Scotts Bluff National Monument

We left Forest City last Saturday morning and drove west across southern Minnesota and South Dakota. We overnighted in Mitchell, SD, and after breakfast, drove downtown to see the new Corn Palace murals. This year’s theme is “Rock of Ages” and an excellent rendition of Willie Nelson and Elvis Presley.

We arrived in Scotts Bluff on Monday for a 2-night stay. Scotts Bluff was a landmark for the settlers going west on the Oregon Trail. Scotts Bluff towers 800-feet above the North Platte River valley. It was very interesting and we enjoyed our stop here.

We are headed south tomorrow on our way back to the USAF Academy family campground in Colorado Springs.

Steve & Julie Cornelius 

Forest City, Iowa

We left Devil’s Tower, Wyoming on Friday morning and headed east on I-90 across South Dakota. We overnighted in Midland and then our “hometown” of Sioux Falls. We left Sioux Falls early Sunday morning and continued on I-90 into Minnesota. Then we dropped south into northern Iowa and drove towards our destination of the Winnebego Customer Service center in Forest City.

We planned to travel way north, hoping to avoid bad weather (high winds, hail, and tornadoes), after both our motorhome and pickup suffered severe hail damage in a storm last year. It turned out that if we’d gone our usual way to Iowa, across Nebraska, staying overnight in Omaha, we would have been hit by an EF-1 tornado at the campground at Offutt Air Force Base on Saturday night where we usually stay.  

We arrived in Forest City around noon on Sunday and secured a “campsite” with an electrical hookup at the service center. Last October we made a 5-day appointment at Winnebego to get several things fixed under our new RV one-year warranty. Winnebego ordered the required parts well in advance and the technician did an outstanding job for us.

However, it’s been exhausting for us to get up at 5AM every day to get ready and turn our motorhome over to the service center at 7AM. We get it back around 3PM and move back to our campsite. We’ve been here before so we know about the “all you can eat pork ribs and fried chicken” dinner at Mitchell’s Bar & Grill on Tuesday and Thursday nights. I also had to go to Shooterz Bar & Grill to have one of their “pork tenderloin sandwiches”. It was all very good.

We headed north out of Forest City on U.S 69, then west on I-90 across southern Minnesota and South Dakota. About midway across South Dakota, we plan to drop down to Scottsbluff, Nebraska on our way back to Colorado Springs. It’s a bucket list item—we’ve never seen Scotts Bluff on the Oregon Trail.  

Steve & Julie Cornelius 

Devil’s Tower, Wyoming

We left Colorado Springs on Tuesday, June 13^th and headed north up I-25 through Denver. We stopped for lunch at Johnson’s Corner, where we had a good place to park at the truck stop. Although Johnson’s Corner is known for their homemade “world famous cinnamon rolls”, but I enjoyed a slice of millionaire’s pie with my grilled chicken sandwich.

We drove north of Cheyenne and overnighted in Glendo, Wyoming at the Glendo Lakeside RV Park. It was very windy and we hunkered down for the night.

On Wednesday we headed towards northeast Wyoming and arrived at Devil’s Tower around 3:30PM for a two night stay at the KOA right outside the gate of Devil’s Tower National Monument. We had a nice campsite with a great view of the tower. It was Julie’s first time to see Devil’s Tower and we learned it was our country’s first National Monument.

We watched the nightly showing of “Close Encounters of the Third Kind” outdoor here at the KOA last night. We had forgotten that the movie came out in 1977 and this year is the 40^th anniversary of the Steven Spielberg film. We saw an "alien" from the movie in a gift shop today.

Today we went to the Visitor’s Center and then walked the 1.5 mile trail around Devil’s Tower. We had great weather, sunny skies and temps in the mid-70s.

Steve & Julie Cornelius 

Colorado Springs

We left Albuquerque on Sunday, June 4^th and overnighted in Raton, New Mexico. Our friends Rick and Diana were camping near Walsenburg, Colorado and drove down to Raton to see us. We really enjoyed catching up with them since we last saw them in Las Vegas in March.

We arrived in Colorado Springs on Monday for a week-long visit and stayed at the Air Force Academy family campground.

On Tuesday we enjoyed seeing my daughters and granddaughters. We enjoyed pizza at a new place called MOD Pizza. It was very good with individual, artesian pizza, and it was reasonably priced.

Last Saturday we picked up our friend Wendy in Penrose and then drove to Westcliffe to visit our friends Vince and Lisa. We enjoyed catching up, sitting outside on a beautiful summer day with a amazing view of the Sangre de Cristo Mountains from their deck.

Steve & Julie Cornelius 

Albuquerque, NM

We arrived in Albuquerque on Sunday, May 21^st, and had a problem trying to get on Kirtland Air Force Base. We used to drive in the Eubank Gate, right next to the Family Campground, but we had read on-line not to try to come in that gate because of the new gate barriers. We’d read that there were several RVs in the campground with damage from coming through that gate.

So we decided to try the Gibson gate. We were about 1/8 of a mile from the gate and the security forces guy ran down the street to stop us. He told me I couldn’t come in the Gibson gate because I’d hit the security barriers and that I’d have to backup, turn around, and go in a different gate. I told him I couldn’t back up because we can’t when we’re towing our truck.

We disconnected our F-150 and Julie drove to the campground. I backed the motorhome up about 1/8 to ¼ of a mile and turned around with the help of the security forces guy. Then I came in the Truman gate with no problem. I got directions at the gate and I was on my way to the campground.      

We went to a retirement party on May 23^rd for an old friend Kris. We met Kris and his wife Jan at Lake Powell back in 2009. Kris worked for the Army Corps of Engineers and was really looking forward to his retirement at age 55 and traveling with their RVs.

We spent our two weeks in Albuquerque just hanging out, seeing Kris and Jan a few times and visiting many of our favorite diners, cafes, and restaurants in the area.

Last Thursday afternoon we went with Kris and Jan on the Sandia Peak Tramway. Julie and I had never been on this tram before and thoroughly enjoyed the trip.

Later we went to the famous El Pinto restaurant for dinner. The food was awesome as usual.

We leave Albuquerque tomorrow morning, with an overnight stop in Raton, NM, headed to Colorado Springs for a week.

Steve & Julie Cornelius