Growing up in Fort Atkinson, WI, we periodically visited the local Indian Mounds in Indian Mounds Park as a school trip. There are eleven mounds consisting of tapering linear, conical, bird and turtle mounds. I found them fascinating back when I was 10 but I never thought I’d be studying Indian civilization when I was all grown up! Here is a list of Indian mound parks in Wisconsin (You have to scroll down to Jefferson County for Fort Atkinson.). The Princess Mound is at the Lake Mills Aztalan Museum at the Aztalan State Park, the site of a ceremonial and residential Native American town established around 1100 AD.
Fort Atkinson, WI, Indian Mounds
May 27, 2009
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Bonneville Dam
May 27, 2009Austin and Bella had fun watching the fish going up the fish ladder at Bonneville Dam in Cascade Locks, Oregon near the Columbia River Gorge. In May, a huge ball of sturgeon was discovered at the base of the dam by fisheries biologists, who at first thought it was debris. Sturgeon are one of the Columbia’s largest and most ancient fish. We have enjoyed feeding the fish and strolling the grounds at Bonneville Dam on several ocassions.
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Fishing or Birding with Grandpa
May 25, 2009A great place to fish or birdwatch with Grandpa is Horseshoe Lake in Southern Illinois near Cairo. It has lots of large-mouth bass and catfish. The whole lake is 4 feet deep (3 ft average). It used to be part of the Mississippi River. There are 15 bald eagles in the Horseshoe Lake area in winter – they like the over 150,000 Canadian Geese that show up too! There is another Horseshoe Lake closer to St. Louis that has Cahokian significance and also the same kind of outdoor experiences available: fishing, boating, hiking, camping, birding and picnic areas.
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Vancouver Washington Railway Station
May 23, 2009The illustration of Grandpa Ron and Austin watching big trains in my book Grandpa, Do It! I Do It, Too! is from a photo I took at the Vancouver Washington Railway Station while we watched trains ( called rail fanning ) after Austin woke up from his nap on his 3rd Birthday Party Day. The Vancouver station is special because it is on a “wye” so it has two front doors – one on the northwest side for North-South traffic and one on the southeast for traffic turning East. There are two major Amtrak trains that stop daily each way here: The Empire Builder and The Coast Starlight, and then there are also eight Amtrak Cascades. Here is an interesting article from 2002 about the renovation plans for the station. It is fun to see how it compares to what is happening now (2 more Cascades are going through it!)
There is also a lot of BNSF, Union Pacific and Portland & Western Railroad freight traffic coming and going – and local sorting in the yard, so Grandpa Ron and Austin had lots of trains to watch!
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A Fighting Chance For Kids
May 22, 2009Kids whose parents lost their jobs can take martial arts classes for free in June at South Coast Fight Club in Huntington Beach, CA. As I covered in an earlier blog, we work out with Nick Rians under his FitnessWorkx sessions. For more information on South Coast Fight Club, 15132 Bolsa Chica Road, call (714) 655-3757 or visit southcoastfightclub.com.
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Missouri Botanical Garden
May 21, 2009Lots of activities for little ones are on the calendar at the Missouri Botanical Garden in St. Louis, Missouri. Then there’s the Butterfly House in Faust Park, 15193 Olive Blvd. in Chesterfield, EarthWays Center at 3617 Grandel Square – St. Louis, and the Shaw Nature Reserve at Hwy. 100 & I-44 in Gray Summit. Family classes and activities are offered at the Shaw Nature Reserve. The mbgnet is a wonderful, interactive learning and information tool that is a lot of fun to use. Virtual tours are also available!
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Chocolate, Dark Chocolate, Chocolate Factories
May 19, 2009Chocolate, dark chocolate can help you stay healthy and can even help you lose weight! Great news for us chocolate lovers! Ghirardelli has 100% chocolate drops that I love to nibble at 3 in the afternoon. Ghirardelli Square in San Francisco is one of my favorite haunts – and across the bay is the San Leandro Factory Outlet.
Then there is Hershey, PA; Chicago and Times Square for Hersey’s Chocolate! Here are videos of the Hershey Factory tour. I am told it is a tasty time! Enjoy!
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Crayola Factory, Easton, PA
May 18, 2009Kathy at work suggested the Crayola Factory as a very fun place to take kids. The review linked here is full of info about it. Here are some youtube videos of people having fun. The official Crayola Site is full of coloring pages, crafts and lots of ideas.
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Davis Monthan – Pima Air Museum
May 18, 2009We had a great time meandering around the planes at the Pima Air & Space Museum at Davis-Monthan Air Force Base in Tucson, AZ. The SW Aviator has this article (Preserving the Best of the Boneyard
story by Mark Swint, photos by Mark Swint and Mike Scott) about the planes.
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Snoqualmie Falls and Salish Lodge
May 17, 2009A friend wanted suggestions for a romantic getaway to celebrate a 1 year milestone and I thought but a minute before coming up with Snoqualmie Falls and Salish Lodge, located about 30 miles from Seattle, Washington. Grandpa Ron and I enjoyed a weekend there many years ago and we still talk about it! It is where we adopted Bear, our first of now very many bears. He was sitting in the middle of the pillows on our bed when we arrived. We paid his adoption fee in the Gift Shop and he has gone on almost every trip we’ve taken anywhere ever since!
Salish Lodge has many scheduled activities that you can participate in. Even if the lodge is too high end for yur budget, Snoqualmie has other hotels and there are other nearby cities to stay. There is hiking, biking, horseback riding, kayaking, whitewater rapids, fishing and golfing galore – and a Railroad Museum!! We loved the train ride and the informative interpretive tour.
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MyGrandmaSue 
