It was a travel day from Gretna/Omaha to Bloomfield (look northeast) NE. Uneventful, no hurry (yay), and we arrived in Bloomfield late afternoon to find we had their little city park to ourselves. It provided a few spaces with full hook-ups for $10 a night.....but no internet as we suspected. We had the place to ourselves as I said, no other travelers joined us. Now here are the past two days.....
Wednesday, Sep 21st
Wow what a day! Our plan was to go to the Lewis and Clark Nat'l Rec Area for another stamp in our Nat'l Parks Passport and then into So. Dakota to north of Vermillion to climb Spirit Mound which we did but also got to check out the Gavins Point Dam crossing the Missouri River and the National Music Museum in Vermillion. It ended up being quite a full day!
It was windy and cool.....in my book cold but I have to admit as the humidity is higher it seems I am actually comfortable at lower temperatures. It was about 59 today....yah cold, and it felt cold cause of the wind but where the wind was not blowing and when the sun was out it was not bad.
Anyway, so we stopped at the Lewis and Clark Lake State Recreation Area to get our stamp and more history lessons and saw this awesome dam crossing the Missouri River. They have had trouble with flooding in the area and all the spill gates were open. What a sight!
The area behind the dam is Lewis and Clark Lake. It is huge, reminds me of Lake Mead. This next picture is below the dam. The Missouri is a wide river and the flooding made it even wider.
Then we drove into South Dakota to Spirit Mound Historic Prairie just north of Vermillion. It is just this little mound 70 feet above the surrounding prairie but it is a spiritual place for the Indians and during the time of Lewis and Clark and Lewis and Clark actually hiked the 9 miles in from the Missouri River to walk to the top of the mound and report on it to Thomas Jefferson. So we took the little trail to the top of the mound and tried to imagine what it must have been like to look down from there and see herds of bison and elk roam the prairie. The 3rd pic is from the top of the mound.
Then we drove into Vermillion to the Valiant Vineyards Winery for a tasting and bought a couple of bottles of wine. We tasted a wine made from the wild grapes that grow along the Missouri River and it was pretty good! The young lady serving us took us down into the wine making area below the tasting room. That was fun.
Last but by no means least, we went to the National Museum of Music in Vermillion where there were instruments from all over the world from very old to new. Wow, it was awesome! I could have spent hours there! A student from the university there came in and played a 400 year old harpsichord while we were walking around.
Check out these instruments and click on the guitar pics for a close up of signatures!
Yes, our little trip into South Dakota was great! What a day!
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