Christina and Robert's Cross-Country Trip: Part 7
On Tuesday 7/14 we left Robert's relatives and drove along the Laura Ingalls Wilder Historic Highway to Walnut Grove, MN--on the banks of Plum Creek!! I stepped into the creek itself and waded where Ma used to do her wash. We saw the site of the sod house and many other devoted Little House fans and their families.
Then we continued down the highway to De Smet, SD--little house in town!! There was the very surveyors' house they lived in the first winter in town, and then Pa's store and the house he built.
I think I was a little more excited by this part of the trip than was Robert. There were lots of other clueless husbands and fathers who, when the guide asked how familiar everyone was with Laura's life, and their women gushed about how many times they'd read the books, mumbled that they'd seen the TV show once or twice. I did a rubbing of Pa's grave (Laura is buried in MO) and then we headed on to Badlands and the Black Hills. It was very hot and a hot strong wind kept blowing across the prairie. That is absolutely all you see for long stretches of the way, and there are as many tractors on the road as other cars (maybe 2/hour). At night we stopped right on the shore of the Missouri River in SD, a big fishing area, and ate an excellent walleye (fried, of course) and a good cod for not too much.