WISCONSIN DELLS

Well, it is July 31, and here we are at the Ho Chunk Casino rv park in Baraboo, Wisconsin, just up the road a piece from the Dells.  We have been here since Wednesday.  We have a large pull thru full hook up space and we leveled the coach and so far the new windshield is holding.  We are a short walk from the casino and very few coaches are here, but the WINDS.  They are unbelievably strong, and it pulls the door from your hands.

Yesterday we went to the House on the Rock, which is a famous house which was built in 1945, but has only been open to the public since 1960.  Alex Jordan used to come to a picnic area called Shelter Rock when he was a little boy.  His family liked the area so much he bought the piece of land it was on.  Afterwards his father purchased all the surrounding property and began building this monumental house.  Alex continued the work after his father passed away and had loads of quarry rock brought in and this is what the house is made of.  Just walking through its dark and cavelike area is extraordinary.  We took the section 1 tour which was the original house, infinity walk and the Japanese gardens.  It was amazing to see this.

Afterwards we went to  Culvers, our favorite fast food place.  Love that culvers.  Then we went to the Circus Museum, Barnam and Bailey was quartered here in Baraboo.  Seeing all the old circus things was wonderful, they even had shows there and live camels and elephants.

Today, Friday we drove to the Dells, which is the tourist area to take a boatride on the lower dells.  This is an hour ride.  The upper dells is over 2 hours and it was very warm and extremely windy so we arranged for the lower one.  A shuttle brought us to the dock and we had almost an hour before boarding so we had some mexican food for lunch at a real nice place right on the dock.  The water level was too low to launch from there, so a Duck, amphibious vehicle shuttle picked us up and took us to a higher level dock.  There were only 6 of us on the tour, and so relaxing.  We chose to sit below because the wind on the upper deck could blow you away.

Anyhow it was a nice ride, we learned about how the dells were formed and I got some nice photos.

There are the sculptures outside the 

"House on the Rock"

Below is on of the carousel animals,

the house had a carousel room, a dollhouse room too

The lovely japanese gardens

Horseless carriage

Photos from the Circus Museum

Jumbo the largest elephant in captivity

Costuming area

Camels and elephants, oh my

Oldtime circus cars

I loved the old posters

Photos of the Dells

NORTHWEST CHICAGO AND BEYOND

Well, it is July 29, and we are now in Union, Illinois.  We are at a very nice Koa, we got in easily but getting out was another story, tight turns and flower boxes all over, but beautifully manicured lawns and overall in the country, cornfields and fun.  We got to do a few things while we were there.  We went to the Volo car museum, about 20 miles away.

However, on the way we stopped at a vienna hot dog place for lunch.  It was pure heaven.  Then we got to the museum, more pure heaven.  There were 6 barns full of beautiful cars, most for sale, restored and gorgeous.  In some of the barns were cars from the movies, and tv.  We saw a short movie about how they made the batman cars.  We went in and passed through a dusenberg exhibit and then they had a whole military exhibit, which was so interesting, outside and in were memorabilia everywhere, even a playground for the kids and a picnic area.  There was also a cute Betty Boop cafe for lunch and had an animatronic animal trio playing fifties tunes, joel and I shared a hot fudge sundae.  We had a wonderful time there and the photos tell the story, then then we had dinner with joels childhood friend, bob anders and his wife barbara.  They drove an hour to come to see us and we had dinner at a german style restaurant.  The next morning before we left for Wisconsin we went to a railroad museum and the photos also tell the story.  We are on the way to the Wisconsin Dells today and will be there for 5 nites.

These of some of the restored classic cars

These pics below of all the special cars from

tv and movies, blues bros, ghost busters,

teenage mutant ninja turtles, beverly hillbillies

Joel with the general from the dukes of hazzard

Kitt, the knightrider car, back to the future de lorean

Batmobile, jalopy from the movie Grease

Herbie and Me

Marilyn Monroe Car

Flintstone Movie car

Batmobile from the Dark Knight movie

Joel's friend bob anders and wife barbara

Joel and I

Above pic of old railroad depot

below of first horsedrawn train car

Lots of great trains 

And we think we have big wheels

This is a waiting area in Chicago, check

out the potbelly stove for folks to keep warm

FINALLY LEAVIN DECATAUR, INDIANA

Well, it is July 26, and is our lasst night here at the Allied Recreation Group Factory and Service for Fleetwood and Monaco Products.  We have been here since July 10, their lot has only electric hookups and we have a dump station a little ways down the road.  We have quite a shopping list to have done and got an appointment for the 13th a month ago.  First was a new windshield, our 3rd in a year and a half.  Putting down the jacks in this really unlevel gravel lot cracked it even worse.  They found out that not enough fiberglass was in the cap and proceeded to redo that, then a new gasket.  The rig had to stay in the shop for the night and we were not allowed to.  So we had to take our 22 lb cat peanut, 2 birds, clothing, litter box over to the baymont for a room.  We couldn't get anyone to help us get there, we have a 2 seater corvette.  I guess not all rv people help you.  Anyhoo, we put the cat in his carrier and put him, the litter box, our suitcase in the trunk.  The birdcage was wedged against my chest, we only had to go about a mile and a half but it was such an inconvenience.  Luckily the next morning we met a guy at breakfast we knew who was getting his rig redone, and he had a car rental and took us back to our rig in comfort and even helped us carry everything in, really nice fella.  So the windshield was done, next our fresh water tank was leaking and they put new fittings on it and it is as good as new.  Our inverter was not registering on our ems board, and they did something with a remote and that was fixed.  Then we had a bad rainstorm here and fried my microwave and the receptacle it was plugged into, the guys leaned on my removeable counter over the stove when the installed it and cracked the counter, so they had to fix that.  Then when they put in the microwave they didn't bother to open the kitchen slide and pushed it into the moulding around the fridge and gouges all up and down which they tried to fix with filler, we will live with it.  My warm fridge, which was diagnosed before we got here and said we needed a new thermistor, well the service writer came in, saw the loose thermistor wire hanging and clipped it to the fin, fridge works great now.  They then put all new seals around all our slides, fixed our flashing dash board monitor, and remote door locks which kept blowing the fuses.  Hooked up our dvd player which was never hooked up to begin with.  Also 15 of our air fitting on our suspension were no good, they were snap on connectors which are no good, and they put on regular fittings.  We did not get our delaminating slide fixed because they wanted $5000 to put a new floor under it which didn't even require taking it out.  We passed on that, the slide still works well.  The only thing we didn't get done was the little motor that lifts the fantastic fan in the bathroom, it never got here, and we put in a new one just a year ago, so we bought a cover for the top and now we can leave it open without rain coming in.  All of this work, our extended warranty paid for some, it was about $6000 altogether and we ended up paying about $2500, not bad.  We have been eating out a lot, we are in an amish community here.  I brought laundry to the wash and fold place, 3 huge bags and it only cost $20 for them to do it, I like that, I may not do my own laundry anymore.

Yesterday we went to a big hoopdedoo festival at the amish village.  We were in a car show and we won an award and lots of door prizes, the boy scouts provided the lunch, we had a great time, they had a sled with lots of concrete blocks for the big belgian percheron horses to pull, that was exciting.
Later we will dump our tanks, we haven't leveled here, I am too afraid to and we will pull out in the morning for northwest koa outside of Chicago for two nites, then on to Wisconsin Dells for 5 nites and then to Mackinaw Island in Michigan for 3 nites, then we will be going to Niagra Falls.

I took only a few pics, but they were pretty good.  I will post again when we get to the Dells.

This is our pretty "Scarlett"

She won an award

Lots of pretty cars, look at chevy row above

This is one of the Tin Can Tourst rigs

Pretty amish farmhouse

I love windmills

These horses work as a team.  One bears down 

and the other one pulls, what strength.  There are 3 men who set them up.

The middle man clicks something called a clovis and they take off.

He has to be real careful to get out of the way.