The Dakotas
We left Grasslands and headed south, scooting through the northwest corner of Montana in order to get to North Dakota for the night. Our destination on this day was Theodore Roosevelt Park, which is a national park. As you may recall, I have lost my lifetime park pass, and so needed to replace it (at a cost of $80.00 US!!!!). We wanted to check out this park and spend the night either in the camp ground within it or at another nearby. So, we didn’t spend a whole lot of time in Montana, we just passed through. However, we did stop at a little town to pick up something for dinner and more ice (always more ice!). Here, some young men were taking a break from their very hot job with a paving company. They asked us about hunting in Canada and if we had any moose. It was an interesting encounter. They were very nice, but so unaware of anything beyond their border, even though Canada is not so very far away from where we were at that moment. However, as I said, they were nice and wished us a safe journey as we headed off to North Dakota.
When we finally arrived at the park, we had become aware of the beautiful lands around this park. It is obvious why this is a national park – so beautiful! Using my passport (I’m a dual citizen) I was able to obtain a new park pass and we drove on into the park, first stopping at the ranger station to find out if the campground was full. The indicated that it was not, but that the loop road around the interior of the park was closed at one point due to a slide. This meant that if we wanted to drive through the park we would have to drive all the way out and then come back the way we had come. There is a Bison herd here, so we had been keen to drive the loop. We would have to decide if we wanted to add more time to our already long day. But first, to the campground. We drove up and around, noting the narrow roads and steep curing hills – not a great place to cycle with all of the rv’s that come through here! About 5 km in, we came to the campground, which of course, was full. It had been full for quite some time, but I guess no one had gotten around to telling the ranger station this news. Drat! Oh well, we decided that we would do part of the drive before heading back down to our alternate camping spot for this night.
The hills here are badlands, like the ones we had seen in Alberta, but with the addition of the deep reds that one associates with these formations. We learned in the ranger station that the red tones come from the iron oxide deposits in the solid here. It sure makes for some breathtaking scenery! We were sad we couldn’t spent the night here as it would have been wonderful to go for a short hike into the hills. As it was, we satisfied ourselves with our short drive in.
On our way out, we saw a group of people stopped, which always means some sort of wildlife. Grabbing the camera, we stopped as well and came upon a herd of wild horses! How wonderful to see these beautiful animals who roam free within the confines of the park.
We ended the day at Sully Creek State Park. The ranger there gave us a great little spot in the shade, which was nice as it was still pretty warm out. However, all that shade came with a price – you guessed it! Our constant nemesis, mosquitos!!! They were pretty thick in the trees, so we ended up eating in the van (thank goodness for the table we included in our set-up), and after a short walk we retired to watch a movie and listen to the crickets lull us to sleep.
In the morning it was a quick breakfast and back on the road for us. We were headed to the town of Lead, just south of Deadwood in South Dakota, where we had a hotel reservation for the night – what a treat!! The drive was uneventful and we drove through Deadwood, taking note of places we would like to visit the next day. Our plan was to enjoy a relaxing evening at the Town Hall Inn, a fantastic old building that was the original Town Hall in Lead. The high ceilings and interesting old architecture made this a particularly enjoyable stay. And, I have to say, it was nice to have a bathroom and shower right there, as well as a big, comfy bed! We enjoyed wandering around this little town before heading up to the Dakota Shivers Brewing company where we tasted some of their fine brews. On of my favourites was a dark beer with a coffee flavour – not my usual kind of beer, but it was quite tasty! We bought a half growler of their Blow Flower Wheat to have on another evening, and then went to a restaurant by the hotel for some dinner. This was also a big treat for us – not having to cook on our little stove! What a fun evening!
A good night’s rest left us ready to tackle the extreme touristy town of Deadwood. If you have watched the show or seen the movie, you will know all about the history of this town. We have done neither, but have heard a lot about it and so were curious to visit this place. First stop was the Mt. Moriah Cemetery, otherwise known as Boot Hill. This is where Wild Bill Hickok and Calamity Jane are buried. It was particularly interesting to read about these two famous characters from when the West was truly wild. In addition, there were other less famous but still interesting folks buried up here. And I do mean up – way way up!!! It was quite the drive to get to the cemetery and then quite the hike to get up to the top. At the very top is buried Seth Bullock. Apparently he was a good friend of Theodore Roosevelt’s and owned the land that the cemetery is on. His dying wish had been to be buried at the very top of the hill where he could look over and see the Mount Roosevelt Friendship Tower that had been erected in honour of his friend, Teddy Roosevelt, who had been a deputy sheriff in the nearby town of Medora when Bullock was the sheriff of Deadwood. Today, of course, trees have grown up so that the tower is no longer visible from Seth’s burial site, but its still worth the climb to see where this memorable character is buried.
Once done with the cemetery, we drove into town and spent some time wandering the streets. Of course, the place everyone comes to see is where Wild Bill Hickok was gunned down. If you are a real aficionado of all things western, you would want to stay in town and enjoy some of the reenactment that happen here daily. However, as we are not, we just enjoyed wandering and looking, thinking that sometime in the future we will finally watch the series and at least be able to appreciate that we had walked where all this history happened.
Our day in Deadwood done, we headed down the road a ways to the town of Hillside. Here would be our stopping spot for a couple of nights as we rode parts of the Mickelson Trail, an old rail trail that runs from Deadwood to Custer. We were fortunate in meeting Dale, who owns a lot just across from the trailhead and very kindly allowed us to park overnight for the time we were there. If you are interested in the cycling part of this, you can check it out at https://www.cycleblaze.com/journals/cherrypicking/the-mickelson-trail-south-dakota/
During our time at Hillside, we managed to also get over to two monuments in the area, Crazy Horse and Mount Rushmore, both of them very interesting and different from each other in many ways. At Crazy Horse, you have to pay to get in ($24.00 for the two of us) and then pay again ($8.00 each) to take a bus tour closer to the monument. Seems kind of pricey, compared the the free entry to Rushmore (other than $5.00 for parking), but wait. The Crazy Horse monument is being built with private money only. It was begun way back in 1948 as a tribute to the Lakota people who lived on these lands. They wanted the world to know that there were heroes in the First People’s of this land. The sculptor, Korczak Ziolkowski, a Polish immigrant who had worked on Mount Rushmore, took this project to heart. He worked on it for the rest of his life and his children are working on it today. All of this makes for quite a remarkable story and makes the building of this monument something very special. Although not finished, we found it quite impressive (even though we did not pay the extra money to go on the bus). The museum and views from the visitor’s centre area well worth the price of admission, when you understand that your contribution is going towards the completion of this massive project. And why, you may ask, has the American government not paid to complete this monument? Well, that would be because the people building it apparently don’t trust them to do it the way they want it done. Hmmm… I wonder why that would be???
Ok, enough opinions on my part. Before we went to Mount Rushmore, we needed to move the van. We had intended to go to a campground run by the Forest Service, but when we got there, we realized that the price was much more than the $15.00 we had understood it to be. This campground was right on the highway and so we didn’t feel that it was worth more than that, so we drove further towards Mount Rushmore itself, hoping to find a spot to park for the night. We pulled off at at trailhead, driving in and away from the noisy highway to a quiet location with a fantastic view of the mountains. Just as we pulled in, the rain, which had been threatening, came pouring down. There was one other vehicle in the parking lot and that was it. We hunkered down, using the time to do a little housekeeping in the van. Eventually the rain stopped and we were able to climb out and look around at the fantastic spot we had found. There were no signs indicating we couldn’t park overnight, so we settled in. The folks in the other vehicle took their two dogs and disappeared into the trees for what looked to be an overnight hike. So, we had this fantastic, beautiful, peaceful spot all to ourselves!! What a treat!!! Later in the evening, as we watched a movie, we could see lightening through the top of our blinds. There was a big storm blowing just far enough away from us that we could enjoy it without being in it. Later on, the stars came out in all their brilliance and we were in awe of what a special special place this was and how fortunate we were to be here.
Morning came and we enjoyed the quiet, making coffee and setting out our chairs so we could take our time, drinking our coffee and drinking in the view – wow! You know, after a while, there just aren’t words enough to express just how great something is. I wish I could share with you not only the sights but the smells and the sounds. It was just too perfect.
Soon enough it was time to pack up and head over the Mount Rushmore, which was only about 10 minutes away. It was a lovely clear and sunny day, perfect for checking out this historic monument. We pulled in to the parking lot and paid our $5.00 before heading up to the viewing platform. Here, we found out that there were some major renovations going on and we would have to head around past the sculptor’s studio to get some good views. We stopped to chat with a park ranger who told us where to go and explained some interesting history about this monument. Apparently, as building began, Thomas Jefferson was supposed to be on the other side of George Washington. As they worked on Jefferson however, they discovered a fault in the stone. If they had continued, it might have brought the entire mountain down, so it was decided to move him over to where he is now. And what did they do with the work that had started? Well, they just blasted it out of there! Ha! So, if you look closely, to the left of George Washington, you can see where the original Jefferson was blasted. I thought this was the most interesting thing and it made the whole adventure to get a closer look much more fun.
Just a note, in case you are interested. The stairway leading to the viewing platforms under the monument has a total of 259 steps. I counted them as we came down. That’s a lot of steps!!! But well worth it to get some very interesting views.
Our time at Rushmore came to a close and we headed off. We were on our way to Minnesota to visit our friends Doug and Pam and then to Ontario for a few weeks of the Jim Price Family and Friends Tour. Yep, Jim hails from Ontario and has a whole lotta folks that he needed to see. I won’t blog about this part of trip, but I would like to thank everyone for not only their generous hospitality, but their continued love and support as well. Unfortunately, we didn’t get pics of Suzanne, Tom and Ron when we saw them. Jim posted a great little video of his friend Gary’s place – make sure you check it out. It was a whirlwind visit for sure! Love you all!!!
