Blogs from South Dakota, United States, North America - page 65

HELLO EVERYBODY, WE ARE STILL ON THE ROAD. TOMORROW WE ARE GOING TO BE REAL TOURIST. WE ARE GOING TO VISIT A FEW SITES AROUND THIS AREA. WILL TAKE SOME PICTURES AND TRY TO POST THEM. HOPE IT WORKS. WE HAVE BEEN RIDING ALL DAY . IT WAS INTERETING GOING THRU IOWA. WE COULD SEE FOR MILES. THERE ARE NO TREES. JUST FIELDS OF PLOWED GROUND. THERE ARE A FEW TREES AROUND THE HOUSES WHICH ARE FEW AND FAR BETWEEN. HOPE TO HAVE MORE TO TELL TOMORROW!!!! I'M SURE YOU DON'T WANT TO HEAR ABOUT THE BORING RIDE. HOPE THIS TRIP GETS MORE EXCITING!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! LOVE TO ALL, DWIGHT & BRENDA... read more

And now for the final installment of our Mother/Daughter Summer 2006 Trip. If you ever want to see the July 4th firework show at Mount Rushmore you must be willing to spend a long time waiting. While we were waiting we enjoyed listening to several wonderful music groups. One of our favorites was a Native American Band named Brulee. We also spent time enjoying the museum and film about the building of Mount Rushmore. We arrived at 9 am and left the park around midnight.The fireworks were spectacular, really worth the wait...it was the highlight of our whole trip!! The next day we visited Bear Country USA, a drive-thru wildlife sanctuary. There were many animals native to the area including wolves, buffalo, elk and of course lots of bear. After driving through the park we enjoyed ... read more

Once again unfortunately we do not have any pictures of the badlands.... sorry. Although we did not spend much time in the park due to a rain and wind storm the park was extremely different than any other park we have seen to date. Although the colors of the Badlands were comparable to the Petrified forest (see previous blog) the landscape was much different. They remind me of drip sand castles you make at the beach tinted with hues of red, orange and pink. We also made a stop at the Corn Palace in South Dakota. The Palace is decorated each year with different pieces of artwork all made from corn. At that point we decided we were through with the midwest and needed some civilization. We therefore headed to Chicago. We spent the night in ... read more

. Did you know that KOA camp grounds have Wi Fi?... No? We didn’t either… But as of writing this we are sitting in the back of the truck connecting to the WWW from a camp ground next to the White River near Bandlands National park in South Dakota, aka the middle of nowhere!! Statistics Starting Destination: Keystone, South Dakota Ending Destination: East of Interior, South Dakota Ending Destination GPS: N: 43° 41.566’ W:101° 56.174’ Elev. 2335’ Miles Driven: 126 Number of Bike Miles: 17.78 Big Heads, in more way than one… Today we got up and went directly to Mount Rushmore… I guess from one perspective it was impressive and awe inspiring—the sheer immensity of the task, the size of the “heads,” the construction obstacles that needed to be overcome... read more

Day 27 - August 31, 2006 You never know when you might have an interesting experience, and this morning it was in the bathroom/shower facilities at Rafter J. Scott’s was first. He was already in the shower, when two teenage boys came in to clean the facility. They either didn’t notice that Scott was there or didn’t care. They proceeded to start the job. Then they plugged in their boombox. Scott has never heard Def Jam (or whoever the heck it was) played so loud. One was asking the other: “So what do we do?” When Krysten and I ran into the bathroom, we were greeted by country music and two cheerful teenage boys. They had just connected a hose under the first sink, apparently to spray everything. One little problem though, the hose had not ... read more