Bow Tie Tour

Ethan’s Side… Pictures and BOLD by Eric:

I drifted out of sleep to the unholy sights and sounds of falling rain. From my vantage point in bed I could see the window and the parking lot through the dripping wetness. I thought to myself, “what in the world do you think you are doing?” The first day into the trip and I already felt like turning back. But I was scheduled to speak that afternoon at the Homeschool alumni reunion in Mt. Vernon Missouri, so we got up, packed and ate a bad excuse for a breakfast, put on rain gear and headed out. Once on the road and dry under layers of plastic it wasn’t so bad.

We rode for several hours in the rain and as the rain broke I saw a sign for the historic homestead of Laura Ingles Wilder, the place where she wrote the little house on the prairie books. Being the good homeschool graduate that I am we got off at the exit, drove through a very small and quaint town to the famous homestead. We parked our bikes, de-geared and walked up to the historic home, it was a plain white cottage but now at least I can say I was there

The home itself:

A random bench in sepia tones:

As we walked down to the bikes I spotted this sign and had a little laugh thinking that we were definitely the “Fastest” traffic in this sleepy little town:

We got back on our bikes and rode the rest of the way to Mt. Vernon arriving at 1pm in time to meet with several other HSA people at Taco Bell. There we ran into Tom, an HSA and Harley rider. We rode up into the small Missouri Mountains to the Camp. It was a fun ride through beautiful countryside to a neat little camp nestled among the hills.

We arrived, unpacked and I prepared for my talk at 4:40. I gave my talk, “Coonskin Cap to College Grad” Homeschooling, how I survived and how I became a lifelong learner. The talk chronicles growing up as a homeschooler, the transition to college then “real life” with lessons I learned along the way. After the evening session we went to dinner, which was surpassingly good for camp food The rest of the evening involved hanging out, good conversations and frivolous ones as well Everything from, finding your purpose in life, to the question, “if a naked man is walking in the forest and a tree falls on him causing a female squirrel to stumble, is it a sin?” Yeah it was late and we were tired

Ethan Speaking at the HSA Reunion:

Campfire Time:

That’s all for today folks, we’ll be catching you all up with us, from both sides over the next couple of days… We’re about to roll out for Wyoming in just a few minutes.