Around the world with two suitcases
We arrived at Mark and Marcy’s cabin in Bailey, CO, overlooking a small lake. On the way in we saw a herd of mule deer:
The setting of the cabin is idyllic, the porch stretches from east to west and you can move your chair from one sunny (or shady) spot to the next all day long.
There are birds coming to the feeder that ignore us, and their chipmunk (ground squirrel) named Scar, will take peanuts from my fingers.
The goal of our route through Nebraska was to see Carhenge, in Alliance, NE, which we did. We stayed overnight at to Grandma Lala’s B&B, a lot more memorable than the Red Roof Inn we stayed at in Council Bluffs, IA last night. Our room had a cherub theme:
As we drove from Alliance, NE to Denver, we passed beautiful country and even saw an antelope among the cattle.
Driving across Nebraska on this sunny, cool day, we crossed lots and lots of open land, some farm fields, some grazing land with cows everywhere. Our destination was Alliance, NE and CARHENGE!
It looks a bit like Stonehenge from a distance, but from up close it’s a car collection, spray painted gray, welded, wedged and hammered together.
An intriguing fact makes visiting Carhenge in late May an excellent idea. The structures are used by all kinds of birds to build their nests. The metal frames provide shelter and at this time of year, the chicks have hatched and are peeping like crazy and the parents fly back and forth constantly to feed them. Carhenge seems alive with birds among the autos.
Some other sculptures have been donated to the site and this struck me as one of the best–Leaping Salmon.
Here’s our selfie of the day.
We had a good dinner at Ken and Daves’ on 3rd St. It was prime rib night….
After our comfortable time in LaGrange, we packed the car for our trip to California. It was a bit more crowded than we expected.
Even though Jonathan took the car to the Toyota dealership (again) at 7 am, he was able to return home with a new headlight and we were packed and on the road by 11 am.
The midwest is at its greenest right now. We spent the day crossing Illinois and Iowa, arriving in Council Bluffs, IA, (across the river from fabulous Nebraska). We passed this truck–at the time I hoped he had a spigot on the side and some go-cups.
We drove down to the edge of the Missouri River, just to have a look and found that this weekend is LOESSFEST, including the Taste of Omaha. 
We may give it a try on our way out of town, but since it was raining and involved a shuttlebus ride across the river to Omaha we passed up tonight’s opportunity. We did see the bridge with four huge spiky sculptures on each corner that goes over Rte 80–that was strange and interesting. We may go have a look at the water tower shaped like a coffee pot before we leave. (Oh yes, you ought to give Iowa a try…).
Do you know what the next line of that song is? A good one for us.
During the month of May 2015, from the day before the closing on the sale of our house until the week after Memorial Day, we are renting an apartment in a (very nice) two flat in LaGrange. We found it on Airbnb, the owners live upstairs and so far it is both comfortable and convenient.
We have managed to put our own stamp on the extremely clean and orderly surroundings.
All the cardboard boxes are ours. The desk has a wireless printer–a very handy amenity. There’s also a nicely equipped kitchen.
We are out and the house is officially sold. Here are some of the photos I took before we got in the car to go to our rental house.
After a year of downsizing, estate sale, and many carloads of donations, we still seem to have had every closet in the house full of miscellaneous things. To get these into our storage unit we started over, renting a slightly larger unit (10 x 15 ft) and purchasing steel shelving units, six in all. The shelves, from Home Depot, proved very easy to assemble and it took only two visits to get them up and move the contents of the smaller unit moved. From there we began adding boxes from the house.
We arrived in Wheaton on April 15, just as spring was emerging. It’s the most beautiful time of year at our house, when the flowering trees, forsythia and tulips are in bloom. How lucky we are to be here for two weeks, packing up the house in anticipation of closing on the sale May 1.
Semana Santa, Easter week, is one of the busiest holiday weeks of the year. Barranca is filling up with visitors. This gives us a chance to see our friends from Lima one more time before we leave for the US in two weeks. The weather is still warm, though maybe not quite warm enough to swim.
Our new puppy and future guard dog, Cleopatra, is gaining confidence.
Our daily schedule changes slightly during a week this crowded. We walk down the beach and back earlier in the day rather than our usual 5 pm to avoid crowds.
We still bring out the armchairs on the front porch at 6 pm to watch the sunset. This week we add an extra chair because there is always someone passing by who can be tempted to sit for a few minutes and chat during the ever changing sunset and afterglow in the clouds.
Those of you who have followed this blog know that the title turned out not to be entirely representative of our travels, as we never made it to Bolivia. That remains for another time. Since we’re starting on the next round of travels on April 15, I want to retire this banner and put up a new one.
Llywindatravels 2025 