Illinois

On our way home from visiting Ingrid, we took a drive through Illinois. We decided to get off the main highway and take some state routes through some of the small towns. And we went off some of the state routes and drove around on the country roads through field after field with almost no houses. We saw one pig farm and one dairy farm. Other than that we saw thousands and thousands of acres of corn land.

We stopped at the Caterpillar museum in Peoria, Il. That is Aubrey next to a tire of the largest dump truck in the world. Which is used mostly in mining oil sands. It is so big they actually has a movie theater inside the dump bucket and it is the start of the tour.

For some reason, Aubrey was especially excited about the excavator and wanted me to scoop her up.

And then kept shouting things like I want to drive the excavator!

There is Martin and Aubrey in front of the giant dump truck.

And then we stopped at a HUGE auction lot. Both Martin and Aubrey had way too much fun sitting in combines and tractors. I don't know what excited Martin more - the fact that we were on the huge auction lot or Aubrey's intense excitement over farm equipment.

There was enough open space on the lot that Martin let Aubrey have full control of the wheel. She was a scarily good driver, doing hand over hand to turn the wheel and everything!

By the time we left the auction lot it was close to eight and Aubrey promptly fell asleep in the backseat. So we drove through the night and arrived in our driveway just as Aubrey was waking up.