Day 1: Omaha to Sioux Falls

Ahhh the first day of a road trip can be trying, but today was a great day. Left home at about 10:30 with the car fully packed with contents including:
1. Duffel Bag brimming with clothes
2. Sleeping Bag, Tent, Grill, and other camping supplies

3. Digital Camera, Ipod Touch, Garmin etc...
4. A Cooler full of PBRs (very important!)

The drive up to Sioux Falls was uneventful, with most of Iowa and Southern South Dakota going by pretty quickly. The Loess Hills of Iowa are beautiful and lush green after recent rainstorms, and provided a nice backdrop for the drive. Nothing really remarkable except for a sign that read: "Best Ice Cream in the World -- Le Mars, Iowa 26 Miles off of I-29." Although I doubt their claims of best in the world (Zesto's in Omaha currently holds my personal favorite), I decided that a 26 Mile venture off the interstate was a bit much for the first day. I guess their claims will have to be tested another time.

I arrived in Sioux Falls around 2:30, with a hunger in my belly that needed to be squelched ASAP! The most famous establishment in Sioux Falls is Bob's, a small diner just outside of downtown sporting a large neon sign with a chicken that looked pretty cocky considering his ultimate fate. I ordered a burger and fries, both of which were good, but nothing compared to what came next. After chatting up the waitress and chef, they recommended that I try the coleslaw and the mother of all corn dishes, 'Bob's Cob'. The coleslaw was sweet and delicious, but 'Bob's Cob' was an epiphany. Essentially they take a whole ear of corn, batter it, deep fry it (they call it broasting, but lets be real, this shit was deeeeep fried), and then serve it with maple syrup. Bam - Mouth Orgasm! Juicy, Crispy, and Sweet -- unlike anything Ive ever heard of or tasted before. The Chef's inspiration: His mother's corn fritters, which he couldn't replicate at work, so this was his solution for a fritter fix -- Genius...

After a meal like that, I needed to walk off some of the excess calories, so I headed downtown to see what was going down. The answer in short, was, well, not a whole lot. It was drizzling, and overcast - sort of how I envisioned South Dakota. It was like a ghost town, with the only person I saw being a policewoman on a Segway zipping around writing parking tickets. I popped into the Courthouse Museum, which is somewhat deceiving in its nomenclature: The museum is housed in a courthouse, with the contents being random at best ranging from 'The History of Corn' to 'Automotive Innovations'.... The contents were uninteresting, but I was able to get a couple good pics of the architecture, which was beautiful and ornate. I ended the afternoon with a quick stroll through Falls Park which houses the namesake for the city. Sioux Falls is more like a trickling stream, but the park was nicely maintained and seemed like it would be a nice place to congregate and throw a football around on a nice sunny day. Today, however, it was rainy, and about the time I got to the falls it started pouring which forced me into a mad dash for the car given that I had my Ipod, Computer, and Garmin in my shoulder bag -- Not wanting to damage said items I retreated.

10 Minutes later I arrived at my motel of choice - The glorious Budget Inn of Sioux Falls - Settled down with a cold beer, put my feet up, and found some silly movie on HBO.... A good day....

A.S. Bloom

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