8. Day 4 - Crossing the Missouri ...

While the owner of the Bridge View Motel was fishing Shaelyn's earring out of the sink drain, we went to the Akta Lakota Museum and Cultural Center. The museum is located on the campus of St Joseph Indian School in Chamberlain SD. The museum is arranged chronologically in the round. You walk through the history of the Great Plains tribes. and end with the history of the native children sent to St Joseph Catholic School. The displays of artifacts and art were very well presented. St Joseph's Indian School is still operating today. Its early history presented a bleak life of work and studies for the children who attended. Ron was given permission to set up his tripod and camera and take 360 degree pictures inside the museum. We then returned to the motel where the owner was happy to present Shaelyn with her almost lost earring.

We hit the road again on Route 50 and headed east. Temperatures were in the 80's so riding was quite comfortable. We are all getting down the right combination of how to angle vents and lower windows to maximize interior comfort. I had the back seat and was able to continue reading aloud Agatha Christie's "Curtain". With the windows partially closed, the wind noise was minimal. Reading aloud on car trips is kind of a tradition,. Past reads include: a boatload of Junie B. Jones books (when Shaelyn was little), The Yearling, I Captured the Castle, The Book ThIef, Tom Sawyer and Huckleberry Finn. Shaelyn still makes fun of me for sobbing while reading The Yearling and The Book Thief.

We stopped for lunch in Wagner, SD at the Boom Restaurant. Originally owned by the Vanderboom's it is a sit down hamburger joint with menus printed on the back of a local newspaper. Burgers were good, atmosphere was even better. When we left the restaurant an old guy, dressed head to toe in farmer khakis, came over to admire the car. He was was driving an old Chrysler Imperial and told us about a '39 Chrysler he had restored. We are loving how Lola provides the opening for conversations with all kinds of people and agreed it would be great to get some of these conversations on camera. Shaelyn will be the videographer.

The day ended in Vermillion, SD, home of the University of South Dakota. On the way into town, we were detoured by a fresh brush fire on our chosen exit. We still made it to the Valiant Vineyards where we had a late afternoon tasting. W learned there is a "Valiant" grape,that grows singly on a vine as opposed to growing in a bunch. Although the grape is grown locally, it is expensive to pick and process. So we didn't purchase the Valiant wine. It was the best we tasted but out of our price range. This vineyard supplies the annual Sturgis motorcycle rally official wine. We picked up a few bottles as a gift to the Grandos family for allowing us to crash their family reunion in a few days. Last time Ron and I stopped at a winery and purchase wine to take home to friends, the wines never made it to the friends. We will be good this time. At the winery, we got a two recommendations for a good steak dinner, one high brow and one low brow. We chose the low brow - Whimps, the favorite of the biking crowd We had a great steak dinner in a down home atmosphere.

LH