Lincoln's Town

Three hours drive from Chicago, and we were in Lincoln's adopted home town and his final resting place : Springfield, Illinois.

First stop was Lincoln's Tomb where the remains of Lincoln, his wife and two sons are buried. Unbelievable that Abraham Lincoln's remains have been moved at least 17 times thanks to the fear of Grave robbers holding his remains for ransom. Now Lincoln rests under an immense concrete structure securely. Was listening to the audio version of James L Swanson's book Manhunt : The twelve day hunt for Lincoln's killer while on the road. Then Secretary of War Edwin M Stanton made elaborate arrangements to ensure that John Wilkies Booth's body is buried in a secret location and ensure that his remains does not get in the hands of Anti-Lincoln / Anti-Union activists and end up becoming a 'holy relic'.

Right outside the Cemetary is a smallish but intriguing Museum of Funeral Customs; it had enough interesting details about the progresses in the funereal business to occupy half an hour of our time. The museum's by-line is Death is only the Beginning! Never really had given thought to what goes into the business of death, and how it would have evolved over the years. One section of the museum highlights a few of the people in this business who have lead to significant improvements. While they may not be house-hold names, I am sure they did earn respect from their colleagues during and after their lifetimes.

The Lincoln Presidential Library and Museum is an impressive monument to arguably the most inspirational American President ever. The museum is organized in such a way as to get the visitors intimate with the life and times of Abraham Lincoln. Key incidents in Lincoln's life are related along with details on the impact of Slavery and Civil war. Next time, I am in Washington, DC., I definitely want to visit Fords Theater and Peterson House where Lincoln was shot and died respectively. Got quite a few books and memorabilia in the Gift shop after touring the Museum.

Too bad everything shuts down in Springfield by 5:00 PM; we would have welcomed the opportunity to spend more time at the Museum, and even the Lincoln home.

Drove down I-55 and arrived in St. Louis by late evening; got to see The Arch in bright sun-light.

Long, liesurely week-end in Chicago-land

We were in and around Chicago from Thursday evening till Tuesday
morning, during which JH flew to California to attend a wedding.

Did quite a few things during this time. Ran in the Corn Boil 5K run -
9:45 minutes for the first mile, 22:00 minutes for the second mile and
34:30 minutes for the full 5K. Went on a Bike tour in Chicago
downtown; was quite enjoyable. Got to know a funny story about water
management cycle between Chicago and St. Louis - will not spoil it by
writing it here. Get onto the Bike tour to know it for yourself. Got
to see the fireworks at the Lake front. Chicago has fireworks twice a
week during summer. Visited the Art Institute of Chicago and spent a
very enjoyable half a day there. Had dinner with AR and GA and then
with AS separately. Slept at UR's and AS's place two nights, and spent
one night in a hostel in Downtown Chicago. The hostel stay turned out
to be pleasant as well as inexpensive. Stopped by at the BAPS
Swaminarayan temple to admire the intricate artwork in the fully
marble temple. UR's two year old son was a joy to play with.

While at UR's place, he accompanied me on a jog of around 2.5 miles -
he biking while I managed to run the entire stretch without stopping.
I can run 2.5 miles non-stop!! I should get more ambitious now :)

AS pulled out the Reminiscence book from our college days; we were
nostalgic going over some interesting incidents from that time and
exchanging notes on many of our batchmates.

Traveled in the CTA and Metra trains in and around Chicago - the
public transit system in Chicago is good, and definitely cleaner than
in New York. Chicago, while being a lesser version of New York, seems
to be much friendlier and cleaner than New York.

I will have to come back to the Windy City in the future with more
time to spare.

iPhone problems : going, going, ...

The iPhone which I had bought a couple of days before the start of this road trip has proven extremely useful during the first part of the trip. I am using it to access emails (yahoo and gmail only; haven't figured out how to configure hotmail yet), maps for directions, browse the Internet, play youtube videos, calendar & date book, taking quick notes, phone with an address book (which is likely to become the central repository of all my contact details) and even the calculator.

The only major functionality of the iPhone I haven't used so far is the iPod part of it!

After serving its function admirably over the first 10 days of its life with me, the iPhone started crashing very frequently by the time we were in Wisconsin. Nothing was working other than the phone, and it was making me feel handicapped.

Decided to go to Apple store to complain about my iPhone problems, and after struggling with Chicago traffic and commuter train delays, finally was able to sit face to face with an iPhone expert at the Michigan Avenue Apple store. They guy did a full power shutdown and restarted it, and all the problems vanished into thin air.

In the 2 weeks I had the iPhone, I had not bothered to read the instruction book-let to know enough as to how to shutdown the damn thing :)

Next part of the trip is going to be iPhone-enabled as well.

In Chi-town

Arrived in Chicago today in the late evening, a little ahead of schedule largely because of the lack of interest in visiting any places in and around Minneapolis. Stopped on the way at a cheese shop - with a perky mouse statue beckoning travelers into the store - in Wisconsin, the 'Bread-basket of America'.

Got to meet AR, GA & AS after a long time. Drove down to Aurora to have dinner with AS & GA, and then drove back up to Cary to stay at AS's place for the night.

I will be in Chicago for four days; will plan out the schedule of activities tomorrow.

Long drive to home made food!

Chamberlain, SD where we had stopped for the night yesterday, turned out to be on the mighty Missouri river. There are three picturesque bridges (two for road, one for rail) over the river at this location. The river is impressive even at its early stage here.

The location also claims fame for being the camping grounds for the Lewis & Clark expedition team on both directions of their exploratory journey to the Pacific coast in early 1800s. Going over the route Lewis & Clark & their men took during the expedition while I was at the at the Lewis and Clark information center, I realized they had moved upstream along the Missouri river from St. Louis to North Dakota making their way to the Pacific.

Other than the brief stop at the Lewis & Clark information center in Chamberlain, we didn't stop anywhere for longtime on our journey to JR's place in Rochester, MN. Reached Rochester late afternoon and had a relaxed evening at JR's place, sipping beer, watching the Hindi movie 'Main Hoon Na', playing with the cute dog 'Gizmo', spending time with JR's family and enjoying some good home made Bangalorean food.

Home made food after almost two weeks!!! Yummy!!!

Flying high...

Today was indeed a day of flying high - rubbing shoulders with US Presidents & American Indian Heroes and actually taking to the air in a helicopter.

Started the day in Deadwood, SD; I decided to take it easy and stay at the hotel. JH went on a sight-seeing trip in the town and had a great time with the Wild West ambience and its history.

First stop on our trip was Mount Rushmore National Memorial. The "Shrine of democracy" is an impressive monument. The carvings of George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Theodore Roosevelt and Abraham Lincoln will hopefully continue inspire people five hundred years from now as President Franklin Delano Roosevelt mentioned in his speech at the dedication of the Memorial in 1936.

15 miles down the road is Crazy Horse Memorial - the Native Americans' answer to Mount Rushmore, originally conceived out of the Red Indian Chiefs' desire to "show the White man that Red man too has Heroes". Crazy Horse was played an important role in the victorious battle against the US Army led by Gen. George Custer. The monument is still under construction, and is very ambitious. When complete - with Crazy Horse depicted sitting on a horse - it is intended to dwarf the monument at Mount Rushmore. Right now, only the face of the warrior is complete. While we were there, there were two dynamite blasts as part of the construction, to clear the rock around the horse's eye area. Even the Mount Rushmore monument was built with the same technology using dynamite for blasting rock.

On the way to Crazy Horse, we noticed a sign for Black Hills Aerial Adventures touting introductory Helicopter rides for only $35. On the way back we stopped and took the aerial trip; the 5-6 minutes ride going close to the Crazy Horse monument, flying behind the monument and returning. The views of the highways along the lush green mountains with very few signs of civilization around was quite impressive!

A few miles out of Rapid City, SD is the touristic high-light of the desolate and barren landscape of along the South Dakota Highways. The place - Wall Drug - was started by a young couple in the early 1930s and the wife hit upon a brilliant idea to attract the numerous travelers in automobiles racing along the nearby highways without stopping at their store: To put signs along the highway that the travelers can get free ice water at Wall Drug! As the story goes, while the husband was putting up the first signs about the free ice water, travelers were already lining up at the store. From then onwards, it has grown to be more than a drug store and has become a full fledged touristic attraction with lot of stuff to do for people of every age. They even have a T Rex which roars every 12 minutes, and a couple of music bands who play very frequently.

Racing towards the Minneapolis and Chicago now, and stopped for the night at Chamberlain, SD - around 400 miles from Minneapolis. Long day's drive ahead tomorrow.

Museum of Natural History, Dinosaurs, Casino-town....

Started the day early to spend more time at the BBHC.

Enjoyed the well-thought out and entertaining/informative displays & learn-by-doing activities in the Draper museum of natural history all morning. The Museum is intuitively organized, starting on either end of the altitude and going down/up - from the plains to the alpine heights - and elaborating on specificities at each level. At many locations in the museum, there are field notes of a fictional naturalist - aptly named B. A. Ware - providing insights on the particular display item.
There are more "please touch" and "do-this" kind of activities included here, and in that way this museum seems to be very different from the Natural History Museums in NY and DC.

Raced through the Buffalo Bill Museum and the Gift shops in half an hour before heading out for lunch, and on the way to Thermopolis, WY - famous for its hot springs.

The website for Buffalo Bill Historic Center (http://www.bbhc.org) will move up on the list of my favourite web-sites, and some of the prints from the Whitney Gallery of Western Art will soon embellish my apartment walls :)


The hot spings at Thermopolis is a good place to swim, as many people told us on the way, but since the outside temperature was 106 degree Fahrenheit, we decided against getting into the hotwaters - we are already very hot, Thank You!

The trip to Thermopolis was saved from being a total waste of time, when we encountered Dinosaurs there. The Wyoming Dinosaur Center and Dig Sites - located in Thermopolis - has impressive displays of Dinosaur remains.

After Thermopolis, it was a long drive towards Mount Rushmore; we made it to Deadwood, SD by 9:00 PM. Guess what : Deadwood, SD is full of casinos, around 80 of them in the small town.