vividreports: Sioux Falls overnight

We did in fact get a loaner and we are spending the night in Sioux Falls at a Super 8 motel. They were still running a test on the alternator when we left the Subaru dealership, but it seemed the likely culprit. The bad news is that they do not have a Subaru alternator in stock - we would have to wait 2-3 days for one! So we will have to get another "after market" alternator, which I was trying to avoid by coming all the way to Sioux Falls. But there is nothing to be done for it. We'll just have to keep our fingers crossed (well, I'll keep mine crossed - hard for Ellen to steer with crossed fingers).

It is sort of odd to have this car trouble all of a sudden because we drove the 1200 miles or so from Angola, NY to Pipestone, MN without incident. Not sure just what is going on and what the "message" is, if any.

We tried to treat ourselves to a nice meal at a Red Lobster restaurant this evening but it was only partially successful. I ordered NE Clam Chowder and a "starter" of seafood-stuffed mushrooms.The chowder was ok - it was much thicker than it would be in NE, but still ok - but the mushrooms were served in an incredibly rich butter and cheese sauce that was just too much for me. I picked out the mushrooms and left the rest. The dish didn't look like that in the photo in the menu! Ellen ordered lobster bisque, salad and coconut shrimp, which was just too much food. She enjoyed the bisque, but the salad was drowned in dressing. After supper we went to a Dollar Tree store to buy reading glasses - I had managed to misplace mine on the trip. I'm always sort of amazed to buy reading glasses for $1. Now we are back at the motel. The room has no fridge - we have a little cooler we usually put in the fridge overnight - but the front desk clerk was very accommodating about letting us use a motel fridge. So that was nice.

Before all this happened, we had an interesting visit in the morning at Pipestone National Monument, which I think is unique in the country as a place where Native American families can come and actually work at quarrying the red pipestone which is ubiquitous at that location (but buried under many feet of quartzite) and which is used to carve very beautiful pipe bowls and stems. Indigenous peoples have been doing this for millennia at this place. It was made a National Monument in 1937, and a treaty with native peoples is built into the law establishing the NM. The pipes have deep spiritual significance for native peoples - typically, herbs are smoked, not tobacco, and the smoke is a form of prayer. We saw a film which gave the background very beautifully, and then we walked around and looked at quarries. Because of a very wet spring, the quarries are flooded, so no one is working there now. All the quarrying has to be done with hand tools, which is a lot of work!

Display at Pipestone NM Visitor's Center

A variety of objects hand-carved from red pipestone

A typical quarry

Along the quarry trail

A little bonus: behind our couch in the waiting lounge at the Subaru place was a 1970 Subaru on display. I didn't get a photo, but it looked like this except it was bright yellow. I'll get a photo in the morning. The car had a 2-cylinder engine in the rear and got 66mpg! Too bad they didn't keep making it! Cute! But it lasted only a short time in America because it didn't meet the public's demand for space and power, and Consumer Reports put the final nail in the coffin by giving it an "Not Acceptable" rating because of safety concerns. It doesn't seem all that different from the VW Beetle (tho that had 4 cylinders). This was Subaru's first car in America. A modest start to what has become quite an empire. I hope Trump doesn't force the Japanese to reduce their exports of Subaru's to the US.