Travels with Walter: Vacation all I ever wanted, Vacation had to get away...

Blue heron in the Mississippi River

I just spent a lovely week and a half in the midwest. I visited the folks in the stunning hamlet of Quincy, Illinois. I certainly got some very needed rest. I spent time with family and friends and was able to have a short creek hike. I took the train and slept through North Dakota. On the way home I had a 4 hour layover in downtown Chicago. I always stuff my belongings into a locker and go for lunch and then a walk. This time, downtown was totally weird. It was a couple of days before the NATO summit and there were cops and Homeland Security all over the place. Really strange.

There are always things when I go back to Quincy that make me think of returning for good; my family, friends, the Mississippi River, thick green forest understory, the smell of damp rotting oak leaves, lightening bugs. But when I step back and think about it, I am not sure my spirit could be fulfilled. The wild places are few and far between. I would have to drive for a long way to get to wilderness. Here, I can easily be in the mountains is about 40 minutes. But I guess I would go back if it was necessary...but I'd need a house boat that I could tool around in on the river and camp on uninhabited islands. Yeah, a house boat...

My sister took me to a totally cool creek full of geodes, fossils and flint. This is one of the many types of fossils and is about the size of a black bean (I know, a weird comparison)

Years ago when I first came to this creek it looked completely different. One part by the road has been bulldozed and it is pretty obvious that it flooded pretty bad.

Lots of different rocks in the picture: flint, limestone, quartz, chalk, diatomite, and mudstone

There is a totally cool cemetery in town called Woodland Cemetery. It is high on a bluff over looking the river. It was built over a complex of Native American mounds. While I was there with my friend Kim a flock of buzzards flew over us really close and one landed on top of the city vault. It was pretty creepy. No one really knows what the vault was for but it is built into the hillside and is cool inside (the door was actually open so I went it...it was full over gardening equipment). Anyway, the most probable theory was that it was a storage spot for people who were killed on the river barges. They were kept cool in there until their family could be notified. It would also make a killer wine cellar.

Kayakers on the river. It is becoming a more common sight. I was there 12 years ago with my kayak for a trip down the Current River in Missouri and no one knew what the funny boat was on top of my truck. I had fun with that. Seeing these guys and being down by the river really makes me want to do a paddle trip on the Mississippi.

Totally cool butterfly in a tree. I noticed it when I was watching a million bees flying into the blooms.

My sister and I went to Fall Creek which is some place we always go when I am there. The rest area access was closed because Illinois is broke so we went to the upper access and walked down on the short little trail. My sister did not want to walk a long way so I headed down the creek and she picked me up by the locked rest area gate.