An Unplanned Stop

We are always feeling the pressure of time on this trip and it is especially hard to be near people that there just isn't time to see. That is how we felt as we were driving thru South Dakota. We have lots of family here that we would dearly love to see but there simply wasn't time to plan it in. We really have to blitz across to the west side of the State.

Heading West on I-90 we did stop in Mitchell to show Taryn the Corn Palace - the ultimate shrine to agriculture. She was here in 1995 at only 3 months old and doesn't remember it, so we just had to show her. We only had time to drive by and snap a picture but it was fun to show her. It's one of those things you have to see to believe, if you know what i mean. Later that day we read to her about it's signifigance and it made much more sense.

Back on the road we passed the exit for Platte which is where our relatives live. I commented to Gary that it is pretty hard to pass it by and not even say hi. Well, we just couldn't do it so we pulled off at the next exit and did a bit of replanning and made a few calls and then drove back to Platte.

My Dad was born in South Dakota and we were here two years ago for a Dykstra family reunion which is always so much fun. We were so excited to at least be able to stop and say hi to whoever we could find around. No one here even knew we were traveling so this was a very unexpected visit by us.

We first stopped in town at the Kings Inn Motel owned by a cousin Ben T. He was able to help refresh our driving directions to the other relatives. We then ate lunch at Booms diner and they let us use their phone to make a few local calls. We were able to find Joe Dykstra at home and he urged us to come right out. We had parked our motor home there in '92 and he graciously offered for us to stay there again.

On our way out there we did stop for a bit at Anne T.'s farm. She welcomed us right in and we had a fun visit at her kitchen table. We also stopped at Sarah V.'s but she is out of town so we went on out to Joe's farm.

Joe had just baked some wonderul cookies so we enjoyed a fun visit with him and were really impressed by his cookies too. Vonnie was shopping and "rummaging" with her granddaughters but was bringing pizza home for a quick dinner together which was so nice. Jow called around to a few other cousins and we had an improptue pizza party with them that eveing.

It was much fun and we enjoyed many stories and hearty laughs. We were so thankful for their generous and warm hospitality having no notice we were coming. At 9:30 we prepared to leave again. It was tempting to stay but knew the drive facing us tomorrow since we had spent this day here.