Dear Diary,

It’s me again!

Last month I went to Tombstone, AZ. There was a road closed off to vehicles. There were stagecoaches though, and they were allowed on the road. The road was dust, and the sidewalk planks. There were beautiful horses. Walking down this road, I felt like a real live Cowgirl! There were sounds of talking, and the occasional whinny of a horse. I got of a picture with John Wayne (a cardboard statue), went panning for “gold,” got an old-fashioned sepia photo, and bought the coolest pen at the Tombstone Epitaph. My favorite thing I did was panning for “gold.” My favorite thing at Boothill cemetery was the mist room. It was cool inside, but hot outside. The Tombstone motto is, ‘THE TOWN TOO TOUGH TO DIE.’ Back in the 1880’s, Marshal Wyatt Earp won a shootout in less than one minute! where the OK corral is, now.

Tombstone sure is a great place!

Dear Diary, I've just read a very exciting book! It is called The Twenty-One Balloons, by William Pene du Bois. It is about a man named Professor William Waterman Sherman. He wants to spend a year in a balloon. But when he comes back, he has been around the world in only 40 days. He will tell the story only to the Western American Explorer's Club in San Francisco, of which he is a member. As he tells it there, he unravels the trip of his life!

The story takes place on the Island of Krakatoa, where most exciting things happen. Even though the explosion really happened, and blew up half of Krakatoa and made a noise that went up to 3,000 miles away, this book is fiction.

The part that makes this story most exciting is my favorite part, too.

The BIG explosion. On "D Day" in the Month of Lamb, Professor Sherman sat telling stories about San Fransisco. The island usually rumbled, but the Professor noticed it was shaking violently... too violently. A huge crack appeared in the wall. All of the families rushed to a life saving balloon raft.

To find out what happens, try reading The Twenty-One Balloons.