles down.Through St. Louis...Over the muddy Mississippi River...

...on to Illinois.

Really hot, tired and miserable today. We rested a couple times at a gas station or rest area but that didn't last long. The temperature in the RV was 99 when we finally stopped for the night and it was after 10 pm before it was cool enough to be comfortable.

Day 71: Longest day yet!

On the road again! Traveled 666.1 miles today and in 4 states:

Wyoming (day 2)...

Either I have been blind this whole trip or just not environmentally aware, since we consume diesel in this rig, but this was the first gas station I saw that advertised ethanol. It's in Wyoming! Go figure! Let me put this in perspective (thanks Terry) Wyoming has a population of 509,294 according to the 2008 Atlas we bought at Wal-Mart prior to our trip. According to the Charlotte, NC Chamber of Commerce web site they have a population of 695,995! How many ethanol gas stations does Charlotte have, I wonder? Nebraska...

This is beautiful farm country!

Nebraska had acres of corn fields!

Cabela's World Headquarters in Sidney, NE. This place had a campground and store, it was HUGE!The Great Platte River Road Archway, Kearney, NE

We slept a few hours at a Rest Area, but it was so noisy and HOT we decided to move on!Through a small portion of Iowa...

On to Missouri... Remarkable buildings

Day 70: Rawlins, Wyoming

We only drove 211.5 miles today to Rawlins, Wyoming. Since we spent the night in the Wal-Mart parking lot, neither of us got much sleep. Again, I wish I had paid more attention in Geology class...what is the continental divide??? I looked it up on line...still not sure..."The Great Divide, also called the Continental Divide, separates the watersheds of the Pacific Ocean from those of the Atlantic or Arctic Oceans. It runs from the Seward Peninsula in Alaska, through western Canada along the crest of the Rocky Mountains to New Mexico. From there, it follows the crest of Mexico's Sierra Madre Occidental and extends to the tip of South America. It is crossed by the Panama Canal." (Wikipedia) Anyway we crossed over it...

We met up with our friend Terry at this campground.We had a very nice visit. He took us to dinner in Rawlins. Here are some pictures of down town area. Cute little town, but he said they had snow through mid-June!

Then we went to visit the only real tourist attraction in Rawlins: Wyoming's Frontier Prison, or "The Old Pen."

The movie "Prison" was filmed here.
Since there were so many outlaws in post-Civil War Wyoming, the state legislators planned this state of the art penitentiary to send a message to these desperadoes that Wyoming is no longer a place for the lawless. It was served as a penitentiary from 1901 to 1981.
This red roofed building is the death row portion of the prison. Legend has it that the inmates were digging a tunnel under the stone wall and would hide the dirt up in the ceiling. This is the reason the ceiling inside sags.
9 prisoners were hung and 5 prisoners were executed by lethal gas in the gas chamber.
Another interesting story is about a little old lady who lived across the street from the prison. She use to bake things every day for the prisoners and they all got to know her. One man was left out on parole, he broke into her house and attacks her. After his arrest the cops thought he would be safer away from the townspeople who loved the little old lady so they put him back into the Old Pen. They did not anticipate the prisoners code of justice. The killed him.