Thursday, September 4, 2014

Day 143: Storm Mountain to South Sioux City, NE

September 04, 2014

It was 54 degrees this morning at Storm Mountain Center, South Dakota – a little cool, requiring a sweat shirt, but a nice start to our day, with a few scattered clouds. We are very glad we stayed the additional day at Storm Mountain for several reasons, but especially because Scott Jenson, the director of the camp, returned home last night from visiting family, so we were able to spend a little time visiting with him this morning. What a pleasure and blessing it has been to get to know all the people at Storm Mountain. It was hard to say goodbye today but we do plan to see them all again. When we pulled back into camp last week after being gone all summer it was almost like being back home. We didn't take many pictures this visit but you can look back in our blog to the end of April and early May for additional information on Storm Mountain.

We left the Center about 9:00 en route for South Sioux City, Nebraska – 444 miles away. That meant we traveled straight across South Dakota and we do mean straight, on I 90 to Sioux Falls, SD then turned south on I 29. There was maybe one curve shortly before we arrived in Sioux Falls - sort of a boring drive. The wind blew all day! Not just a breeze either. From what we have been told that stretch of I 90 is known for strong winds and we fought the winds on the way out in the spring and back across today. At least today part of the time it was a tail wind so our mileage might be a little better. The scenery was primarily flat farm land. We saw huge fields of corn, hay, soy beans and barley. There was also fields of sunflowers but these flowers were not as large as the ones we say saw Montana and North Dakota.
The kind of wind we "enjoyed" all day
Little chapel at one of the South Dakota rest areas
We arrived here at the WalMart in South Sioux City about 7:00 pm – we lost another hour today and we are back on Central Time for the first time in about 4 ½ months. The people here are very nice. After we parked and verified with WalMart that it was OK for us to overnight here we met a lady in the parking lot. She saw us get out of the RV and asked where we were from and welcomed us to their community. “We think it is the best in the world” she said. She shared a little about the community and told us that we were in a very safe area. Very nice!  By the way - she and her husband own an RV too.  Later we went into WalMart to pick up a few items – yes, it always costs us to stay at WalMart – and the employees in the store were also particularly nice and friendly. We were going to tell the manager, but they were so busy tonight that we didn't want to bother anyone to find the manager. We may try to go back in before we leave in the morning to say thanks and compliment the staff. Anyway – we will be on the road a little earlier tomorrow morning and hope to travel approx 432 miles to somewhere around Lamar, Missouri.

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