Met you in St. Louis

Today, on our way out of Illinois, we had some free sample candy and saw the world's biggest covered wagon, complete with a giant Abraham Lincoln. He was studying LAW, apparently.


We then made our way to St. Louis where we saw the St. Louis arch, which was huge and shiny.


We also saw the Soldier's Memorial Building, which was amazing. Filled with war memorabilia, the building itself was a marble monolith that was gorgeous. The amount of history contained within was incredibly impressive. Items ranged from torpedoes and guns, to katanas and Nazi belt buckles. The guard that worked there had lived in Portland and even let us stay a little longer, because we were homies. The library in St. Louis was also an architectural wonder and very appealing.

Comics, guns and swords from WWII.

i got kicked by a cop

so we slept in a little access road to a cell tower and at 5 in the morning im woken up by something moving my feet. he didnt really soccer kick me or something, just tapped my feet to wake me up. he more or less said he had run our plates and just wanted to see what was up. he was actually fairly cool given the oddity of our situation :) he told us that if someone called he already knew we were there and as long as we didnt stay too long it was all good. he took off and we slept for a little while longer.

church

Bill, thank your mother for all that food! we finished the last of the bread on friday night i think. it was good to have bread with some of our meals and i think we still have some of the other things she got for us packed in the car.

well saturday night we spent in an abandoned industrial park. it got really foggy but since we were sleeping in the truck loading dock we stayed fairly dry. while we were getting ready to go to bed the sprinklers for the area came on. i had run out of water earlier in the day so i ran over with our water jug and filled it from the sprinkler. then i decided that since i hadnt showerd in 5 days i should just shower in the sprinkler! austin saw me but he got there right as they shut off :(


in the morning it was time to go find a church. Thomas was on the phone talking to his friend Jake about a possible church in Wheaton and i was driving. we passed Fox Valley Bible Church and i just decided to pull in. God has found awesome churches for us to go to so far and this was no exception! we were there about 45 min early and so we sat in the car for a few minutes. Austin and Thomas went in to find a bathroom and somehow austin found a shower! i went in and was sitting and reading my Bible when i met this guy named Horst. while i was telling him my story Laury and Victoria overheard me and so i got to tell them my story too! after we talked for a few minutes they invited the 3 of us to a potluck at 5:30. we got directions from them after church and while we were talking we met this guy named Ian. we talked with him and several other guys including a guy named Chuck. we decided to go over to Ian's house so we could cook food instead of eating our food cold but once we got there they decided to take us out to lunch!

lunch was "chicago style" food at this place called Portellos. it was awesome! it was so good to eat warm food and something other than our canned food. we had whats called the combo. its like a sausage with sliced beaf and peppers in a bun. it was good! it turns out that Ian and his family were part of the small group who was having the potluck so we ended up seeing them again later in the evening

after lunch we drove to Wheaton and visited Thomases friend. while we were at the campus these two girls asked us if we knew how to get to Target. we didnt know because we more or less had no idea where we were but i was able to help adjust their bicycles brakes so they stopped properly.

we left wheton and drove back to the Potluck and small group. it was awesome to sit and have a discussion with solid Bible teaching as the framework. Gods family has been so good to us, i only hope i can be as good an example as they have been. Bill - we were able to apply some things we learned in your small group and discussions last week! we met a lot of great people, its amazing how God has found such good people for us to meet.

we left headed back to Wheaton where we were going to spend the night and we were greated with an awesome display of lightning!

we spent the night on some couches and then cooked breakfast in their dorm kitchen. Thomas talked to people at admissions about doing his masters there while Austin and i looked at a mastodon, C.S. Lewis and Tolkein's desks/wardrobe, and the Billy Graham Museum.

we left Wheaton late in the morning and headed into Chicago. we drove through Lombard where my Dad lived when he was little. they call it the windy city and windy it was! once we got to down town Chicago we saw Millenium Park (shiny bean),
light and water towers, Sears (Willis) Tower,
Lake Michigan,
800 Canadian Geese and a whole lot of people. id like to take the time to say that i rather dislike walking in my cheap flipflops and that i took them off and walked barefoot around Chicago for a good amount of time.

oh and Thomas found something to ride

I eated the purple berries!

Our journey today began when we began searching for a Great Harvest Bread so that our breakfast would be provided by their delicious selection of baked goodness. We patrolled around for a goodly amount of time until we gave up and searched again on Google, only to find that the store we were searching for did not exist in the real world, only in Google Map's imagination. Failing to secure free bread, we went south in search of free cheese. We came upon New Glarus, America's Little Switzerland. We managed to find some free cheese and wine samples and proceeded to head south toward Monroe, where we again had some free cheese. (Sorry we missed you Todd. We didn't see your note until we had already left town. Feel free to let us know how your trip goes though.)

Cheese cow in Monroe.

Pleasant Prairie was today's highlight; we got to visit the Jelly Belly Factory, take a tour and we also got some free candy! (And free hats.)


We are now in Illinois, the land of Lincoln where we await the wonder that this new state offers.

rain rain go away

well it didnt rain last night but the 250 something miles of driving we did in the rain yesterday got some water inside our car top luggage. we think its puddling up in the drainage spout and then sloshing in when we stop. nothing important has been damaged so far but its just not good to have things get wet and then stay wet.

last night we had a can of baked beans, spam, corn and mixed fruit - now thats living! we spent under the cover of an abandoned bank drive through. since it didnt rain we didnt really need cover but it helps keep the dew off. at one point it got really windy and we had a few visitors. there was a bicycle path that ran by about 50 yards off. there were cycleists who passed us at 4 am!

im sure i speak for the other two when i say i really want a shower! its been almost a week since ive felt clean!

well our plan today is to drive out and see some old swiss village thing and then mozy on over to this other possible lead we have on a cheese factory. from there we will head south into Chicago and see the sights such as they are.

one last thing - google has found our site! now you can search through the site for your favorite posts (it helps bring us traffic) but google told us there was a great harvest bread store here and it wasnt here - youre back to zero google!

Wisconsin, where is your cheese?

Today, we journeyed to the Como Park Zoo and Conservatory, where we saw a goodly number of animals and monkeys with sweet mustaches. (Emperor Tamarins)


After a quick lunch in the car, we journeyed into Wisconsin in search of cheese. We needed to find some to compare to our own Tillamook brand cheese. After many false leads, we found a shop that offered the object of own desire. Unfortunately, the shop was closed and we are no closer to getting cheese. Let's hope we have better luck tomorrow.

We also had the opportunity to visit Warrens, the location of the Warrens Cranberry Festival, the world's largest cranberry festival. Cranfest! And by visit, I mean drove through. We weren't going to pay 8 dollars for parking, or stop really. No offense, but it didn't look very exciting.

Currently, we're in Madison, Wisconsin awaiting tomorrow, which will hopefully bring new opportunities for cheese. And less rain.

so yesterday we slept next to a hotel where some truckers parked. one truck idled all night long. in the morning we got breakfast and internet from the hotel. i installed my replacement headlight - one took a rock a week ago and the rain we got the other day killed it. we went to napa and got my brake pads. i ended up having to buy a special tool to turn the caliper pistons in so the new pads would fit. $13 for a little chunk of metal ...

after that we drove into down town Minneapolis and looked at lots of stuff the city has to offer. we found the Mississippi river but i still havnt been east of it yet! i was tempted to run across the bridge just so that i could say i had but we will likely cross the river today.

while in the city we found a park with lots of cool sculptures...


and Thomas rode them ...

"if you build it, I will ride it" -Thomas

and a huge awesome church.



last night we wanted to camp in this park but some old guy told us to leave. we ended up stealth camping in one of those tents they set up in front of stores for big sales and stuff. austin got bit in the hand and on the face by mosquitoes and is kinda bitter about it - currently still mumbling about how much he hates them :)

todays plan is to see a couple of different things in St Paul in the morning and then head east into Michigan!

tell your friends about our blog!

wet

last night it got really wet. our sleeping bags are all damp and we need to find a way to dry them out. it didnt help that it kinda sprinkled a little this morning while i replaced the damaged headlight.

hopefully Napa will have my brake pads when we drive over there. after playing with the brakes i think the calipers still function properly but something caused the pad to slip sideways and rub like justins unsafe at any speed Kawasaki Ninja 250 brakes.

anyway thats todays update from me, i think the plan for the rest of the day is to see some more sights around town and then move on to Wisconsin and the other great lake states.

All right so now it's my turn, using proper capitalization and punctuation. Here's some pictures of us.

Visiting Kevin in Iowa. Unfortunately I didn't get any pictures of when we visited Cody at ISU (not OSU), but we had good times regardless.


Here's some of us at the SPAM museum in Austin, Minnesota.

After our adventures in the southern part of the state, we made our way up to the Twin Cities, where we are now waiting for repairs on the Subaru's brakes.
I might also mention that the Mall of America has no special properties other than being really big. Also, it is owned by Canadians. It's true.

bad news

my E brake sticks so i just dont use it. when we were at OSU the other day we parked on a hill that was steep enough it rolled in gear so i pulled the E brake. when we left i manually released each caliper but the drivers side was still a little sticky. we drove and it got hot so i messed with it some more and it released. the passenger side seemed to be fine (other than leaking which its done for 2,000 miles) and we drove up to Minneapolis.

while driving today you could clearly hear brake dragging noise and when we pulled into a parking lot to see a museum we found the passenger brake pads were totally gone. i can get pads at the auto parts stores but no one can find the calipers! if we put pads on we can drive the car but its likely going to keep chewing up pads because the caliper is sticky.

Napa thinks they can order my calipers and have them here in 4 days but who knows if thats true or not.

Toto i think we are back in Missouri

we are actually in Minasota right now but that was a funny quote from the other day that didnt get posted.

thank you again so much Bill and Julie for your hospitality!

last night we were at Ohio state and visited some friends of Thomas's from Japan. we cooked breakfast in their lounge and got a shower! nothing like two showers in two days! thats living like kings!

anyway we saw the ABC computer which could solve 29 equations with 29 unknowns and some interesing art. we met some people and got free pizza! Thomas got a free shirt for anwering some questions to which he was given the answers...

after that we went and saw the Spam museum! we saw how they made spam back in the day, we raced canning our own pretend spam, we took pictures with all sorts of weird things and Thomas rode some pig statues.

we will have to put up pictures later because i dont know where Thomas is with the memory card to the camera and the mall of America closes in 20 min.

its a huge mall with its own theme park but its just that, a huge mall. we ate some PB and J sandwiches in the parking lot and then went in to post this, find a wal-mart to sleep at and check the weather.

i guess thats it for today, tomorrow we are going to explore the city and see some museums and what not so that should be fun!

Another week gone by

Well when we left off, we were in the parking lot of the Kansas City Wal-Mart and Ben was getting his brand new tire. Austin and I headed over to Men's Warehouse and while he got his measurements, I poked around, picking up change and rode a pig. (I made that hat.)


We spent the night in the parking lot, getting shout outs from locals about how great Oregon is (Right on.) and how awesome the Ducks are. When we woke up, we headed out and started looking for a church to attend. We made it to Liberty, MO and started following folks who were well dressed and in their cars. After one of them decided to pull into a school (which was also a church we later found out) we kept going and eventually found Liberty Christian Fellowship, an amazing church where we were welcomed and had a chance to visit small group and their service. Afterward, we were welcomed to attend lunch with some great folks and we were even invited to spend the night at their house! So here we are, sitting in their living room, awaiting a home cooked meal and it is stupendous. (They also let us use their showers and do some laundry. Also great.) We are really blessed by this church and their members and if you're ever in Liberty, Missouri stop by and visit.

Also, we had a visitor in our car yesterday. The bugs around here are fond of hitting the Subaru. Austin got sprayed by his internals and this little dude wound up back next to me in the backseat.


Lastly, hello to Amanda!

car update

1:transmission fluid leak from the clutch side of the transmission
2:brake fluid leak from front right
3:coolant leak from lines to heater core on the outside of the firewall

almost time for my 3k oil change

50.6 mph average for more than 2,700 miles of driving

~ 27mpg average

and thats all the interesting stats i can think of :)

WAR driving

so i had to do a little WAR driving to get this latest post up. i eventually found someones home network left open. any way we are waiting for wal-mart to put a new tire on for me and then we will be on our way. Austin and Thomas are out looking for mens warehouse so that Austin can get measured for the suit he is buying for Phils wedding.

while i was in the wal-mart parking lot i met a couple who also did a little blogging. aparently the guy had done a 3 month long camping trip when he was younger - guess its the thing to do these days!

an old lady we met a couple of days ago called what we are doing a "life break" :)

we are a long way from home!

so last night we found a place to sleep but then trains started going by every 20 min so we packed up and slept in a rest stop.



this morning we lost a tire. i was driving along thinking how i didnt like sectioned cement roads because they always made that flat tire feeling. then i feel the car pull a little to the left, a little more and then yeah totally flat tire all in about 5 seconds. we pull off to the side of the road and change it. the tire appears to have split at the bead. hopefully we can find a place to get something cheap to replace it with here in Missouri.

yeah the tire isnt supposed to open like that ...

An addition...

Ben forgot to post this, but he insisted I add it regardless. Here is what we found in Alliance, Nebraska: a redneck rest stop.


There you have it ladies and gentlemen, there you have it.

who would do that?

hicks in Nebraska would!

thats right boys and girls, we saw carhendge!




we stopped at an original pony express place and the old lady inside was nice. we also got some free cookies.

right now Austin and Thomas are inside a food place seeing if a coupon we have will get us some cheep food.

what?! so the lady they talked to inside heard our story and hooked us up! Thomas had a coupon for something and asked how big it was to see if it was a good deal or not. i guess this got her interested and she came out and we explained what we were doing. she took them back inside and got a bunch of food, pretended to ring them up but gave them all the food for free!

it feels good to eat different food!

- thanks for the comments and remember to tell your friends to check out our blog!

so last night we almost saw a motorcycle crash! for those that dont know, most of the states we have been in recently are not helmet states. its weird as a biker seeing other riders racing around with no helmet. anyway we watched some guy on an old katana almost T-bone a guy on a 4 wheeler. the guy on the 4 wheeler pulled out and the guy on the bike locked up the rear end. he was actually wearing a helmet and yeah they ride 4 wheelers on the road with no helmets in Wyoming...

we stayed the night at devils tower. we got a couple of good pictures in the evening and then a few more in the morning. we saw some lights on the tower at night, most likely head lamps of climbers. no idea what they were doing up there after dark.


we slept under the stars and austin and i talked for almost 4 hours about all kinds of things. we talked about the shooting stars we saw. we talked about how fast gravity travels, how fast sin travels. God. why there are more stars than we can ever visit. whether or not there is an edge to the universe. whether or not you are translucent when there is no light shining on you. relationships and leadership. it was good

this morning we got up and saw the Jewel caves, the 2d largest cave in the world i think. after the caves we went on and saw Rushmore! i really enjoyed looking at how they carved it.

austin and i hanging out with the presidents!




after this we plan on heading south and seeing carhendge!

so far i havnt found any of the auto parts stores who have my brake calipers (the front right one leaks fluid really slow)

anyway thats it for today i think.

oh wait, yes Thomas found something else to ride...

well since Thomas really didnt put much story in with his pictures ill just fill you guys in a little. in yellow stone we saw all kinds of neat things and met some interesting people.

when we were walking down to the hot springs where we met the girls i saw a nice Triumph motorcycle with one huge boot sitting under it. at the hot spring i tried to guess who the bike belonged too and i guessed right the first time! the guys name was Jose i think and he was from salem oregon!

the girls we met were also on a crazy long road trip, theirs was just ending in a different place. it was cool to find people doing more or less the same thing we are doing. the next day we did some hiking with the girls and then parted ways. since we dont know more than their first names and dont have any contact info its unlikely that we will ever see them again.

the next night we spent hiding in the car from the rain. we got some crazy thunder and lighting to go along with it. infact i got zapped by static collecting on a tree! we left yellow stone and headed east towards devils tower which brings us to now.

i think this was last nights sunset. it got kinda wet so i went back in the car for a bit and then got back out when it was dry.

some of the canyon walls on our way through Whyoming

Thomas likes riding things!

and for those of you who wanted to see our sign:

so the plan is to move on toward devils tower (close encounters of the 3rd kind) and then on to mt rushmore!

Picture post.

I would like to share some pictures that we took in Yellowstone and around Wyoming. Unfortunately the weather turned rainy on us, but we were able to take what I think are some good shots. I would also add that I am now an official Yellowstone Junior Ranger, having completed the necessary steps and obtained my patch. So without further ado, here are some pictures:

We also had the opportunity to take a hike with some cool girls that we met at the hot spring. Here is one of the canyons that we went by.

Sawmill Geyser

And lastly, me riding a jackalope.

what? nine thousand?

OVER NINE THOUSAND!!! yeah so on our way out of yellow stone national park we drove over some mt pass that was something like 9,500 ft high! my poor little subaru just kept chugging right along. currently the only damage to the car is a leaking front right brake caliper, a rock in my front right headlight and a tire that leaks really really slow. it would take about a week to go flat so its not really a big deal.

just make sure John knows the car has done over 1,500 miles and still runs :)

Thomas should be putting up some pictures with a little story to go along with them here in a bit. we are currently sitting in a taco johns parking lot using taco johns internet :)

9/13/09

So ya, after hittin up Helena we decided we should stay in town, get some shut eye, and drag our sorry butts to church in the morning. Oh ya, did i mention we slept in a Walmart parking lot?, well we did.....and Thomas was pooped on by birds in the morning cause he slept under that tree....moral, don't sleep under the trees in parking lots.

These couple other shots are of St. Mary's Falls on our way outa Glacier, just another beatiful sight that you all chose not to see.

Lastly, we did make it to church this morning, we winded up at Plymoth Congregational Church here in Helena led by Rev. Dick Weaver. Oh we also learned that there are three reasons Jesus may have been black; 1: He called everyone brother, 2: He liked Gospel, 3: He didn't get a fair trial... Besides that the people here are a joy to be around and let us share a great lasagna meal with them. So pretty much if you ever end up here in Montana come down say hi, share a meal, and enjoy some great fellowship with these amazing people.

so in the previous post we told you that we were planning on doing a 22 ish mile hike. we did it and now we all walk like old men :) it was totally worth it though because we saw some things that no amount of pictures could do justice.

we woke up at first light, packed our sleeping gear and took out our pre packed day trip bags. we had a couple of pop tarts each and we were on the trail a little after 7am. it wasnt as steep as some trails but it was knowing that it would be this steep or steeper for a little over 10 miles. we talked about all sorts of random things including whether or not my subaru would make it up the trail. we got warm from moving but the air was still rather cold. its that weird situation where you can be sweaty and warm in some parts of your body and cold in others. we got passed by a about a dozen pack mules and teased their driver a little bit about how he was cheating by riding a horse and not walking.
the first major stop was a little over 6 miles up the trail. it was called Sprerry Chalet and it was about a quarter mile off of our route. It is a collection of buildings on the edge of a sheer cliff that i guess people can rent or get rooms in some how. anyway the view from the cliff is fantastic. we went around to the cliff edge and sat down to have a snack. we were eating some jerky and trail mix when a fat little chipmunk came up to us. she came right up to us, totally unafraid. we didnt feed her at first but she was so cute we couldnt help it and she ended up getting a few bits of dried mango, peanuts and some other tasty crumbs. Austin had a peanut in his fingers and she came up and put her paws out to grab it. he pulled it back a little and she waddled forward with her outstretched paws, trying desperately to get hold of this glorious morsel. it was so funny see a fat little chipmunk grasping at the air!

while we were playing with our friend which Austin named Clarice i turned to find two mountain goats! they kinda snuck up behind us. i have never seen mountain goats up that close, fact i dont even know if ive seen them in the zoo!


we packed up and headed on to our destination which was sperry glacier and which the map told us was just under 4 miles away. the trail left the forest and started switch backing up the next clif. the trail crossed some rock slides that were more than a half mile wide. the trail crested a false summet and we walked into a series of giant sized steps filled with glacier melt pools.

this is some of the best landscape i have ever seen in my life! nothing i can remember comes close to this!

we sat down to take a little break and i took off my boots and socks to let my feet air out. i noticed a little mousey thing under the rock i was sitting on which made squeeking noises every so often. eventually it came out and Thomas and i guessed it was a pika (we found a book this evening which identified it as an American pika). this little guy ran around my rock and then back into a series of tunnels in the ground. the thing came back out and sniffed my foot, decided it was good and took a few test nibbles! fortunately it didnt break the skin but it totally nibbled on me! it came back again and went over to my socks because i guess it really liked the way my feet smelled. i watched it closely to see what it would do. i guess Thomas was willing it in his head to jack one of my socks. sure enough it looks around an grabs one and makes a break for one of its tunnels! i scared it and it dropped my sock. sock thief!

we kept moving and came across these little furry guys. Thomas looked in a book and told me what they are called but i cant remember what it was now that im typeing this. at the time we decided that they were mountain beavers (hoary marmots)

still further up the road we found some mountain chickens(white tailed ptarmigans) - Thomas told me their name too but ive forgotten it.



we climbed up this little crack blasted into the rock and we were at the top! the glacier wasnt as cool as we expected it but we were told that there woudnt be any of it left in 15 years. the old ranger guy said it was like two ice cubes fighting a battle aganst the sun.

i was taking a little nap on a rock and Austin wondered over to a little water fall about a quarter mile away. Thomas and i went over and joined him we ate some more jerkey and the last of our trail mix. we also had some weird hard cracker things which the package called bread. we put a little peanut butter on them and they were ok.






we started back down the hill and came across another pair of Mt goats! this time they were walking up the trail that we were trying to walk down. we didnt exactly know what to do since we had no idea how they would react and since running around on the rocks is their forte we decided that it would be best to back off the trail and let them go past. they walked right up to us! we wanted to pet them but they have pointy horns ...


we kept going down and found a total of 13 something goats!

all of us were tired on the way down and we talked less and less. you just kinda heard each persons foot steps and knew that they were still moving. we went to a picknic spot swam in the lake and cooked some dinner. we came back to the same Macdonald Lodge that i wrote yesterdays post from because they have soft chairs and a fireplace!

tomorrow we are going to see a couple of things that involve really short hikes and then head south to Yellow stone. hopefully somewhere along the way we will find internet and a church to go to sunday morning. we should be in yellow stone some time monday.

just as a funny side note as we type these in the lodge people wander past and ask us if we have internet here. most assume that its a public computer because we are sitting at a little desk with a lamp and potted plant. we have to explaine that it is infact not a public computer and that it does not have internet. this evening i think 5 people have asked so far.

thanks for posting that you saw us on the road! this is awesome to hear that our sign is actually working :) sorry about spelling and out of order pictures and what not, im really tired and blogspot is kinda frustrating at times