Scotland-London April 2010

Chicago, Springfield, Indianapolis, and Detroit

After passing through O'Hare Int'l Airport (ORD) many times over the years on our travels, we decided to actually visit the city itself. My Dad had taken me there when I was about 8 yrs. old and the only thing I remembered was the Field Museum and Natural History Museum and the dinosaur skeletons.

We took a shuttle into downtown and stayed in the heart of the Theatre District. It was convenient to get around downtown and to use public transport. Chicago is great city for ethnic food, and we overdid the pizza and hot dogs for several days. We did the usual city bus tour which is always a great way to get the lay on the land in a new city. For us, the highlight of the trip was our visit to the Museum of Science and Technology. It is a pretty long ride on the train, and transfer to a bus, or direct bus along Shoreline Drive, but well worth the effort. They have the only extant WW II German submarine which was captured off the coast of Africa! They towed it to America, brought it through the St. Lawrence Seaway and through the Great Lakes to Chicago! There is a wonderful time lapse video of how they trucked the sub to the site they had built to house it: The museum built a new wing and had dug out space for the sub. When that was complete, the brought the sub to the site and lowered it into its new home, and then proceeded to complete the building walls and roof over the submarine! Pretty clever and quite an engineering feat. The exhibit itself is very educational and if you desire, you can pay a small fee and tour the interior of the sub.

From Chicago, we picked up a rental car downtown and drive South to Salem, IL. It is a State Park and home of Abraham Lincoln as young man. Salem was a small town of a river which could not be used for navigation by the big paddle wheel steam boats which came along in the 1830's and early 1840's, and town slowly died. During the Depression, the town was rebuilt by the CCC, and it is intriguing to visit. They have docents in period costume who are very knowledgeable. It was an educational experience.

From there, on to Springfield, the state capital where Lincoln practiced law and from where he got elected President in 1860. There is a park where Lincoln's house if beautifully preserved, and several surrounding blocks have been acquired by the Park Service and it is now a true step back in time to the 1850's. There is Park Hdq. and Rangers put on educational programs. The Lincoln Presidential Library is located within a few blocks, but is mainly for scholarly research and not casual tourists. Across the street from the Library is the Lincoln Museum. It is a somewhat commercial operation, but is very interesting with some wonderful presentations on the Civil War, and many artifacts.

From Springfield, we drove essentially East to Indianapolis, IN. The idea here was to see the Indianapolis Motor Speedway and the Museum on the Speedway grounds. I'm a fan of auto racing and have never attended the race and this was a wonderful but short one day visit. The Museum is nirvana for fans of the Indy 500, and there docents ready and willing to help with any questions you may have. We opted to take the bus tour of one lap of the track with a recorded narration. To think the racers reach speeds as high as 230 mph is a scary prospect!

From Indianapolis, we drove to Dearborn, MI to visit the Henry Ford Museum. There is a complete complex collectively called "The Henry Ford". There is the massive Museum itself, the Village, which is an amazing recreation of America in the early 1900's. You can tour the Village on foot or you can also get a ride in a Model T, of which they have 13! Henry Ford's home is there, as is the Wright Brother's Bicycle shop from Dayton, Ohio. It is truly a wonderful historical re-creation. Adjacent to the Museum is an IMAX theater. From the Museum, you can proceed via bus to the Rouge Plant where they currently build Ford F-150 pickup trucks. Part of Ford's genius was to have a completely integrated manufacturing facility. Iron ore would arrive on boats on the Rouge River adjacent to the plant, and that would be made into steel for engines, frames, brakes, and bodies and other mechanical components. A very interesting tour which takes several hours. The only automated operation we saw was the installation of windshields by a computer operated machine. Five years ago, we toured the Mercedes Benz plant at historic Sindelfingen outside of Stuttgart as part of our purchase of new Mercedes and many of the operations there were computerized such as installation of dashboards, sunroofs and windshields. An interesting comparison of manufacturing techniques.

We flew home from Detroit Metro airport (DTW), which is very large and modern. An interesting trip through what is "flyover country" for a lot of travelers.

In Agra, we stayed at the Oberoi property which was luxurious as usual and only six hundred yards from the Taj. We proceeded to the property via electric buses designed to save the environment, and for good reason. The haze and smog was pretty thick in the area. Getting into the property requires two lines, one for women and another for men. I was told by our guide to not even bother bringing my Prosumer camera. I had a Canon GL-1 and I've had problems in other places trying to get this camera into some historic places. The powers that be think I am a professional photographer and they want you to pay a fee and do all types of other things, and of course I'm not a professional. I reluctantly left the camera and Ellie brought her Canon 35MM slr.

Having said that, it is worth the hassle! Up close it is a work of art. They have inset black marble arabic words into the white marble and you are left breathless by the workmanship. This is a MUST see if you ever get to India.

Glacier National Park

In early September of last year, Ellie and I accomplished one of the trips we have always wanted to take; Glacier National Park in NW Montana. As we fly AA most of the time, we flew to Seattle (SEA), connected to Spokane, near the Idaho border. From there we rented a car crossed the panhandle of Idaho and drove the balance of the day ending up at the western entrance to the Park where we stayed at the Lake McDonald Lodge in a shore side cabin. Very basic accommodations, (no TV etc.) but clean. This lodge is one of four lodges which were originally built by the Great Northern RR in the early 1900's. They were designed as places for passengers to overnight on visits to this magnificent region. The design of the lodges is basically the same: a massive open lobby with huge fireplace and completely open for as many floors of rooms in the lodge. No 2x6 or 2x8 wooden structure here; they use the entire tree trunk as a column and they are huge! The season here is June (WX permitting) through about mid-September. They have a very short time to make their profit and prices are quite high for the quality of the lodging. All the lodges have beautiful dining rooms with fabulous views over the water where they are located. Food quality was OK, but definitely not gourmet. Of course you are not going there for the lodging and restaurant but for the many attractions of the Park, which are fabulous. If any of you have been to the Canadian Rockies or the Rockies west of Denver, or Switzerland or Austria or the S. Island of New Zealand, you will love this place.

We also stayed at Glacier Park Lodge, the Prince of Wales Lodge (just across the border in Alberta, Canada - bring your passport!), and the Many Glacier Hotel. All of these lodges are in the park and frankly all similar. You can stay at other accommodations outside the Park but the ambiance at the lodges is wonderful. If you decide to go, book as far in advance as possible. These lodges are old, and one half of the rooms face the water at each location and the other half do not! At Many Glacier, our room overlooked the parking lot, but it was still a great place. A word about the Prince of Wales Hotel: It sits on a hill overlooking one of three lakes. It reminds me of a fiord in Norway or Milford Sound in NZ. Five floors and a lift which only goes four of them. Of course our room was on the fifth floor! It has the oldest operating elevator in Canada which requires an operator. You call a bellboy (they all wear wee skirts - aka Kilts) and he takes you to the fourth and either they handle the luggage for you or you can do it yourself to the fifth floor. Our room overlooked the lake and the view was was every penny they charged! Of course they have High Tea in the afternoon overlooking the Lake. Very traditonal and very English.

There are different ways to get around the park; we had our rental car and it worked out very well. You can also use the Red Bus Tours. These are custom made trucks/buses, originally made by the White Motor Company in 1937. You older readers will remember these! They have seats for about 16 passengers, and a canvas top which slides back so you have essentially a giant sunroof. They all have been completely rebuilt by Ford and have modern engines which burn propane, automatic transmissions, and modern brakes. You can take a day tour from any of the lodges, or book a multiple day tour using the buses to take you from lodge to lodge. I had heard criticism of these as being rather cramped and crowed with little legroom. We were there at the end of the season and all the buses were full.

Going from east to west or vice versa, you travel the Road to the Sun, which is dramatic drive across the Continental Divide. Allow time for this as they are rebuilding large portions of the road and there is construction and delays.

While there are breathtaking vistas around every corner, our favorite place was Two Medicine, which is a lake accessed from the eastern edge of the park. It is called Two Medicine because over 100 years ago, two local Indian tribes were to meet there to make medicine. The local Indians consider this a sacred place. One tribe did not arrive on time for some reason, and so the first tribe "made medicine" and when the second tribe arrived later, they did the same, thus Two Medicine. There are numerous hiking trails, and in season you can rent boats to take on the lake. There is an old lodge there, smaller the the ones previously mentioned which is now used for a General Store. It was closed for the season when we were there. There is a campground here as well as several other campgrounds throughout the Park. On August 5, 1934, FDR broadcast a fireside chat from here, and shortly thereafter, he and Eleanor were inducted into the Blackfeet Tribe.

From Glacier, we drove to Great Falls, located on the Missouri River. We wanted to visit the Visitor Center of the Lewis and Clark Expedition located on the outskirts of Great Falls, right on the river. This is an extremely well done and comprehensive exhibit which covers several acres and is about four different levels. It has a modern theatre which runs two films, one by Ken Burns and another by the Park Service themed on the Expedition. I have read and highly recommend "Undaunted Courage" by Stephen Ambrose, which chronicles the trip across the continent to the Pacific. At Great Falls, the party had to portage around 5 separate waterfalls. This is a "Must See" if you are within 500 miles of Great Falls. We stayed at the Crystal Inn Hotel and Suites just off the Interstate. I mention this as we had never stayed with them before and I was very pleased; they had very nice rooms; hot breakfast included, laundry, exercise facility and pool. All for around $120/night.

We traveled onward to Bozeman because we wanted to visit the Museum of the Rockies on the campus of Montana State University. Rather than drive the Interstate we took state routes and what a trip! Two lane asphalt, speed limit is 70 MPH (don't do it!). On several occasions, we would come around a bend in the road and either livestock or wild horses in the middle of the road. At one place, we come around the bend and the pavement stops and its dirt. A couple of miles on we run into a rancher driving about 100 head of cattle down the road! He said to just drive through (!) I tried this but was apparently going too slow being afraid I'd spook some bull and he'd kick/charge the car. They were using quad bikes and one of the guys pulled alongside and said follow me. He charged ahead at a more robust pace running interference for us. Several miles later (still on dirt) a head of elk crossed the road, jumped the fence and ran across the hills. Amazing. Later, we saw several deer by the road, and once, I saw a grizzly bear running across the hillside. Got him on film.

Bozeman is a town of about 60,000 at 4600' elevation. It was started in the 1870s and the old downtown is charming with several great restaurants. As the town has grown, there are the usual malls with all the usual stores and national food chains available. It is close to the Interstate and has a very modern airport. We stayed at the Hilton Garden Inn here and the one at the airport in Spokane. I'm not normally a fan of Hilton hotels, but these were very nice and we highly recommend them. The only problem with Bozeman is the winter weather. Surrounded by mountains and in a high valley, it gets pretty brutal in the winter which is long.

The Museum of the Rockies is essentially dedicated to dinosaurs. It is really an incredible place well worth the visit.

Next up: Our trip east to Chicago, Springfield, Il.; Indianapolis; and Dearborn, MI..