South Dakota IS fun!

The next day I found myself actually in awe in South Dakota. Who would've known. Well, I'm sure lots of people knew of South Dakota's beauty, but not me. We made it to the South-Western corner of SD were we went into the Badlands. AWESOME!

On our way to the Badlands, across the state it was so windy it was rocking the car all over the freeway. We stopped one time at an overlook and our jackets were flying off. Wasn't really a good day for the gas mileage but it was still really cool.


Along the way there were so many tourist stops, but none were open. We followed signs once to a "Ghost Town" and it turned out to be really just that. There was not a soul there, I can't really convey how quiet and strange it felt there.



Once we reached the Badlands it was time for a break from driving. And man, the badlands were so impressive! They made us both stand in awe overlooking the first point. We were both so excited about them we stopped at each turn out, took lots of pictures and felt like little kids excited about the new discovery. Tim was really in heaven, he was so happy it was cute.

Standing out on ledges taking pictures, walking out on the rocks, looking at fossils, listening to prairie dogs talk, and getting cold in the high, whipping winds. It was so cool and really made me get excited to get back home to go hiking and exploring! As I drove through Tim took so many pictures that we laughed he would fill my whole card up with pictures of rocks!


After hours spent in the badlands we decided that we headed to Wall, SD. People told us that is was really cheezy but we were so close we couldn't not stop at Wall Drug! We walked through, took some pictures, bought some cheezy gifts, and had a good time. But, yes, it was pretty cheezy. Word to the wise, don't ever go to the restaurant across the street, it was awful!



Next we drove out to Mount Rushmore, figuring we would just drive there and stay somewhere near there that night. As we pulled into the town of Keystone it was just dusk, got to the monument and it was dark. But we were there and decided to go anyway. We ran in the freezing cold to the lookout point just as they turned the lights on, it was us and just two other people. Freezing we took the picture and raced back to the warmth of the car!

Driving down the hill and back into the town we realize that nothing is open! The town is in the off season and there isn't one place to stay! So, we decide to push on to Deadwood... It was just another 20 miles away.

Once we reached Deadwood we hit snow! Yeah, the first snow of the trip!! It was so pretty. We quickly found a hotel so that we could get out of the car and see the snow. Ending up at a pretty cool casino, Deadwood was so cool. It was just what I always expected it to be, felt like an old time town. That night we ended up in a pretty old building on the top floor in a little restaurant. It felt so nice to relax and eat food, after the night before of gas station food!

Able to just stumble back to the hotel room we decided to have a couple bottles of wine, walk the streets of Deadwood and enjoy the snow. It felt good to just slow down. All this after just weeks prior working myself to the bone. It was becoming apparent to me I was returning to my old self... Finally.

Back at the hotel we went down to the pool and hot tub and just swam around like little kids. Fun. :)

The World's Largest Ball of Twine!! Oh yeah!

So the next day we found ourselves driving right through the town in Minnesota with the WORLDS LARGEST BALL OF TWINE! Yeah! Glad I can finally now knock that one of my list of things to see in my life. It really is just what you would think, it's a giant ball of twine. Enclosed in a glass cased gazebo of course to protect it from the harsh Minnesota elements.

From there we went to eat breakfast at "The Home of Stuffed Hashbrowns". What the heck? Yeah, exactly what I said, I had to see what this was all about. I love the fact that we weren't in a hurry on this trip and could stop and see random stuff like this and the ball-o-twine. It's really more fun traveling across country this way.
The report on the hashbrowns... Well they weren't really all they were cracked up to be. They were actually pretty bad. As soon as the plate was set in front of me and I saw the canned mushrooms peaking out from between the layers of potatoes I knew I was in trouble. During lunch I just sat and stared in jealousy at Tim's chicken fingers.

The rest of the day was spent trying to get to a town, any town in South Dakota. Since we had started our day off the interstates we were going to stay off them, thought we could see more that way. Well, there's not too much to see in middle South Dakota. The only excitement of the night was driving to try to get to the next town to find a hotel and a deer in the middle of the road that we almost hit at 80mph. Tim used his wonderful defensive driving skills to help us avoid hitting the deer. ;)

Later, I was so shook up by the almost flip that Tim kept thinking I was mad at him. Really I was just so freaked out that we almost flipped and very thankful that he reacted the way he did, saving us from near disaster.

Shaking we made it to the next town and there in the middle of nowhere, the three hotels in town were booked. What? We were in the middle of BFE and there was NO VACANCY?! Well, turns out there was some kind of hunting competition going on. Oh boy. The next nearest town was 45 miles away.

Finally we found a little hole in the wall, crappy, little hunter's lodge hotel. Now, food. Yeah, we drove through town and were frightened to go into any of the places so we ended up at the gas station... Yup, sour patch kids, chex mix and beef jerky for dinner!