After spending an hour or so with my nephew Norman David and his family, I had to hit the road – had to put some more miles on the odometer before bedtime. My goal was to make it to Sioux City, but unfortunately the hour got late and I got a little drowsy before reaching there. I ended up spending the night in a little town called Albert Lea, Minnesota. It’s about an hour west of Rochester, so I felt pretty good about the distance I was able to travel. Found a hotel off the Interstate 90 exit called the American Inn, and rolled into there a little after midnight. The place was simple and clean – even had a swimming pool – and the staff was friendly. A good place to put down for the night.
Had an interesting experience about an hour before reaching Albert Lea, though. I saw a sign for a Holiday Inn Express, took the exit, and turned in the direction I thought I was supposed to turn in. 10 minutes later, I was on the one of the darkest, most desolate roads I had ever seen, with no sign of a hotel or anything else, and no cell coverage. That was a little spooky. Anyway, after traveling about 5 miles without seeing signs of civilization, I retraced my route, got back on the interstate, and headed for Albert Pea.
Next morning, I took care of some computing chores, including calling my web hosting service to figure out why I couldn’t upload blog posts from my phone. To my pleasant surprise, the techs there sorted it out! I’m making this post from my computer while I sit in a hotel room, but many future posts on this trip will come directly from my phone.
Off to my destination on this leg of the trip – the Badlands and Mount Rushmore. Always wanted to see the latter, and the former sounds downright interesting. On the way, I saw an exit for Fargo and was tempted to take it (that was, after all, the location for one of the best movies of all time!), but I had no time for detours. Onward and upward.
Stopped for gas along the interstate and saw something I thought to be long extinct – a Sinclair gas station! Naturally I had to gas up there! I felt like it was 1966 all over again.
