First off – there’s the two of us! Then on the final leg of our yearly cross country trip to see TWO sisters we will acquire TWO more States on our campers map plus TWO more National Parks! And TWO visitor centers at Theodore Roosevelt National Park! The TWO new National Parks will bring my NP list up to 22!!! Double TWO!!! And TWO World’s Largest Animal Sculptures in North Dakota!!! I’m feeling SO accomplished!

Western Montana is gorgeous! So lush, green, mountainous and wild! Fun sighting for the mornng while following I-90 in Montana, off the road at the edge of Clarks Fork river, someone has placed a lifesized Sasquatch!

As a side note, passing Glendive reminded Chris of a childhood memory! When Chris was a kid living in Plains Montana playing in a Babe Ruth baseball team they went to Glendive for a statewide competition! He still remembers having a blast there. What I saw in Glendive was a huge Tyrannosaurus Rex bursting thru the wall of the Dinosaur & Fossil museum! That is clearly on the bucket list for our next trip across Montana!

So far on this trip we’ve seen pronghorn antelope, elk, mule deer, magpies and a glorious flock of white pelicans! Then Theodore Roosevelt National Park gave us herds of buffalo, wild horses, wild turkey, loads of prairie dogs & a lone coyote!

These pictures do not even begin to do justice to the sheer magnitude & diversity of this park. It is breathtaking & a well deserved dose of “Vitamin N” after a stressful week in Seattle! Bonus: we arrived at the peak of wildflower bloom! Everywhere we looked there was a new flower in bloom, nothing big & showy, just delicate little splashes of palest pink, blue, and lavender beside vibrant yellow, orange & magenta! Really quite delightful!

The Enchanted Highway!!!

As you know, I am always on the lookout for offbeat oddities so is it any wonder that I devoted the next day to just that! We took a trip down the Enchanted Highway in western North Dakota for a glimpse of classic weird & whimsical roadside art. Giant metal sculptures line the highways leading from Regent to Gladstone for just over 30 miles!

Next up: Salem Sue, the world’s largest holstein cow!

Salem Sue is almost four stories tall! She was created in 1974 to promote the local dairy industry. Salem Sue was the second giant roadside animal sculpture built in North Dakota, after the world’s largest buffalo was erected in Jamestown, North Dakota in 1959. So, care to guess where we’re headed now?!?

World’s Largest Buffalo!

Yes, we made a stop to see the World’s Largest Buffalo! They had a really cute frontier town as well, complete with horse drawn buggy rides and a train loop for the kids!

Second new state of the trip added to our campers map!!! Getting pretty gosh darned full!

In Rothsay, Minnethotah we took a moment to visit the greater prairie chicken statue! It depicts a male prairie chicken with his cheeks puffed out in a mating display. This strange little bit of Americana was designed as Rothsay’s contribution to America’s 1976 Bicentennia!

Not to brag, (totally bragging- LOL!) but we have now been promoted from Waze Warrior to Waze Knight!!!

In Wisconsin we spotted a MOOSE!!! Ok, not a real live moose (sigh) but a really cute wooden carved moose! With attitude! You may recall we biked the Maine Moose Tour in the white mountains a couple decades ago. Serious hills, riding at dusk and dawn hoping to spot moose…. We saw the tail end of TWO, meanwhile that year my brother Charlie walked out of a bar in Montana & spotted a bull moose ambling down the road! SO unfair!

After talking again with Merry’s hospice nurse we made the command decision to buy her a new lift chair – get the nasty smelly one out of her room. We sent a couple options for Margaret and Maria (head nurse in memory care) to look at, then ordered the one they approved in fake leather (water proof and wipeable). $1,142 later it will be delivered and assembled tomorrow (Thursday). I feel confident that this will be a huge positive for Merrys quality of life! Yay for small victories! Or as Margaret says “It’s not Magic, it’s Marianne!”

Our SECOND new National Park on the trip is Indiana Dunes, the 61st National Park!

We hiked the West Beach Diana of the Dunes trail. We were a little dubious when we saw the massive wooden steps, because while UP is not a problem little T Rex has been too terrified to go DOWN steps and this would be a LOT of steps to carry him down…

Imagine our surprise when the little boy started down the steps, at first a little hesitant but after a few flights he was bouncing over the last step of each flight! Our baby boy is growing up!

Floof was totally exhausted, but he completed the Diana of the Dunes dare and was rewarded with his official:

The little tiny Tyrannosarus Rex is now officially a National Park BARK Ranger!!! How cool is THAT?!? BARK rangers remember to BAG their poo, ALWAYS use a 6′ leash, RESPECT wildlife and KNOW where they are allowed to be!

Five new stickers commemorate this journey;

And tomorrow we’ll arrive back home in Batesville! We’re still Waze Knights, but our badges have been upgraded!