Why don't you purify yourself in the waters of Lake Minnetonka?

Good question Prince. And so it was on to the Land of 10,000 Lakes, Minnesota, State No. 44 on this journey. I should mention that I spent a good bit of time in Madison this afternoon, mostly walking State Street and taking pictures of the Capitol. I also had to make a stop at Camp Randall (again with the football) before heading west.

I put my driving shoes on today and made great time from Madison to Minneapolis without really speeding to speak of (I rarely if ever speed much on the highway). Wisconsin is the first state since Tennessee to have any real scenic land to drive across, and the rolling plains dotted with dairy farms were very cool. One interesting landmark on the way was a place called Wisconsin Dells, which can best be described as Myrtle Beach on steroids. It was the ultimate in touristy kitsch, as evidenced by the vast number of amusement parks and other such silliness. Case in point, this Trojan Horse at the entrance to the Mt. Olympus park.

Upon arriving in Minneapolis, I parked near the Mississippi River at a place called Saint Anthony Falls. This is almost the extreme north end of the river and once featured the only waterfall on the Upper Mississippi. The falls have since been covered by a concrete apron and dams installed. Here's the view from just down river on the St. Anthony Falls Heritage Trail.

I finished the walk around the trail, had a quick dinner of fish and chips at Tuggs before heading to my home base for the night at Casey's friend Anne's house. Special thanks to Anne for the fine (and free) accommodations.

Tomorrow we start to get serious. Mall of America, lunch, then on to North Dakota.

Oh, and I know it's been the weekend and all, but don't you love me? No comments? I'm not blogging for my health here.

Tune in next time for "Hail to the victors" or "Cheer, cheer for old Notre Dame"

It's been over a thousand miles and I'm titling posts with homages to Rocky and Bullwinkle...let's just say that I shouldn't have this much time alone with my thoughts. Anyway, today I wrapped up my impromptu college football pilgrimage today with visits to Michigan and Notre Dame.

First up was Michigan Stadium in Ann Arbor, the Big House.

It was raining, and the field was covered in preparation for graduation, but it was pretty awesome. It wasn't nearly as big vertically as I'd imagined a 100,000+ capacity stadium would be, but it wasn't hard to picture that many people in there. It was built in 1927 and felt like it could have looked exactly like it did today way back then. Very cool.

After a cheese steak at Mr. Spot's for lunch, it was off to South Bend. The toll road that runs east to west across northern Indiana (I-80 and I-90, cleverly-named the Indiana Toll Road) was closed due to an accident this morning, so I was forced onto US 20 from Angola into South Bend. It was extremely slow going with all the normal Toll Road traffic on the mostly two-lane road, but I did get to drive through some Amish country around Lagrange. You know you're going slow when you get passed by a horse-drawn buggy. But I digress...

I got an in-depth Notre Dame athletic facility tour from fellow women's hoops SID Chris, highlighted by the ridiculously-nice new football building which features hands down the nicest weight room I have ever seen. Carolina's football weight room is nice, but this place blows it out of the water. I was unable to actually enter Notre Dame Stadium due to construction (glad to know it's not just Chapel Hill), so I decided to walk around campus a bit.

After taking the requisite picture of Touchdown Jesus, I ventured toward the center of campus. With all due respect to Carolina (and UVa for that matter), I can't imagine a place looking more collegiate than Notre Dame. A very intimate, walkable campus with just the right combination of really old buildings and well-landscaped nature. And in the middle of it all, the famed Main Building, which you may recognize...

I made a quick pit stop at the bookstore for my first T-shirt of the trip before heading west toward Lake Michigan. It was still kind of rainy (and newly-foggy) as I got closer to Chicago, so I decided to call it a night in Portage, Ind., before driving into the city tomorrow. There is some clearing in the forecast, so hopefully I can spend most of the day walking around Chicago.

With that, good night from the Central Time Zone. Here's hoping this is the dumbest thing I do on the trip. (What can I say, I couldn't let my dad be the only one to lose money tonight).