North Iowa Tractor Ride...day two

Southeast Minnesota is hilly and full of bluffs. Excellent scenery. It was gorgeous being on top of the hills and looking out over all the farmland.

It is also Amish country. The coolest thing I saw was the laundry hanging out to dry at one home. No one got a picture of it. It was beautiful. Lots of black, deep purples, blues and reds hanging, like flags, from the house to a pole. It was just as sunny and hot on day two. Everyone had a chance to work on farmer tans....head neck and arms taking the brunt of the sun. Sunscreen is a must have for rides.

Here I am....I was holding the camera up to get a shot of what was behind me. I never knew what I would get...this seemed to be the best one. That is Rod back there.

This was my view for 2 days....

My knees didn't get so stiff...I was able to stretch out.

Not a cloud in the sky.




Breaks were scheduled....a place to stop, get down, walk around and use a bathroom....

On day two this was a break on the side of the road.

It was perfect...if you don't mind not having a toilet to use. (I didn't, and I had to go) The corn was just right to walk into and go to the bathroom.

and....no, I didn't see any baseball players in there.

(Field of Dreams....is this heaven? No, it's Iowa)






We are almost back to Cresco....

It is hard to see, but, Bill was in front of us. He was standing, one leg up, trying to air out and cool off.






The end....

Rod has this down to an art form....he and Brian can load, and chain down tractors in no time at all. They have done this before. In fact they were going home...only to regroup and then head out the next day for another tractor ride! I was happy to stay home. I need a bigger break between rides!

It is something we will do again. Maybe next time use the Farmall, that tractor isn't as noisy (according to tractor joe). I don't know...to me they all sound the same.

North Iowa Tractor Ride 2010...day one

We finished our first tractor ride!!

these are the cell phone pictures that I took.....

We were only gone 48 hours....But I feel like we were gone for days and days and went a lot further than we did. Here we have Brian, tractor joe, Rod and Bill.... We all met in Cresco, IA on Thursday. It ended up with 170-something tractors participating. They had 4 sections.....from the slowest group, which always left first... to the fastest group, which always left last. We were in the fastest group.

Hang on to your hats....I lost my hat once when a gust of wind took it. Bill stopped to pick it up.
I got it back when we stopped for a minute to check our brakes on the tractor...
they were smokin' hot!!!

I am still not sure of the problem...but it was easily fixed. We discovered that we would like one of the slower groups better. The faster you go, the louder the tractor. It was hard to talk without yelling at each other.

we said "WHAT?" a lot....and did a lot of pointing. At a slower pace it was easier to talk.

On the first day we were in front of Bill and Rod. It was hard taking pictures. There was lots of bouncing in my seat.

I had the cooler, my backpack and me all seatbelted down on the bench. There were times I was airborn back there. The first time it was OMG!!!....then you just kinda get used to it happening every once in awhile.

We left at 9:00 am and arrived in Lanesboro, Mn about 3:30 in the afternoon. It was very hot and humid...waiting in line for fuel was another chance for more sweating. Not much wind to help cool a person off.
Out on the road you didn't feel the heat as much.

I had put a quilt on the back of the bench.

Then we had to find the place we had made reservations for...



It took a bit of searching...finally we found the door sandwiched between two shops.

Check in was at the Amish Experience shop.



Then off to our room....

Right behind that door is a set of steps...24 of them and right at the top was our room. I kept reminding myself of all the great exercise I was getting each time I went up them.


There were 3 rooms, each with a bed and bathroom. The rooms all shared a livingroom area and one beautiful kitchen.

It was stocked with everything you would need to make breakfast. We loved it. Our roomies were Rod's in-laws and we all ate together at the table, talking about the ride so far.

Just about all the decorations were for sale...there were price tags hanging on different things, including these chairs. Amish built, they had $169.00 on them. I don't know if that was per chair or pair of them...we didn't buy anything, not even a postcard.

I will do day two next time!!