8 more hours, three more states & one more cop encounter.

Once we got up, the first place we headed to see was the pier on Lake Michigan.

Briana stopped to get some quick advice from a shrink. 

After walking around the pier and the river ways we went to go see the famous bean shaped sculpture called Cloud Gate.

It took us for ever to find parking. Chicago is terrible when it comes to finding street parking. The last place we stopped before heading out of Illinois was the great lake, Lake Michigan, so we could put our feet in.

Then hit the road for another 8 hours && headed for Pennsylvania.

Didn't make it too far in Indiana before the cops pulled 
me over. Luckily I got away with a warning :)

Our last state before home.

eye-spy.

One last happy meal.

&& we make it home and are welcomed by some rain.

Katie brought us to Grandview Avenue to see a great view of Pittsburgh.

Our last night of our trip, Katie’s dad Gary make us a camp fire to roast marshmallows on.

It was so nice to stay inside a house since we’ve pretty much been living out of a car for the past 3 weeks. Tomorrow we head back to Philadelphia, && end our trip. 

after 16 hours we made it to Chicago.

After our final drive through the night we made it to Wisconsin. We got tired so we pulled over in Minnesota && slept in a Holiday Inn parking lot. Bri couldn’t sleep so was so scared & I slept with my BB gun in my hand. Katie slept completely sound.

&& then we finally made it Chicago after driving 16 hours & stopping to sleep for 3.

We checked in to our last hotel, which happened to be a Holiday Inn, around 15:00. After showering && resting, we went out around 19:00 to explore Chicago. We had to check out the famous deep dish pizza shop, Uno.
There was a 45 minute wait. So we waked down the block to their other store called Due.

There was no wait. But it takes 45 minutes to cook the pizza. 

After the super delicious pizza, we went and found the closest bar to have a beer && whined up getting some cider instead.

The view from the lake was absolutely beautiful.

Katie had to get her daily ice cream fix, so after the bar we hit up a local ice cream shop that conveniently stays open till 4:00am.

We headed back to the Holiday Inn for our last stay hotel stay around 3:00am and are planning to get up by 7:30 to go see some more of Chicago.

pit stop at a biker rally? sure why not.

After another night in a motel, we headed out at 11:00 to go to see Mount Rushmore. As we stopped to take our traditional picture in front of the state sign of South Dakota, we happen to run into some super nice biker dudes. We told them were on our way to see Mount Rushmore and they asked if we were stopping in Sturgis. Obviously, we had no idea what they were talking about so they proceeded to tell us its the largest biker rally in the world and its only 20 minutes away & it happens to be on the way to Mount Rushmore.

They let us sit on their bikes & they convinced us to make a pit stop

So we went to go check out what they were talking about. 

While having a beer in One-eyed Jacks Saloon, we got persuaded to take a quick job handing out flyers for $30 plus they’d let us keep the t-shirts that we had to wear. Which was perfect because that $30 was going to pay for our camping equipment for the night.

While on the clock we got to see some pretty cool looking bikes.

But far more interested than the bikes, were the people we got to see.

After that quick pitstop and crazy experience we continued on our journey to Mount Rushmore. It was only 45 minutes from Sturgis so we caught it before sunset.

First is the worst, second is the best but third is the one with the treasure chest.

After seeing the monument, we continued our drive to Chicago. We had 16 hours to drive and we were planning on camping outside under the stars with a fire to keep us warm. Well that did not work out as planned since we couldn’t just sleep on the side of the road. So we slept in the car in the parking lot of the Holiday Inn. I was sleeping in the back of the car when we passed into Minnesota, so Katie snapped this quick picture for me at 3:00am.

Tomorrow we keep driving until we make it to Chicago.

yellowstone, where animals don’t exist.

We got up early again, && were super ready to go white water river rafting. We got there at 8:20 in the morning and were ready to set sail at 9:00. Before we went out, we got our safety training and hung out until the rest of our boat got there.

&& here’s Jason!! Our newest Canadian friend.

After our 2 hour trip we stopped at the best burger joint in the USA.

&& then finally entered the park!! (note the sign)

About 5 minuets into the park we went through Wyoming. For those of you who did not know, Yellowstone National Park is technically located in three states; Montana, Idaho & Wyoming.

We explored the park for 4 1/2 hours before hitting Old Faithful. I took so many cool pictures is was really hard to pick which ones to put up. One cool/disgusting thing about the Hotsprings & Geysers is that you can smell them before you see them. They have this distinct STRONG smell of rotten eggs but worse. The steam that comes out of the ground makes the area so hot/smelly that you can 100% smell a spring before you even know its there.

Here’s a fun fact: Hotsprings and Geysers move. So the park rangers of Yellowstone are constantly updating trails and view points due to the activity of the springs.

We were so hot from driving that we took a quick dip in the river. 

&& then we saw Old Faithful.

After Old Faithful, we only had one more stop before we headed out of the park. Sad that we didn’t see any animals, Katie pretended to be a bear to make me & bri smile 🙂

&& here is the waterfall at the Grand Canyon of Yellowstone.

As we were leaving we finally saw an animal!!!

We left the park out of the east exit. We had to drive through this part of the park and it was really sad to see. 100’s of millions of trees on several mountains were destroyed by a forest fire. It was unbelievable how much destruction there was. 😦

After leaving that part of the park we got to see another beautiful sunset.

Today was a lot of fun && we got to see so many cool things. I’d love to go rafting again in a more intense river! Tomorrow we see Mount Rushmore before heading to Chicago.

Our path is set

Our path is set for our footsteps to follow. I cannot believe we leave in a couple of days!

So much left to do, so little time.

I added a picture our itinerary that I wrote down in my sketchbook journal. If anyone has any suggestions of where else to go or anything you can think of please let me know!