Americana Extravaganza - Day Two (Rough Lock Falls, Deadwood and SASKATCHEWAN!!)

Well, after an eventful Day One, I wasn't really holding out all that much hope for the rest of the trip. I mean, we'd covered what I'd wanted to cover (Badlands, Mt. Rushmore)... what more could there possibly be?

Enter... Day Two. Day Two started off with a visit to Rough Lock Falls, which is this gorgeous woods-y/forest-y area complete with... you guessed it - waterfalls. We ended up mainly just driving through the area, but we did end up stopping here and there for the occasional picture or two.

This picture, without fail, cracks me up... pretty standard, some might say. (And by "standard", I mean "Christie laughs maniacally at, clearly, nothing that anyone else finds all that entertaining.)

Oh well, it was too early in the morning to be fully sane...

But it's never too early on a Saturday morning to... well, be doing an Irish jig? (Hahah - this picture also, without fail, cracks me up.)

Actually, you know what... come to think of it - I completely forget if these pictures were taken en route to Rough Lock Falls or en route elsewhere. Whoops (this is what happens when you delay blogging about a trip for TWO MONTHS!) - oh well, for all intents and purposes, we are going to say that yes... yes, these pictures were taken en route to Rough Lock Falls.

However, I can 100% assure you - THIS was taken AT the Falls themselves...

Pretty, right?

After doing another hike gentle stroll through some pretty forestry, we headed back into the beast of a Suburban to head to Deadwood. Deadwood is this town in South Dakota that closely resembles a "Wild West" town. While we were going to visit to see the "Wild West" in all its glory, our primary activity in Deadwood was... that's right - seeing a rodeo!!

I can safely say that each and every one of us was at least slightly traumatized by the rodeo - I mean, these cowboys were a bit aggressive when lasso'ing their horses and TYING THEM DOWN??!?!? (I'm absolutely NOT posting pictures of that spectacle taking place - I can't bear the memory!)

After that traumatic event transpired, we decided to walk around the town for a bit... and what a great distraction! It was as we were walking around that I noticed that my birthplace was showcased on QUITE a few license plates in the area - who knew that so many Saskatchewanians would be vacationing in South Dakota, of all places?? I HAD to document accordingly...

And naturally, I HAD to befriend my fellow Saskatchewanian...

(Of course, the owner of the car HAD to come back to his car while I was shamelessly taking my picture with the license plate. Oh well, at least my people are friendly folks, I guess.)

Honestly, seeing all the Saskatchewan license plates (and meeting my fellow Saskatchewanian!) was truly one of the highlights of my trip. I really need to see about making a trip back to my birthplace... if I'm going to advertise it as much as I do (I mean, how can you NOT advertise a place called "Saskatoon, Saskatchewan"... doesn't it just sound MAGICAL?!?!), I should probably see how the place has changed in... I don't know... the past 30 years or so?

Ah, but I digress. Another trip for another time.

We ended up wandering and finding a little tour group of Deadwood, so we ended up hopping right on board.

Literally.

It was fun - the tour guides were nice (and very knowledgeable!). I mean, the fact that they openly judged us for how little we knew about South Dakota, let alone Deadwood itself, is a mere aside.

After we'd gotten our fill of Deadwood, we ended up piling back into the beast of a Suburban and headed back to the hotel for a little downtime before heading off to dinner. Downtime for Rina and myself consisted of wandering through downtown Rapid City, doing a self-guided tour of all the presidents which line the streets of Rapid City.

We are such nerds, but, quite frankly - I absolutely LOVED THIS PART OF OUR DAY!!! I mean, you have to admit - we've had some serious WINNERS to serve as our presidents... we're pretty lucky, America.

Ahh! Rina and her favorite president - Abraham Lincoln...

Ahh! JFK!!! AND I happened to have Ted Kennedy's autobiography (one of my favorite books ever) in my purse!! It was so just meant to be!!

And... naturally, I HAD to save the best for last.

God, Bill Clinton. I don't know how much more of a love someone can have for a president. (Ironically, for how much love I do have for him, he's actually my second favorite president... second only to FDR, in case you were curious.)

In any event! We ended up wandering up and down the streets a bit more before finally heading back to the hotel to meet the rest of the group for dinner at Everest Cuisine - which happened to have only some of the most amazing Indian / Nepalese cuisine I've ever experienced. Rapid City... who would've thought, huh?

*Special thanks to Purvi and Trang for allowing me to straight up steal borrow their pictures from this trip.

Americana Extravaganza - Day One (Badlands, Wall Drug, Mt. Rushmore)

My friends and I decided we would all fly out to Rapid City, South Dakota on Thursday night and fly back on Monday morning. Because we were all coming from various locations (San Francisco, St. Louis, Chicago and Yosemite-ish), we figured it was just going to be easier to meet at the airport.

Easier said than done. I think Purvi's flight from San Francisco was the only one that was remotely on time (landing around 9:30 PM). The girls flying in from Chicago ended up being delayed and arrived only around midnight / 1 AM. And my flight from St. Louis was straight up cancelled. I think there were some weather issues going on but still - what kind of start to the trip WAS this?

Oh well, some of us aren't seasoned travelers for naught. I mean, traveling can be a nightmare but a snafu here and there really isn't the end of the world - it actually just adds to the adventure, no? (Okay, I may be stretching the optimism / positivity a bit here.)

In any event, after approximately four hours of sleep on Thursday night (at this hotel that the airline put me up at), I was back up and at 'em at the Houston airport (I had had to connect from St. Louis through Houston to get me to Rapid City)... ready and waiting to fly through Dallas to connect to Rapid City. (Who knew I would be getting such a tour of the grand state of Texas through all this?)

Ah well - nothing a nice cup of (iced!!) coffee can't cure

After the craziness of Thursday night, Friday's flight(s) were fairly uneventful. My friends were ready and waiting to pick me up in the rental car (and by rental car, I mean the beast of a Suburban that Purvi had been able to swing with Hertz) at the airport so that we could head straight for our first planned adventure - the Badlands.

Oh, let me back up quickly to explain who all was on this trip. It was basically the Maine crew minus one plus two - yeah, I'm sure that made no sense. To spell it out... this trip was comprised of myself, Rina, Purvi and Trang (we all went to Maine together), Joyce (another friend from Chicago who is just crazy and added some real razzle dazzle to the group, let's be honest here) and Mark (another friend from Chicago who decided to make South Dakota a pit stop after a two-week backpacking adventure in the wilderness). 

Our trip started off as a bit of a reunion - some of us hadn't seen each other for AGES! So you can only imagine what ensued... lots of this...

And this...

Aaaand... finally, we got it just right...

(Poor Mark - I think he questioned joining us on the trip from this moment onwards.)

In any event, we continued along our merry way, hiking through the Badlands. I think "hiking" is a loosely used term in this situation - more... a gentle walk along pebbly ground, one would say. 

I mean, don't get me wrong. There WAS room for confusion at various points in time... 

But thankfully, Trang took the initiative to sign us up at various points along the trail in case of emergency situations... 

Can never be too prepared, I guess... ;) 

Overall, though, the Badlands turned out to be pretty picturesque:

I would argue that it's not necessarily worthy of a solid 3.5 hours of hiking gently strolling through pebbly terrain, but to each their own.

After the Badlands, we drove back to Rapid City with a stop at Wall Drug - this ridiculously touristy place, filled with all KINDS of tschotchky items. I couldn't BELIEVE how HUGE this place was - it was like a little playground, if you will.

Once we'd gotten our fill of Wall Drug, we piled back into that beast of a Suburban and headed straight for... where else? Mt. Rushmore.

I was so, so, so excited for Mt. Rushmore. I mean, it's an historical American LANDMARK!! I love history! I love America! How could one NOT be excited for this 20th century masterpiece?? We got to Mt. Rushmore close to dusk, as we were strongly encouraged to visit Mt. Rushmore for its spectacular night light show (or something like that). Check it out in all its daytime glory...

It gets even better at night!!

Okay, to be perfectly honest - Mt. Rushmore was nice to visit and all, but it's definitely just one of those "check things off a list" kind of things. I have no desire / need to visit Mt. Rushmore again... I mean, it's cool and all but... well, it's a lot SMALLER than I was expecting it to be. God, Mt. Rushmore is to South Dakota what the Panama Canal is to Panama... kind of a giant buzzkill.

Sooo, in a nutshell, that was Day One of this Americana extravaganza. You ready for Day Two?

*Special thanks to Purvi and Mark for allowing me to straight up steal borrow their pictures from this trip.

"That's My Ish" - A Weekend With My 21-Year-Old Twin

Wow, has it been a while or WHAT? Oh well! Let's get right to it, shall we?

You've likely seen a post here or there about the one, the only... Maria Thomas.

I've known Maria and her family for about 25 years and, simply put, they are the best. Maria is the middle child of three and... well, we take great pride in the twin-dom (in personality) that we've formed over the years. I mean, who else could have taught eight-year-old Maria the lyrics to such age-appropriate songs as JayZ's "Big Pimpin"? (I take great pride in the fact that, to this day, Maria does text me when she hears that song from time to time. Ahh, the legacy and teachings I leave for future generations...)

Maria is one of the few people I know that is more crazy (in the "my kinda crazy" sorta way) than me. I do believe she's learned a fair amount of her crazy ways from me and, to be quite frank, I'm quite proud of this fact. Again... that whole legacy I'm leaving behind and all that. ;)

In any event! I cannot tell you how excited I was when Maria mentioned that she was going to be gracing Chicago with her presence this weekend. Of course, I hadn't exactly planned out an itinerary for the two of us (unless you count "hugfesting it out" to be itinerary-worthy) but I figured we'd just roll with it and figure things out when she got to my place. Easy peasy.

Well, that whole "getting to my place" came a lot earlier than I expected. Come 8:30 AM on Saturday, Maria was ready and waiting in my lobby. I was a bit surprised to receive a text from her that early on a Saturday morning (I mean, she IS 21 and she HAD been out the night before!) and, to be perfectly honest, I was a bit of a zombie upon greeting her given my whole four hours of sleep the night before, but... well, nothing a little hug/gab-fest can't cure, right? Right.

After hugging it out and chatting it up for a bit, we talked plans for the day. We decided to start off by venturing to the Lincoln Park farmers market for some coffee and breakfast, then make an appearance at the Lincoln Park Zoo and then head back to my place for a nap. The fact that the nap made it on the itinerary right off the bat is just one of many reasons why I adore the one, the only Maria - we are two. of a freaking. kind.

After strolling through the farmers market and finishing up our coffees / breakfast, we made our way across the street to the Lincoln Park Zoo. It never ceases to amaze me that this zoo is literally three blocks from my apartment - it's just a whole different world...

Filled with lots of animals (which I may or may not feel a touch bad for)...

And/or lots of adorable children (I swear we're not creepers)...

As we were wandering about the zoo, Maria and I managed to cover a WIDE range of deep topics - from the frequency with which an average college student checks Facebook... to our love of mixed children... to a detailed discussion of "which" mixed races would evolve the most beautiful child... to, well, something related to Maria's love for Hispanic families (hahah - is this getting to be way too much information?)... to... well, Maria's use of such clutch phrases including, but not limited to...

"That's my ish".

Okay, to be fair, I've heard this term before, but DEFINITELY not used in natural conversation. I forget what we were gabbing on and on about, but when Maria just inserted that phrase so naturally to the conversation... well, THAT's when it became clear that I was hanging out with a 21 year old ;) I think my new goal is to try to start incorporating that phrase into MY everyday conversations (dream big and all that)... I mean, Maria taught me well - that phrase was only inserted into any and all conversations for the remainder of the weekend, let's be honest here.

Ah, but I digress. All in all, it was just such a BEAUTIFUL DAY that we got to spend in Lincoln Park!

After spending some time at the zoo, were we EVER ready for our naps!

Such a money idea if ever there was one. After a couple of hours (what can I say? We don't take napping lightly), each of us woke up nicely bright-eyed and bushy-tailed... and totally ready to start the "downtown" part of our day of fun.

We hopped on that 151 (God, it's been so long since I've ridden that thing and no WONDER - it is the slowest thing EVER) and headed down to Michigan and Wacker. Stop #1: Chicago's architecture tour. This is one of my favorite "touristy" things to do in Chicago because you get to be on the water, soak up the sun AND learn about Chicago's history / buildings... so many of my favorite things all rolled into one tour!

After the tour, we headed a bit further south to check out Millennium Park - it had been AGES since I'd been to Millennium Park and it was just so FUN to wander about it with Maria, who had never been before.

Okay, so maybe our idea of "fun" is a bit different from others... considering the majority of our time was spent... well...

Stalking Oprah...

And/or attempting to pose like FOBs in pictures. I mean, is this a new fad or something? Maria told me about how her and her friends make it a point to do this each time they go places and... not going to lie, I definitely just gave her a "What the f" look. But... well, turns out Maria knows what she's doing. I kind of want to do this each time I travel now too! ;) (Clearly, this whole "craziness influence" is a two-way street.)

Take 1:

Take 2:

Take 3:

I have to say, I was quite impressed. The girl's got the look DOWN PAT. All she really needs to do now is stick her index finger and middle finger in her pocket and she will be SET. Ah, for next time.

We tried to do another FOB shot on the lawn, but... well, the darn picture turned out a lot cuter (read: less FOB) than we were intending.

Noted: next time we attempt a "FOB sitting on a grassy knoll" pose, make sure we are NOT beaming and are sitting more on our hips with our folded legs slightly to the side... do you know what I'm talking about? Have we thought about this way too much? Moving on...

After spending way more time than was necessary posing for these pictures (which, ironically, was actually taken by a FOB couple we'd spotted from afar... sigh, shamelessness-personified), we decided to move on to... Pritzker Pavilion!

I love, love, love this spot! It's. Just. So. CHILL! And Saturday was no exception! I actually had just intended to show Maria the pavilion itself, since it's so "majestic" in nature. Upon making our way to the pavilion though, how much of an added bonus was it that we stumbled upon...

Oh, just a Saturday night symphony concert. God, it was so lovely. I haven't been to the symphony in AGES and it was just so relaxing to zone out to some seriously calming / soothing music. Sigh. After hanging out for a bit, we decided to continue on our merry way - next stop: the Bean.

I actually had never seen the Bean at night - and it was definitely worth it.

We couldn't get enough!

As if the love for this city couldn't grow any more...

Amazing, right?!?!

Anyway, after THAT photography session, we made our way back on the 151 and headed back to my apartment. By that point, it was about 10 PM and... well, you know me - if it was up to me, I would totally have just called it a night. But of course, I've got my 21 year old twin to keep me in check - she was the one who voiced the executive decision that we were going out.

Of course, I smiled and nodded along but MAN, inside I was just thinking "It's just one night with a 21 year old, Christie. You can do it. You can do it." Hahaha.

It actually ended up being a LOT tamer / chiller than I was initially expecting - we were going to start off with drinks at the John Hancock tower's Signature Room before heading out... well, somewhere lively and bumpin. We ended up getting into the Signature Room pretty quickly for a Saturday night and snagged a pretty money spot, complete with:

Some pretty sweeeeet views

Some pretty sweeeeet drinks

And, of course, some pretty sweeeeet company

I honestly thought we would be there for about an hour before peacing out and heading out. However, we ended up gabbing for WAY longer than expected... and actually ended up closing down the Signature Room at 1:30. I guess this is what happens when you get engrossed in some pretty deep convos about family... Facebook... friends... Twitter... life... Tumblr... well, you get the idea.

By that point, I was definitely ready for bed (that nap can only hold me out for so long), so we ended up calling it a night.

But MAN! What a wonderful day! What else can one expect when they spend a day with the one, the only Maria Thomas? ;)

*Special thanks to Maria for some of the pictures which were incorporated into this blog post.