We stop to get gas about and hour after the start. We pull into the Exxon and from the people mulling about I become a bit concerned but try to ignore it. I fill up with Court and Abby go in to go to the bathroom. After I finish filling up, I moved the van to the side of the building and hid everything of value before telling Gideon he needed to come in to attempt to pee. On our way in there is an obvious drug deal going on in the breezeway which was great. I rush Gideon past and we get to the bathroom and there's a sign on it that it's closed for cleaning. Crap. Well, not crap but that's okay because this was just a just in case kind of stop. We head back out and the worker cleaning the bathroom came out and informed us that the issue was that the toilet was clogged but the floor is clean and we could use the urinal if we needed. Gideon passed but I figured I would try. We get some drinks and snacks and get on the road as quick as possible. While on the road Court informs me that there was a woman in the women's room shooting up.
We have only one stop today and two original alignments before our stop for the night. The first original alignment that we reach is a dirt road and at first is decent but becomes a pretty rough dirt road pretty quick so we bail on it and return to the normal route. This works out because we needed to head back anyway to visit the stop that I wanted to see today which was Sleeping Buffalo Rock. It was supposedly a sacred rock for the Native Americans in the area and I was hoping to see something nice. As we approach we see a car on jacks missing a tire right next to the little covered shack that the rock is in. When the rocks come into view there is a prairie dog sitting on top of it and it's so still it's hard to tell if it's dead or just up there. It is indeed alive and it bails when it realized that we were getting out. Immediately you can see the trash all around the rocks and there is a strong smell of urine. The view wasn't at all nice because of the litter and other environment issues around it. It's honestly very sad.
Around lunch time we attempt to find a place to have lunch but can only come up with McDonalds. It's the first one of the trip so at least we are doing good in that respect. The forget my quarter pounder, the lobby is closed and the line for the drive through again is terrible so we just make do. We keep cruising along without much else happening except another stop at a bathroom in a rest area. There are some Munzees here that I grab while we are stopped and we keep on moving. As we pull into Shelby where we are staying for the night we are not impressed with our eating options again. Most of them are official bars it looks like and the ones that aren't are a bit concerning from the outside at least. We opt for Pizza Hut and use most of the free time to work on blogs and website stuff. After a bit of working on the blogs and such and letting out stomachs settle from dinner, we take the opportunity to go swimming again since that's Gideon's addiction. The pool water is deceptive. As you step in your first thought is that it's a comfortable temperature but as you take the steps down you start to realize that it's just the top layer of water that's warm. The under layers are cold, very cold. Again, as was last time, Abigail spent the time mostly trying to drown Gideon and Gideon spent the time instigating the assault. Court and I can only take the cold for so long before we back out of the pool and let the kids play for a bit longer before we pull them out to head to bed.