CC48 Day 4 (9/9) Part 1

I am going to break today's blog entry into two parts, because it was probably the most eventful day so far in this trip. Morning dawned bright and sunny in Rockford, IL. Today I would finally leave the traffic of the east behind me, cross the Missippi river and move on into the "west". I love it out here. The wide open spaces, friendly people and lack of congestion. I worked my way up to Madison, WI. This part of the trip was familiar as I had traveled to Madison when Chris was playing football to see him play there against the Badgers. I can't remember if they won or lost, but I do remember the 5 kinds of Brats the locals said I had to try. Next to Nebraska they were the friendliest fans I encountered in the entire Big 10. The Missippi crossing into Iowa was uneventful. At this point the Mississippi has an East and West Channel, separated by land. It is actually like crossing two large rivers each the size of the Delaware. Although I hear the Delaware may be a little wider than normal right now. After seeing the devastation in VT and NY, I feel for the folks along the Delaware and Susquehanna. The crossing put me over into Iowa and Corn country. When you see towns named Cobb, you know you are definitely in corn country. Things seem very prosperous out here. Lots of big new farm machinery everywhere you look. Machines like the one shown here that you never see back east. I guess we are using a lot of corn produced alcohol, in our gasoline these days. The farmers must be incented to plant more and more corn. I passed this huge Alcohol plant along the highway. Apparently it all gets transported by tanker and not trains or pipelines, because just before I came to the plant, I saw a trailer parking area that had to have at least 2,000 shiny stainless steel tank trailers all lined up waiting to be filled. Energy is a big business these days out here. I also saw lots of windmills everywhere. These states are way ahead of us when it comes to renewable energy. Just after crossing into Minnesota I stopped at Harmony for lunch. This is Americana at its best. A local resturant run by a fellow and his wife. Great home cooked meal and very reaaonable. The pumpkin pie was homemade and one of the best I have ever had, next to my grandmothers. Rest her soul! Part 2 will explain how this eventful day ended.