vacation in the black hills

badland bloopers outtakes and statistics

 I have a better post waiting in the wings but I figured I would just make a short list of some of our adventures from the last five days of our trip.

* You may not be able to tell from the picture above but we went to Mount Rushmore!

*  Look closely and you can see Thomas Jefferson behind us.

* Thomas Jefferson had the first ice cream recipe in America, so we ate nothing but ice cream for lunch that day (including T. J.'s famous recipe).

*  We stayed off the interstate and stuck to two lane highways all the way to the badlands.

*  At one point we were traveling down gravel roads for miles without a house in sight and miles of rolling hills and grasslands.

*  At Custer state park wildlife preserve we saw one lone Buffalo.

*  Every beautiful scenic drive we took; that was the exact time the girls chose to play with each other and not look out the window.

*  We witnessed three young men attempting to kick off the cliff they were sitting on in the badlands (no word on whether they survived).

*  Total miles travelled: 1400 (2250 kilometers) in 5 days.

*  We listened to the radio a little bit but most of the soundtrack of our trip was exclusively Neil Young.

*  We ate biscuits and gravy nearly every day (something we never eat).

*  Wall Drug was the low point of our trip until we hit the Corn Palace on our second to last day, (they should be embarrassed) it was bad.

*  Jewel cave has over 170 miles that have been mapped out (estimated to be less than 5 percent of the actual caves air mass).

*  We spent an hour and a half walking through less than 1% of 5% of the cave (and it was huge!!)

*  We played trivia most of the car ride, we are all very well versed in American history.

little car on the prairie

 On Thursday we ventured out on our first epic road trip. Our destination is the Black Hills of South Dakota.   

 Our first night we spent at an 1880's homestead without electricity or running water....

 which was the perfect start as we are stepped back in time, living like Laura Ingalls Wilder.. 

It was a great first night in the heart of the Badlands but our homestead was a bit low on the riverside which made things a bit buggy with mosquitos and horseflies but we had a cool evening, good sleeping weather.

Before bed we spent our time reading books and perusing through the Sears & Roebuck catalog of 1902.

 Such a perfect evening!...and the family we stayed with even had some burro's!

Our entire trek across two states took us through Walnut Grove and De Smet  along old highway 14 where Laura Ingalls lived. The museum in Walnut Grove was great but by the time we got to De Smet we were rather rode wiry and ready to be settled so we just stopped for a picnic lunch and skipped the one hour tour.