Today is Aug 28th , day 10
We drove 185 miles today from Muscatine, Iowa to Tinley Park,
Illinois.
With last night spent not in a hotel
but in a real bed everyone felt a better and I think that's why the
kids slept so well. The kids slept in until 7am (which being 5am PST
is more or less their normal time, but at least no one was up in
the night). I think having a day where we didn't drive as much was a
big help too. We've been pushing so hard now a respite was very
welcome.
When the kids got up we played more
games of Candyland, Chutes and Ladders, as well as Jenga, and Bingo.
Alec still doesn't ant to learn the rules, but he's loving all these
new things to play with! Bingo was a pretty bad idea (too many small
pieces) so we ended up putting that one away. But then Alec
discovered Twister. That one he sort of got the rules to... but he
kept leaving his spot on the mat because he wanted to “spin the
clock”.
Soon Ruth treated us with a wonderful
breakfast of eggs, sausages, and homemade biscuits. The kids we're
happy and ate lots.
After breakfast we decided to take
advantage of Aunt Ruth's awesome swimming pool. The idea was relax a
bit and get Calum especially tired out and then we could drive on
through and push for somewhere around the Chicago area.
The kids had such a good time swimming
that we ended up staying a bit late, but that's ok. As long as
everyone is having fun, that's the important part. It was already
getting hot (ended up mid 90s in Muscatine) and very bright out so we
eventually pulled the kids out of the pool.
Since the carseats were already out of
the car and in Ruth's Yukon I took advantage of it and vacuumed the
car before reinstalling the seats and packing up. Wow, our car is SO
dirty. Its pretty amazing. While I was out, Erica played with Calum
and Ruth read some stories to Alec.
Soon enough it was time to say goodbye
and hit the road. We had such a great visit with Aunt Ruth and Uncle
Marty. They were very gracious and we really appreciated everything.
We headed out on the 61 to the 280 East
across the Mississippi and soon found ourselves into Illinois, coming
up along the south side of Moline. Calm slept for a bit and Alec
played well. Hes definitely gotten used to entertaining himself with
just the rest of the family.
There's not really a ton to say about
the landscape here, we're getting closer and closer to what Erica and
I grew up with. Same kind of trees, same kind of houses as Southern
Ontario. Its still hotter than we're used to, but I don't think we'll
be too impressed with the landscape while driving anymore. Not that
its bad, just not terribly exciting or different. I will say both
Erica and I enjoyed seeing sunflowers growing wild at the side of the
road though.
Eventually Calum woke up and we stopped
for a bathroom break at somewhere called the Great Saulk Trail rest
area. I thought it was just a rest stop on the side of the road but
it was obviously built up pretty well. I think it must've been a trail-head. Either that or the State of Illinois makes the nicest rest stops ever. That's possible too.
There was a playground and a ton of
picnic tables. I think Alec was a bit punchy because we lathered him
and Calum up with sunscreen and he walked out onto the playground in
the hot sun and came right back to me onto the sidelines saying
“”playgrounds are too hot, trees are better” Then he played in
the shade and with the brush on the side of the nearby woods for the
next 20 minutes. Calum of course flowed. He'll pretty much do
whatever Alec does.
Eventually Alec propped himself up at a
picnic table and asked for snacks. We told him that we were planning
on pushing through, and that this was just a stretch the legs stop,
but he very calmly explained that it was late, and he was hungry. And
that we should stop for a snack now and then have a BBQ later on.
Well, he made a convincing argument. Especially since we swam in the
morning it was already well into the afternoon, and despite the time
difference for us, we were pretty hungry once Alec pointed it out. So
we had cheese, bread, crackers, and humus, along with some
strawberries. Definitely made everyone feel better :)
Then it was really time to get back in
the car. We had an idea of a hike in the afternoon and wanted to get
there.Driving on the 80 East now we passed La Salle, and turned south
onto the 178. I had seen the Starved Rock State Park on the map and
thought it might be good. I mean its right on a river, maybe we could
swim again? Anyhow, I called them to ask if they had any good hikes
they would recommend for families with young kids. Firstly they
informed me that NO ONE swims in the Illinois River. Apparently that
is a bad idea. And then she suggested we actually go to another state
park! A little one just South of Starved Rock called Matthiessen.
After picking up some groceries in town
we headed into the park itself. Although it doesn't look like much
when driving up, we were told that there was a play area for kids and
a place to BBQ and a good short hike. Since we'd already eaten a big
snack recently we decided to look around and hike before eating
again. We looked for a play area. There was definitely no playground
around the mostly barren and boring parking lot though. Just one sad
set of swings that Alec couldn't even bring himself to use. Not so
promising...
There was a rebuilt fort there though.
I had read online that it was a replica of the French Fortifications
that we're built in the area at some point or another. Don't quote me
on that … this isn't a history blog. Anyhow, we enjoyed exploring
the small fort even though it was a top a very long looking set of
stairs that proved to be the trail-head.
Just seeing the people come u pall
sweaty from those stairs made me worry. I know how this plays out.
Lots of stairs with kids means lots of carrying :( It couldn't be
helped though, so we packed up our hiking gear and headed down for
what we planned as basically a 2 mile hike.
I won't keep you in suspense though.
Thankfully, all of my doubts were quickly washed away. This park was
honestly amazing. We got to the bottom of the long staircase, into a
valley and found the bridge crossing the shallow river flooded with
water! Well, we needed to get to the other side of that water. So we
started our adventure walk by shimmying along the railing of the
bridge. Avoiding the water like it was lava or something. Alec did a
super job, although he couldn't totally understand it since he loves
walking in water.
Getting to the other side we started
our hike out about a mile slowly careening up a gravel path along the
opposite hillside of the valley. Up, and up we went. Not so bad
considering it was a slow climb, and Alec did pretty well. The trees
were beautiful here in the valley, especially the way the sun broke
through them, and the little grey squirrels we saw running around
we're very cute. This is the kind of hiking I enjoy.
We walked the mile out and ended up at
a “lookout”. What a weird structure. I can't tell when something
like this would've been built and I'm not entirely sure why. There
was no explanation, no signage, but The lookout, actually looked out
over a nice green lake. Lilly pads, algae covered much of the surface
while and bulrushes dotted the sides and big oaks surrounded the perimeter. If it wasn't a state park, I might say the lookout was a
hunting post, and maybe it was sort of. There was a road leading up
to the back of the lookout and a sign about fishing in the lake. Yes
you are allowed to fish, but only certain amounts and sizes. Maybe
this is a fishing lookout... do people who fish have lookouts? But
why the weird design with the pillars and everything? Very odd.
Anyhow, we stopped for a snack of blueberries and enjoyed the view.
Then we moved down to the bridge
crossing beside the lake. As we got onto the bridge I realized what
this was a bit better. The lake was actually made by damming up the
river which naturally flowed through the valley floor. I had wondered
why the valley floor and riverbed was so deep, steep and much lower
than us. You would think they would've designed the park to have us
hiking along side the river. But the dam held back a ton of water
considering how big the lake was. This bridge was built above and
over the dam. Separate, and above. Once in the middle of the bridge I
looked over the side expecting to see just to the lake level, but
instead found myself looking all the way down to the face of the dam to
the mostly dry riverbed below. I'm not sure If I'm explaining it
properly so you'll understand it but this was a very cool view down
the face of a dam. It was really far down.
Crossing the bridge one way, we stepped
onto the bank on the other side of the valley and then we're able to
walk back across again on the top of the dam. It looked like maybe
the majority of the dam was actually natural rock-face. My guess is
that this was a very cool waterfall that the parks dept just stopped
up the top of forming the lake. Really neat stuff, and beautiful.
The best was yet to come though as we
followed the path which looped us along back to our starting point
across the water bridge. This time though we didn't walk on the
gravel path, no instead we wound down some more stairs and found
ourselves walking right on the bottom of the mostly dry riverbed! It
was very very cool. I've been on a lot of hikes, and I don't think
I've ever been hiking along the bottom of a riverbed like this. At
some points I'm sure the wall was 30 feet straight up, and the ground
was pocked with puddles, rocks, sparse vegetation, and deep tree
roots. We hopped along a path on the riverbed, thoroughly enjoying
the really original hike.
I'm not sure the pictures can convey
how cool this was. I was really impressed with it, and the kids loved
it too. We walked along until we came to a large pool called the
Giants Bathtub. Alec had a good time with that one, especially after
we told him the giant was gone for now.
We continued on and found ourselves at
Ceder Point where we reluctantly headed back up the slope to the main
gravel path. Along the way we came to a point where the parks
department had placed this meshed large rubber netting along the
ground, no doubt to stop the path from eroding. Alec thought it was
just about the funniest thing. He decided that it was a great place
to sit, and every few feet would just sit down again.
He might have been getting tired too,
since once we got back to the top I carried him for a while. We
crossed back across the water bridge shimmying along and then hit the
stairs.
Alec was definitely getting tired as we
started back up. I told him he had to walk, and he did but that
didn't mean he couldn;t stop for a rest along the way. Roughly every
three sets of stairs there was a bench for people to rest on. Alec
climbed up on every single one of these benches to “take a little
rest” It was pretty hilarious.
Once we eventually made it back up to
the top Alec started running around again. I guess he wasn't that
tired out ;) We played in the fort again and Erica got us a snack.
We'd decided not to BBQ at the park, since Calum was so tired and we
really wanted to get closer to our destination. Instead we had
dessert. If you'll recall Alec had made some cupcakes with Aunt Ruth
yesterday. Well at Ruth's instance we had taken a few along with us
on the road and it made for a good snack at the picnic tables. Alec
was again very funny as he kept trying to make a cupcake mustache. He
did this of course by rubbing the cupcake all over his face! What a
guy!
Finally we hit the road and got on our
way back towards Chicago. We'd thought about staying in the city, but
then thought better of it. This is not the trip for that kind of
stuff. We're not trying to do a ton of sightseeing here, just taking
advantage of the opportunities around us. Also getting in and out of
Chicago would be super annoying. And would Alec or Calum care? I mean
we'd still just be hanging out in a hotel room at this point.
So as we started passing the city to
the south we decided to call it quits once Erica had enough of the
rush hour commuters. We stopped once again in Denny's for a quick
meal. Since we'd pushed off BBQing to get some more distance on the
road. Not a great meal, but not terrible by any means and they are
immediately set up for families.
We decided that enough was enough and
found a hotel as close to the Denny's as we could. Well, a hotel as
close as possible that wasn't a dump. We ended up at the Comfort Inn
in the suburb of Tinley Park. And surprisingly we found a way to get
it cheaper than Priceline. We've been using the Priceline app as
we've been traveling, and are usually very impressed with it. After
finding the hotel we wanted though this time, we just called them to
see if we could do it over the phone directly with them. If they said
no on a price match then we could always just do it through
Priceline. Instead they told us that they could do it cheaper than
Priceline, especially since we also got a AAA discount. Fantastic.
We settled into the hotel and got the
kids changed and into the pool asap. Both kids we're squirrely and we
wanted to get hat final last bit of energy out. Also it had been a
hot long day hiking and a swim (or another swim I guess) sounded
great. We all went into the small but very nice pool at the hotel and
had a good time.
Afterwards we had a good excuse to
throw both kids into the bath. Something they are definitely not
getting enough of on this trip. But there is really only so much
time... Then it was off to bed for the kids, and Erica while I
stepped into the lobby to get a bit of work done.
Fun times all around. We had a great
day, and I'm looking forward to another one ahead as we make our way
in towards Michigan and the end of our trip. Just two more full days
to go!