We're Rollin' Now Baby...

If I had the time (and a decent internet connection), I could probably write a 100 pages about our travels today. Today was simply amazing, start to finish. We got lost once, but even that turned out to be a wonderful side trip.

Everyone slept well last night at the Hampton. After our "hot" night at the Holiday Inn in St. Louis, we went to bed with the air set a little too low, perhaps. I rolled over at one point and thought I saw it snowing in our room, but perhaps it was a dream... We've been rotating who sleeps with whom every night. One night I get Trey, one night Taylor, and last night I actually got to sleep with Steph. Steph and I assumed we would sleep well without the kids rolling over and punching us in the night. Didn't really work out that way - the kids ended up bumping into each other all night, and Steph was up several times to referee them. We slept a little later than planned, but managed to get it all packed up and back on the road by 8:30am or so.

We headed West on I-90 from Sioux Falls, and shortly outside of town we passed some fellow Mississippians from Madison County driving a large RV and towing a Jeep. We waved as we passed to spread some hometown hospitality. As we drove by, I swear I saw someone feeding $20 bills into the dash to keep that monster moving... Perhaps we'll run into them somewhere in our travels.

Mid-morning we hit Mitchell, SD home of the world famous Corn Palace. The Corn Palace is well, the Corn Palace. It's a neat stop, but I wouldn't plan a trip to SD just to visit the Corn Palace. There was a bit more excitement than usual - Omaba was to speak at a rally there around 3pm today, since the SD primary is on Tuesday. Steph and I hope we can find time to register to vote in SD so we can get our votes cast for Hillary on Tuesday...

After the Corn Palace, we kept pressing through SD at a rapid pace thanks to the 75 MPH speed limit. We stopped for a picnic lunch along the banks of the Missouri River, and then crossed the Missouri again (seems like the 20th time) as we made our way to the Badlands. We stopped about 20 miles east of the Badlands and gassed up ($4.07 gal - UGH). We crossed into the Mountain time zone and cruised on into the Badlands early afternoon.

We took a ton of pictures in the Badlands, but none of them do the place justice. I hope the videos we shot will, but I doubt it. We did some short hikes, and continued our way to the visitor center. After leaving the visitor center, there was a thunderstorm moving through the park. Mostly at a distance, but we did get a little wet. The Badlands are a pretty ominous place, but when you add lots of wind, dark storm clouds and lightning, you get the whole effect. It was a truly amazing experience.

We had some of our first wildlife sightings in the Badlands - several mountain goats (I think) and more prairie dogs than we could count.

We left the Badlands and made the obligatory stop in Wall at Wall Drug around 5:30pm or so. Everyone enjoyed ice cream and ice water and a stretch of the legs.

We moved on across Western South Dakota on our way to Custer State Park. The GPS went nuts, and out map skills weren't quite what they though we were, so we ended up taking the long way to Custer State Park (the REALLY long way). We would our way to and through Keystone, near Mount Rushmore, and caught our first glimpse of the Mt. Rushmore Monument. It was truly striking. After creeping through lots of twisty roads, switchbacks and narrow one lane tunnels, we finally found our way into Custer State Park. The deer were out in full force - we had seen about 20 when I stopped counted. We also came upon a large turkey taking his time to cross the road. We snapped pics of him as he took his time meandering up the hill next to the road. He could have cared less that we were there...

The landscape around Custer State Park is beautiful. Lots of granite outcroppings that we can't wait to go back and explore. The elevation is about 5,000 feet here, so most of the deciduous trees (hope that's the right word...) have just started to flower and send out new leaves. We arrived at Sylvan Lake Lodge at Custer State Park around 8pm MST tonight. We found our way to our cabin, which is truly picture perfect - log walls on the exterior, lots of granite stonework, a large stone porch, and a real stone fireplace to boot. I'm sitting on the front porch now enjoying a cold beer as I type. It's amazing how cheap beer always tastes so much better with great scenery. This is what it's all about. It's also much colder here - about 50 degrees now - crisp but really pleasant with a jacket.

My internet connection is slow at best, so I doubt the 100+ pics we took today will make it into cyberspace tonight. I'll get those up when we wander back into civilization.

Goodnight from the Grays.