New Home

We made it! Mom, Dad and I made it to Champaign-Urbana on Friday afternoon. It's about an eight hundred mile journey from Fargo to this spot in East Central Illinois. I'm living in an apartment, smack dab in the middle of a bunch of Greek houses, just outside of the University of Illinois campus. It's pretty exciting.

U of I, like NSDU, graduated their seniors yesterday. As U of I has about 40,000 students, it was a pretty big deal. Ironically, Mom wore an orange shirt, while Dad wore a dark blue shirt and together they represented the Fighting Illini well... Especially fitting for graduation day.

After I got my Champaign Public Library card (awesome, yes) I drove some of the backroads south and west of town. I ended up making it to Decatur, Illinois and headed back to be in bed before 10:30. The farmland here is incredible... I was told that, on average, land still goes for about $12,500 an acre. I look forward to seeing how productive this soil really is throughout the summer.

While driving to Decatur I looked at the alternating fields of corn and soybeans. Corn seems to be the majority, with soybeans planted where corn isn't. I passed probably two winter wheat fields, which, compared to winter wheat fields back home, look incredible and are ready to head soon.

The soybeans are at unifoliate stage and corn is anywhere from V2 - V3.

Corn at about V3

Tomorrow morning I'm flying out to Raleigh, North Carolina for training at BASF headquarters. Onto the next adventure!