South Dakota 2007 days 8 and 9

Saturday, June 16: Bill and I woke up at 6:00 on the nose to the alarm on his watch. Saturday morning brought with it mixed feelings. We were excited to be seeing The Badlands National Park, but kind of sad that this was the end of our trip. Despite the nightmare with the truck repairs, we had an awesome time going to all the places we did and hanging out together all week. I was leary about camping for so long, but (and I can't believe I'm about to say this) I really enjoyed it.

Anyway, Friday night we had packed up everything. I had laid out everyone's clothes (well, Bill laid out his own - LOL!) so that just pajamas had to be thrown into clothes bins in the morning. We got the kids up and hustled them into the truck so we could start loading our stuff into the camper and collapsing it. The morning was overcast and cold and it was drizzling while we were trying to load up. Eveything was wet, including the camper that we had to collapse onto itself. Yuck! We were loaded up and on the road by 6:59 - not bad! We were on Mountain Time, though, so we would be losing an hour on the drive.

Our first planned stop will be Wall Drug in Wall, SD. This just so happens to be where the entrance for the loop through Badlands National Park is, too, and is about an hour or so from our campsite. In case you didn't know, Wall Drug is advertised all over the place. We started seeing billboards for it in western Minnesota on the drive out. Bill and I were both advised by people we work with that we HAD to stop there. This picture shows only about a 1/4 of the store - it actually stretches the entire block it is on. Turns out, Wall Drugstore is a giant, block-long gift shop and cafe. We went into 5 sections - the gift shop, cafe (they have homemade, fresh doughnuts that are to die for!), the 'drug store', a t-shirt store, and a jewelry store. We only got about halfway through the place. We made sure to get a famous "Wall Drug" bumper sticker, though!

Take a look at the skies in the picture. It hadn't cleared up any and, in fact, was starting to look ominous. We headed for Badlands hoping to beat the rain. It was still cold - only about 60 degrees - and the winds had started to pick up..

To say The Badlands are beautiful would be an injustice. You really can't describe how breathtaking the place is. As you come upon it, it is the same rolling scenery you've been looking at for hours and then WHAM! there it is. We learned that the French and the Native American's words to describe this area both translated to "Bad Land". Can you imagine being a pioneer, you're forging through the prairies and then you come upon this place:
The pictures don't do it justice. The lightinsg is awful and the colors are all washed out. You can see how small the people are, though, and how big the rocks are. Here's another shot so you can see the striping in the formations. I guess the whole place was the bottom of an ocean in prehistoric times, which is why the rocks are striped like they are. Because of the weather, we kind of got gypped on the scenery. I guess in the sunlight the colors are unbelievable. We were able to see vivid colors in a place called The Yellow Mounds. Trust me, in person they are even more awesome.

(if you click on the pictures they will open in another window and you can see them enlarged. This is true of all the pictures I've uploaded from the trip).

The drive through the park took about 45 minutes. We knew we had 11 hours to get to LaCrosse that night so we didn't take our time and stop at all the scenic overlooks. Aside from the time, it was starting to thunder and you could see the storms in the distance as they were closing in:


It would have been nice to be able to spend a day there are really explore it. I don't think either of us regret only taking the scenic drive through it though. We both knew that this was probably a once in a lifetime trip to this area so we were going to see it one way or another. And once you've seen one striped rock you've seen them all, right? ;)

The next 10 hours were spent getting to our campground in West Salem, Wisconsin. We were able to book a site at the campground we stayed at the summer before on our annual Family Camping Trip. It was a little after 8:00 pm when we arrived and it was hotter than hell. We drove through storms in South Dakota and Minnesota, but the front hadn't gotten as far east as Wisconsin yet. The humidity was just like it always is in the midwest - stifling. Thank goodness we only had about an hour of daylight left and two fans for inside the camper. We did what any road warriors would do after 12 hours in the car and ordered pizzas for dinner. I need to mention, too, that Billy was beyond pissed that we were camping AGAIN. All week he was obsessed with seeing the movie Surf's Up (which opens on June 8th, as he so throroughly reminded us) and we told him that on Saturday we were going home and then we would see it after we got home. He didn't realize that we wouldn't GET home until Sunday, though. He was being ornery - arguing about everything (I'm going to SLEEP IN THE TRUCK!! I HATE CAMPING AGAIN!!). Bill took Alex and Caty to the pool while Billy and I waited for the pizza to arrive. We made a really small campfire and called it a night fairly early. South Dakota was over 600 miles behind us, now, and we were eager to get home.

Sunday, June 17: Happy Birthday, Caty! Happy Father's Day, Bill! As eager as we were to get home, we were in no rush to pack up and get out of there. We'd studied the map and knew we only had about 4 hours in the truck this day. We freshened up, broke camp, and started out to find a place to eat. We found a little cafe connected to a gas station at the entrance for the Interstate. It was classic small town - the menu kind of reminded me of the cafe in My Cousin Vinny where they ate grits for the first time (the menu in the movie had three choices on it: Breakfast, Lunch, or Dinner). The menu at this place had eggs, pancakes, or frenchtoast - LOL! We fueled our bodies and fueled the truck and I took the wheel for the drive home . Bill wanted to read Marley and Me on the drive. I think he was a bit put out that he'd started it and, when I finished my paperback, I hijacked it and finished it while we drove the day before (it's a great, light, entertaining book, by the way). We were on the road by 10:30 and pulled into our driveway at about 2:15 - not bad if I do say so myself!

This vacation is one that I think all of us will remember over our lifetimes. It was the first vacation we've taken where we didn't go visit other family members. It was just the six of us (don't forget about Sammy Boy!) for the entire week. We saw so many neat things and went to so many cool places and just had a great time. Even Sammy, who spent most of his days locked in our camper while we were our adventuring, was content (we agreed, later, that it was probably a mistake to bring him and he would have been much happier at Auntie Vicki's house or Grandma Gina's house) .
We're already planning our next trip for 2009 (we should have the truck repairs paid off by then!). Washington, DC, look out!

South Dakota 2007 Days 6 and 7

Thursday, June 14th: As luck would have it, Thursday was warmer than the previous two mornings had been. By the time we hit the road, around 10:00, it was already up in the mid 70s. Of course, our first stop of the morning was the payphone in Keystone to make our daily call into Ford. The phone call to Ford was not good. To say Bill was fuming when he got back into the car would be an understatement. Apparently there was some sort of mess up when the parts had been ordered the day before and they didn't come in. The truck wouldn't be done until Friday. Unbeknownst until now to the Ford people, we were supposed to leave on Friday morning. This news warranted a visit to our (now) good friend Eric at McKie Ford in Rapid City. The rental car was costing us $75 per day, and that was at a discounted rate because the lady at Enterprise took pity on me when she found out we were on vacation. On top of the cost of the truck repairs (that weren't under warranty) we were also looking at a minimum of $300 for the rental car. Most of the 20 minute ride to Ford was in silence. We finally agreed that we were going to ask that Ford pick up the cost of the rental car. The screw up was on them and it was going to cost us 2 extra days with the rental if we didn't return it by noon that day. We get to Ford and Bill seeks out Eric and the mechanic working on our truck. He wants to see the damage they are telling us we have and find out why they didn't know all of this yesterday when they supposedly had "everything taken apart". After the talk with the mechanic, we are out ANOTHER $600 as he shows Bill just how fried our rear brakes are - the ones Eric told us we would be able to get home on. All in all, the reapairs are going to run $1800. Ford agreed to pay for our rental car, so there was a bit of a relief. We had no other choice but to suck it up and take the hit on the repairs.

That taken care of, we head for the waterpark. We got there around 11:00 and it was a beautiful day. The temps were near 80 that day and it was breezy. The park wasn't crowded and there was no wait on the slides. Everyone gets changed and I stop in the little shop to buy some suncreen. Bill takes the kids down a slide while I am in the store. We meet up, towel off, spray on sun protection, and head for the slides. I guess Caty didn't like her ride down with Bill, but I took her up anyway and told her she could ride down with me. She was a nervous wreck the whole time, whimpering and "whooooooa"ing the whole way down. The slide was really tame and I held her up over my head when we hit the water so she wouldn't go under. Much to her dismay, I made her go down a 2nd time. This time we tried a different slide (there were 4 slides at that attraction). When I had gotten to the bottom the first time, the guard told me that I had to ride one of the first two slides if she was going to ride with me. So when we get to the top I ask the guard up there which slide is the most kid-friendly. She looks at me like I've sprouted a 2nd head and offers no suggestions. Okaaaaaaaaaaay........I pick slide number 1. Wrong choice. Slide number one has a big drop that increases your speed and sends you flying into a high banking curve. Upon landing after the drop, Caty flew out of my arms and we hit that curve out of control, on our backs. She is screaming and frantic after that. I managed to reel her in back to me and get her over my head before hitting the water. That was it for her, though. No more slides. The rest of the day Bill and I spent "babysitting" her in the 3' pool while the other one was on the slides with the boys. The park was really fun, despite not being able to ride the slides most of the day (I stayed with Caty for the most part). Billy tended to hang out in the pool with Caty and I and Alex and Bill did the slides. There was one slide that you rode in innertubes and another slide that was three really big, steep drops. That one was called The Bonzai and was the "speed slide". I rode all the slides with Alex over the course of the day As it turned out, my favorite slide was the one by the 3' pool where Caty was hanging out. It was just a wide, flat slide, but it was fun. After awhile the boys started doing stunts down them:
It doesn't look that stunt-like, but Bill actually ended up going in on his stomach, feet first. This picture was taken in the middle of a roll. We spent 6 hours at the waterpark that day. We were all waterlogged and (we thought) a bit sunburned.
Later that evening, we realized just how sunburned we had gotten. Even though we had been reapplying the sunscreen, everyone got pretty fried. Billy, unfortunately, got the worst of it. He ended up with 2nd degree burns on his shoulders that blistered and cracked and peeled and looked really nasty until yesterday. He was actually asking for lotion. If you know Billy, you know how much he despises lotion and the lengths he will go to to avoid having to put it on. The only thing I can think of as to why he got burned so much more badly than the rest of us was that he had eczema patches on his shoulders and back and maybe they didn't absorb the sunscreen. He was really hurting and Bill and I felt like dogs that he was so burned and in pain.

That night, we head into Hill City to pick up some more groceries and treat ourselves to grilled steaks and fried potatoes for dinner. It's a lazy night around the fire. I haven't mentioned it before, but the nights are very chilly. Temperatures routinely drop into the low 50s over night and since were in a non-climate controlled camper, we look a little goofy as we head into bed. Bill captured my efforts to read by firelight each night. I was so close to finishing that book! Anyway, the way you see Caty and I bundled up is the way we went to bed each night - flannel pants, hoodies, and socks. I'm sure we were a sight =)

Friday, June 15th: It's truck pick up day! YAY!!!! We get up and shower, have a quick breakfast, and take off for Mt Rushmore. We've been driving past it every day since we've been there and are finally going to park and go in and check out the features of the place (aside from the obvious one). It's a pretty cool place. We read about the history of Gutzon Borglum - the sculptor, and about how it is made and why he chose the presidents that he did. We watch a short film about the building process. Most of it was carved using dynamite. The museum has models and castings and different versions of the sculpture that Borglum had created and rejected. An interesting fact - Thomas Jefferson was originally supposed to be over Washington's right shoulder, but when they started blasting they found there wasn't enough hard granite available to make his head. They blew off what they had started and stuck him in over Washington's other shoulder instead, pushing Lincoln over to where he is now. All of the loose rock underneath is the stuff that was blasted off to make the sculpture. Another cool feature of the park is the flags. There are 13, four sided granite pillars with a state flag at the top of each side. At eye level is the name of the state, the number it was made part of the Union, and the date it was accepted into the Union.

As you can probably guess, the place we spent the most time in at Mt Rushmore was the gift shop. We loaded up on souveniers for our families and then called it a day. We started our now daily trip into Rapid City. We stopped in Keystone to call Ford and they told us it would be ready by 3:00. It was 12:30. We stopped for lunch at Ruby Tuesdays (a margarita has never tasted better, I tell ya!), drove to a dinosaur park off the beaten path (only Bill and Caty got out to look at it), and found a coffeehouse that offered free internet with a cup o' joe. We needed to find and book a campground for Saturday night. We sat down in the cafe with our map and tried to figure out a good place to stop for the night. We knew we were going to take the "Loop" through Badlands National Park and stop at Wall Drug on the drive home. We also knew that we wanted to break up the trip as we had on the way out - 10 or so hours the first day and 6 or so the next. We decide to stop in a small town just east of LaCrosse, Wisconsin - about an 11 hour drive if we don't stop. We book the campground and head to Ford. Miraculously, the truck is finished when we get there. We move all of our crap out the pick-up and back into the Expedition, pay, return the rental truck, and head back for our campground.

We just hang out at the site, starting to pack up what we can. We are bent and determined to get up at 7:00 the next morning and get out of there quickly. We get everything packed up, but it all gets stored in the camper while we are driving so loading up and hitting the road will have to wait until Saturday morning.

South Dakota 2007 Day 5

Wednesday, June 13th: Who knew you could get such a good night's sleep in a camper?? It seems when you are beyond exhausted you can sleep anywhere. Even Sammy-Boy slept well, as evidenced below:
Today we're putting our worries about the truck behind us. They told us yesterday it would be done today, so our plan is to head into Keystone, grab some breakfast, and do the President's Slides and Beautiful Rushmore Cave (I don't WANT to go to President's Slides and Beautiful Rushmore Cave! It's too SCARY! The Rushmore Cave has a Rushmore Lion that is going to EAT ME!! Mrs Rubeck told me! - Billy's reaction to hearing our plans for the day. They've become expected at this time and we've started thanking him for saying it - LOL!).

We shower, dress, and take off. We grab breakfast in a little diner and call Ford when we finish. The truck probably wont' be ready by noon like they told us it would be. Since our rental truck is billed every 24 hours and not by the day, if it isn't back by 12:30 we get charged another day. I tell the guy to finish it up and we'll pick it up the next morning. What he says to me next would prove to be the foreshadow for the rest of our week: "Well, call us this afternoon, then, in case we run into any more problems while we putting things back together". You see, he explained to me that everything was taken apart and that they were waiting for the parts to arrive so they could put it back together. This was, in fact, not true - at least not wholly.

Anyway, sounded good at the time so I hang up and off we go for more "Old West" gift shops and the President's Slide (Billy still doesn't want to go, in case you were wondering). The President's Slides are concrete "chutes" that you slide down on plastic, wheeled sleds. There is a handle in the middle that controls your speed. Caty has to ride with an adult so Bill and the boys will ride solo and I will ride with the little girl. To get to the top of the 2000 foot slide, you have to take a chair lift - just like the kind you take when you are skiing. Bill rides the lift with Alex and Caty and I ride up with the white knuckled, loudly protesting, "I'm going to fall OFF THIS THING" screaming Billy. Thank god for small miracles that they lift has a pull down hand rail/safety bar so his odds of actually falling off are slim. The ride up takes about 5 minutes. From the top you can see Mt Rushmore in the distance. There are little garden paths and a restaurant where they grill burgers and chicken for you to enjoy while taking in the view. We poke around for a couple of minutes, getting more dorky pictures like this for the family album:

Now we could have left this humiliation strictly to the children. As parents, it is practically our obligation to secure pictures such as these to use as blackmail when our children grow into all-knowing, strong-willed teenagers that want to try to develop relationships with and impress members of the opposite sex. But alas, we couldn't help ourselves and were tempted by our inner-dorks to pose as a fifth president without hesitation. *sigh*


Okay, so we finally work our way over to the slides and settle in for the 20 second ride down the hill. I've been briefing Billy the entire time how to control the speed of the slide, we decide who will ride down in what order and in what sequence around Billy. I'm going to ride with Caty behind Billy in case he gets stuck. Bill is going to ride in front of Billy (in case he doesn't control the speed and crashes into the person (Bill) in front of him) and race Alex, who will be riding on the 2nd slide. Sounds good. Off we go. It's cool. I was worried about Billy when I should have been worried about Caty, who did nothing but moan "Whooooooooooooooooa" the whole way down because, apparently, 5 mph is too fast for her. UGH! It was everything in me not to open that sucker up and take the slide at full speed, just to do it. Anyway, 20 seconds and $45 dollars later, the ride is done. Alex wants to go again and so does Bill so off they go for another race. Clearly, Alex kicked Bill's ass in their race down the slide. Bill is that teeny-tiny, light blue dot on the curve of the 1st slide. GO ALEX!!!!

With the slides under our belt and checked off the list, we pile into the truck and head for Beautiful Rushmore Cave (But the Rushmore Lion is going to EAT ME!!!!). Billy is actually more worked up about this than he has been about anything we've "dragged" him to. It seems his assistant at school jokingly told him lions live in caves so he has convinced himself, based on her joke, that not only is there a lion in this cave, but it is a savage, man-eating beast just waiting for him to arrive so he can swallow him whole. We have to wait 15 minutes for our tour to start, the entire time watching him grow more and more anxious, bordering on tears, and proclaiming he is going to die and the lion is going to eat him. Of course, the entrance to the cave and the waiting area are in the freaking gift shop. Mercifully, next to the doors to the entrance, are miner's hats - you know, the yellow hard hats with the lights on the front of them. Best 10 bucks we spent the entire trip. We get him a hat with a light, remind him once again that there is no lion, we aren't worried so he shouldn't be, that the cave has lights, there are no bats, and that we will be right there next to him the whole time and he can hold our hands if he gets scared. Finally the doors open and we have to practically drag him in there. He lets out a few loud "It's too SCARY" and "We're all going to DIE!!!!"s, drawing looks from the other children on the tour before he finally settles down and realizes that it is really harmless and actually kind of neat.

The tour through the cave is 3/4 of a mile long. It's got the famous "Big Room" with stalactites, stalacmites, helictites (growing out of the wall), flowstone, and coloumns. It was really cool. Speaking of, the temperature in the cave is somewhere around 55*. A bit chilly! Here are some pictures from the interior:

We get through the cave without being eaten alive and head on back to the campground. We've got one more activity planned for the day - a 90 minute trail ride on horseback. But, before we head back, we make a fateful call to Ford. During that call, we learn that not only was whatever was messed up before messed up, but now they have found that the whole area they are repairing is rusted out, a pinion ring needs to be replaced (whatever the heck that is!), and that all of the seals in the area are dry-rotted. Do we regularly tow a boat and put it in the water? They can't figure out how all this rust damage happened and are convinced we've been submerging the back end of our truck in lakes just for kicks. Oh yeah, the rear brakes are also shot and should be replaced (we question this as our mechanic, before we left, said we would likely need new brakes in the fall, so we can't figure out how we've completely toasted them on the drive out). The guy tells us we should be able to get home on the brakes we have and that the pinion ring and seals and whatever the hell else they were fixing was going to be an additonal $400. The good news is that they've ordered the parts, they should be there in the morning, and it should be done by noon. Riiiiiiiight. What can we do? We hang up, pissed, wondering how they had everything apart that morning and didn't see all this damage, and have an exteremly quiet ride back to the campground.

Our trailride was really neat (of course, Billy let off his obligatory "I don't want to go horseback riding!" about 15 times before we saddled up). We were with another family of 5, so 10 of us, plus the two trail leaders. Billy was on a lead rope and everyone else was left to steer their horses on their own. Alex's horse, much like him, wanted to eat the entire ride. It took him 80 of the 90 minutes to finally figure out how to hold one rein in one hand and pull the other one to steer the horse out of the brush and back onto the trail. All of our horses gladly indulged our children's fascination with bodily functions and either pooped or peed on the trail. Billy entertained the trail leader by singing the SpongeBob Christmas Special theme song for her a few times and changing his name to "Harold" half-way through the ride. My horse, aside from being one of the slowest horses in the barn (Bill was on one of the other ones) was an ass-biter. About halfway through our walk, he started nipping at the ass of the horse in front of us, which just so happened to be the horse of the 2nd trail guide. Every once in awhile the trail guide would catch him coming in for a taste with bared teeth and whack him on the nose with his reins. It finally happened though - KC (my horse) bit that horse's ass one too many times and SMACK!, got kicked in the face by the guide's horse. Hysterical if you're not on the horse getting kicked in the face! Okay, it's funny no matter how you look at it - he had me cracking up the whole ride. Stupid horse....

All in all, it was a nice, enjoyable ride through the wooded hills around our campsite. Everyone enjoyed themselves. Before heading back to our site, we grabbed an ice-cream treat at the snack bar (shockingly, Billy was all for this). Wednesday night ended with dinner on the grill, a campfire (which Alex gleefully peed on to put out at the end of the night) and some S'mores. Thursday would be waterslide day -we couldnt' wait!

South Dakota 2007 Day 4

After surviving the Night of Ungodly Winds, Tuesday morning was rough. It was chilly, we hadn't slept, and we didn't know what we were going to do that day. Since all of the attractions we wanted to see were either in Keystone or Rapid City, once we were ready to go we headed in that direction. The kids were itching to go to the waterpark. By the time we left it had warmed up to about 70 degrees. The skies were overcast and heavy, though. We get to Rapid City and there are very few cars in the parking lot at the water park even though the sign says "Open". We also notice as we pull in that there is no water running down the slides. I pop over to the ticket counter and they are "waiting until 10:30 to decide" if they will be opening for the day or not. So now what? We make the decision that the truck needs to be looked at. Rapid City is the biggest city around us so we have the best chance of finding a place that will look at it that day while we are there. We know it is the rear end, maybe the transmission or the differential (it's all Greek to me) so we were thinking a place like CarX. We ask around and find such a place. They can't even look at it until 3:00. We call Bill's dad and he advises us to take it to a Ford dealership. If it needs parts they are likely to have them on site. We find Ford and take it in. They can look at it "in about a half an hour". We ask if they have a vehicle we can rent and they hook us up with Enterprise, who just so happens to have ONE vehicle left to rent. They pick me up (just like the commerical) and I arrive back at Ford to pick up the family in a brand new Dodge Ram pick up truck with a full sized cab. *snort*. We advise Ford of our cell phone predicament and they tell us to call back that afternoon and they will tell us what is wrong with it and how long it will be to fix. We load our crap into the Dodge and head off for the Cosmos Mystery Area (which Billy didnt' want to go to!).

Cosmos Mystery Area is something I found while online looking for things to do in the area. "Feel it! See it! Survive it! You'll see people change heights right before your eyes! You'll see balls roll UPHILL!!". Sounds intriguing!! There were signs for it all over the place so we thought we'd give it a go. One thing about the Cosmos Mystery Area - it was cheap! Less than $20 for all of us to get in. They do little tours through the place and, like everywhere else, the ticket counter just so happens to be in the gift shop. The kids were incessant on their quests to get something at every place we visited. Once again we were able to fend them off with sticks while we waited for our tour to start. This was accomplished by waiting outside, where Billy had no problems reiterating, loudly, "I don't want to go to Cosmos Mystery Area!! It will be SCARY!". After what seemed an eternity, our tour started. The staff are very lively and engaging and encourage participation by the group. Each one of us were called out to participate and each one of us did so (even Billy, little stinker!). First they draw your attention to a group of trees next to where we are standing that are all growing toward a center point. "No one knows why". Apparently Discovery Channel and Travel Channel have both been there to "study it". There are no magnets involved, as they kept repeating and demonstrating. The demonstrations were neat. We still haven't figured out how they did it. We're convinced that they had to be a combination of optical illusion and something pulling on the gravity in the area. Right before your eyes you see two people stand on a level surface, measure up, and then switch places. Magically, the shorter person grows and the gap in height decreases - just by changing places! Before entering the "indoor" places, they demonstrate a tennis ball rolling up a hill and water running uphill instead of down. It was freaky! When you walk into the structures on the property you can immediately feel a force pulling you in a certain direction. This totally freaked Billy out as he kept on saying, in his nice loud voice "We're going to DIE!!!!". They have railings on the walls to hold on to and to help you walk. Thank goodness because this is what you look like while you are in these rooms
Notice how everyone is leaning in the same direction. Everything in this room pulls to the same corner. It is really difficult to walk in here and the "force" pulls on you pretty hard. It was givign me a headache and making me feel a bit nauseous (leading me to believe that there was some sort of contraption creating centrifugal force under the buildings and pulling things toward its center). In the next room is a piece of metal is hanging from a rope on the ceiling. They pull a strong looking guy to manipulate this piece of metal - pull it toward him and push it away. He pulls it with ease, but pushing it away from him proves difficult. Just to once again prove that it isn't magnets, they roll an aluminum can, plastic water bottle, and tennis ball uphill, away from the slant of the room. There is also a bar in this room that, when suspended from it, pulls you toward the corner of the room everything is attracted to. Lastly, they have some pieces of wood nailed to the wall that they balance a chair on by it's back legs. They invite a girl to sit on the chair and, unbelievably, she doesn't tip forward in the chair when she sits on it and they let it go. The whole place was really bizzare. Once you get through the tour and back into the gift shop, the "force" is gone and everything feels normal again. As I stated earlier, we still haven't figured out how they do it.

We leave Cosmos and look for a pay phone to call Ford. They've diagnosed the problem - something about the bearings and a bad seal - and it should be ready the next day by around lunchtime. Cool! We head back to camp to rest for awhile and have dinner. After dinner we head back into Hill City to get some ice cream and look through the touristy shops. We bundle up for a campfire and call it an early night.

South Dakota 2007 Day 3

If this is your first time here to read about the trip you'll have to scroll down to the bottom and read up or click the link on the right under "previous posts". There are too many things to say to cram it all into one post so I'm doing this in sections. That said, I'll pick up at the start of day three....

Monday, June 11th: Before I get into Monday I should mention that while we were out shopping on Sunday night, we found a mechanic in Hill City "just in case" for our truck. We also called American Express about getting a cash advance. As always, we didn't budget correctly for this trip and we were quickly running low on funds. We hadn't done anything yet but fill up our gas tank and eat and we were closing in our last $100. Very few places take AMEX out where we were. AMEX issued me an emergency PIN code that could be used for a one time withdrawal. While I had the lady on the phone, I asked about ATM locations. There was one right at Mt Rushmore in the Visitor's Center. Perfect!

So Monday morning rolls around. We eat, we shower, and we get ready to hit the road. Our first stop is the Visitor's Center at Mt Rushmore to get that cash advance. Bill is leary about the truck and wants to see how it is running today without the camper on it. We shove off, pay to get into Mt Rushmore (it's a one time $8 fee for a year-long pass) and head for the Visitor's Center. Just our luck, the ATM is out for maintenance. Son of a...... We load back into truck and start toward Rapid City. We don't look around the memorial because our pass lets us back in any time for the rest of the year. I should take this moment to mention that neither Hill City where we are staying, nor Keystone, the town between us and Rapid City, offers us a cellphone signal. I attempt to call AMEX twice and get dropped both times. I am about to lose it by this time because not only are we roaming and losing calls, but each time I call I am being routed through Security/Fraud Protection before they will let me speak to a representative that can tell me where a freaking ATM is. You see, on Saturday, while we were driving, we attempted to pay for gas in western MN and were declined. They wanted to verify that we had our card and were indeed trying to use it. Each time I called them after that they had to verify the same information. Have I mentioned that Security/Fraud Protection is outsourced overseas? On my third call to them we finally learn where an ATM is and make our withdrawal. Now we have to head BACK the way we came to go to Bear Country USA and Old Mac Donald's Farm. I would also like to share, at this time, that every time we mentioned we were going somewhere, Billy would let off with a very loud "But I don't WANT to go to ______!!!!!". Actually, he would repeat this every few minutes until we were inside the attraction and participating in its features. Bear Country was "too scary" and the "bears are gonna EAT ME!!".

Bear Country was actually very cool. You drive through the park and there are sections where different wild animals are roaming around. They have moose, reindeer (that don't fly, much to our kids' dismay), buffalo, arctic wolves, timber wolves, black bears, grizzly bears, some sort of mountain sheep, and mountain goats. At the end of the trail you can park and visit the "baby center" where there are exhibits with baby wildlife. Here are some photos:
At the top is an arctic wolf and a non-flying reindeer. Below is a buffalo with a white buffalo baby (Cool!), a ram and 4 of the 5 of us in front of the waterfall.

Finally, some baby bears in a tree and some fox kits.


We hit the gift shop at this place with gusto and then had some lunch. The last thing we saw were those baby bears climbing the tree. Billy was being a pill the whole time we were walking around, yelling "It's too scary!" or "I hate this!" very loudly. The last straw was him throwing his empty water bottle into the baby bear habitat. Although he found this wickedly amusing - it would send him into giggles for the next week whenever he remembered it - Bill and I were beyond pissed and had had enough. It was 95 degrees outside, we were still somewhat aggravated with american express, and Billy was driving us nuts. In the backs of our minds we were worried about the truck, too.

I'd like to say that Bear Country was our only destination that day, but we were tourists on a mission and hit Old Mac Donald's Farm after lunch. Old Mac Donald offered pig races, pony rides, and opportunities to feed baby animals. What's not to like? Off we went. As luck would have it, you enter OMF through the gift shop. We were able to fend off the clawing beasts that were eager to get something - ANYTHING - in every gift shop we walked into and headed into the park. We were minutes away from the pig races - cool! Apparently the people that run the pig races have twisted senses of humor. Check out the names of the pigs (Hamlet, Nota Hot Dog, Sausagewea, Jimmie Dean, and Justa Wiener). My personal favorite, Sausagewea, won the race =). After the pig races we hurried over to the pony rides. They were due to go on break in 15 minutes so we wanted to make sure we didn't miss them. Caty and Alex both took rides.

I was ready to leave after this, but there was still lots to do. We fed the goats, sheep, koi, and everything else with a feeder hanging on the pen. We went into the hatchery and watched baby chicks poke their way out of eggs and held days old chicks in our hands. Finally, we were just in time for the calf feedings. Each of the kids got to feed a calf from a bottle. Unfortunately, genius here was wiped and didn't think to take pictures of this stuff.

After the farm we hightailed it back to the campground. Upon arrival, Bill looked under the truck and it was continuing to leak oil from the rear axle. We had nowhere else to go that day so we let it sit, changed into our swimsuits, and hit the pool. It was crowded as hell, but it felt great. Caty and I tip-toed off to the candy store and the ice cream shop and had a cool treat. We regrouped at camp, cooked out, and had a campfire. During the fire the winds started to pick up. We thought a storm front was moving in. We collapsed the camp chairs and put them under the camper, made sure our plastic clothes bins were tightly shut and under the wings, and headed to bed. OH.MY.GOD. You know that scene in Forrest Gump where Lt Dan says "So where's your God now?" and Forrest narrates "Just then, God showed up". The winds blew and gusted that night with a fury I've never witnessed before. I don't know if being in the camper just multiplied the effect or what but holy shit!! The sustained winds had to be about 30 mph. Our campground is surrounded by mountains so in the distance, you would hear this roar start and it would build....and build.....and build....and you'd be laying there, bracing yourself for what was about to come, and then WHOOSH!!!!! A 60 mph gust would slam into the side of the camper, blowing the "windows" in on one side and out on the other and shaking the thing so hard I, at least, was worried it would tip. At some point, Bill heard the poles from the roof of the screen room hitting the ground. He went out and collapsed the screen room to prevent it from getting torn to shreds and blowing away. The winds were like this all.night.long. The skies were crystal clear, too. We'd get up and look out the windows, expecting to see storm clouds, and instead could see every start in the universe. I remember at one point getting up and looking out and thinking "My god, it is still dark. How much longer is this going to last??". Morning couldn't come soon enough. At some point we dozed off - each managing about 2 hours of sleep that night. Alex ended up sleeping with Bill in a wing and I was on the single bed. The next morning the weather had changed - it was in the low 60s when we got up. I was just happy to have survived the night in that flipping camper (or non-flipping I guess I should say).

South Dakota 2007 Days 1 and 2

Saturday, June 9th - Ready or not, here we come! At 7:15 a.m. we shoved off for the first leg of our trip. Our plan was drive to Mitchell, SD and then set up camp for the night. According to Mapquest, the drive should have taken about 9 hours. The first four hours of the trip are a piece of cake. It's the same interstate that we take to Minnesota every summer. Where the intestate splits is where the trip becomes new. We're crossing into Minnesota further south than we normally do. Our route has us travelling through southern Minnesota in a straight line to South Dakota. For those of you that have never travelled through southern Minnsota, let me take this opportunity to share with you how exciting it is:
That's right, friends. From LaCrosse, WI where we crossed the border into Minnesota all the way to the Missouri River in South Dakota, this is what the scenery out the window was. I wish I was exaggerating. It is NOTHING but cattle farms as far as the eye can see. No hills, no towns, nuthin'! For over six hours! We ended up needing 10 hours to get to Mitchell, not bad when you consider we needed to stop for gas 3 times and eat twice. We rolled in and set up camp around 5:30 Saturday night. We hit the pool after the camper was up, had sandwiches for dinner, and a few S'mores around the campfire. The people in the sight next to us were from a town about 30 miles south of where we live. They were on their way back from the Black Hills and gave us a few tips about the area. They also told us it would take about 4 hours to get to Rapid City from where we were. Obviously, they didn't know us.

Sunday, June 10th: We get up, breakdown our campsite, and are on the road around 10:00 am. With the time frame our neighbors gave us, we expect to be in Hill City, SD (where our campground is located, about 25 miles south of Rapid City) around 2:30 that afternoon. Woo hoo! We're stoked! We've heard that once you cross the Missouri River, the landscape changes. Of course, you can't be in Mitchell, SD and NOT see the world famous Corn Palace. Here we are, like dorks, in front of it. We walked in the front door, looked around at what appeared to be a shopping mall, and walked right back out. People are freakin' crazy.

We also find a K-Mart and make a quick stop. We both brought our iPods with us to listen to while the kids watched movies, but Bill had forgotten to bring his car charger. Both of our batteries were nearly drained. Bill is also complaining about his eye - the lid is swollen and it hurts. So I run in. The only car charger they have for iPods is in a 'starter kit' for $40. It has the car charger, an ear-phone splitter, an extra set of ear buds, and little filmy screen protectors. Fabulous! I had no choice. I also find Bill some homeopathic stye medication for his eye.


Finally we are back on the road. Only an hour wasted. For the next couple hours the scenery out the window is the same as above and then... (cue the Heavens parting and the angels singing)...THE MISSOURI RIVER!!! Woo hoo!!!! The Missouri River! The Missouri River! It's every bit as wide and appealing as the Mississippi River that we crossed over 400 miles ago! And look! What's that I see? HILLS! We have hills! Oh my god, no more flat prairies! Thank you! THANK YOU!! Little did we know, that that was about as exciting as it would get. From the ol' MO River to Rapid City, SD, the rest of the trip looked like this

Nothing but rolling prairies instead of flat ones. Same ol' cattle farms we've been watching for hundreds of miles. Not even The Badlands offered much relief as we were north of the park. A few taller hills offered a glimpse of what we would be seeing if we'd been driving a few miles south of the interstate. The Badlands National Park, though, would have to wait for another day.

Finally, after five and a half hours of driving, we got to Rapid City, SD - our exit for The Black Hills. Our campsite is in Hill City (sounds promising!), a town about 25 miles south of Rapid City. We're getting antsy, now. We were under the false hope that this 2nd leg of the trip would only be 4 hours. We were also under the impression that the entire trip from our house to the campsite was 870 miles. We were wrong on both parts. South of Rapid City, the landscape finally changes for good - we're finally entering the mountains. By now the truck has about 900 miles on it and it is DOGGING it up the mountain roads as it struggles to tow the camper. We figure it is just "tired". The speed limit is only 35 mph on these roads so it must be typical for vehicles to struggle a bit. As we creep up the mountain, we can see through the trees some granite peaks. Then, peeking through forest, we begin to catch fleeting looks at Mt Rushmore. All of a sudden, you come around a curve and WHAMMO! There it is! I've been telling everybody the whole time, "We're never going to be able to see it from the road. Why would they make it so you can see it from the road? If you can see it from the road, why would people pay to go in and see it"? I now stand corrected. You can, indeed, see it from the road, in all it's magnificent beauty. Further along the drive, there is a place you can pull off to the side and see Washington's profile. This was by far the highlight of our entire trip - finally seeing Mt Rushmore. By now our energy is renewed and we are stoked. We know our campground is only 5 miles away from the monument. After driving for 6 hours, we finally make it there. It's a nice place, too! They have their own riding stables. The pool is crammed with people (it was 91 degrees that day). The campground is huge. To emphasize this, I will tell you we were camped on site number 654. SIX HUNDRED FIFTY FOUR. That's a lot of campsites!

We back into our site and go to unhitch the camper. When we get to the back of the truck, I notice an extreme "car smell". It's nasty. Bill started to crank the lift and notices that everything is coated in oil. Upon further investigation, we notice that the entire back side of the truck is covered in a thin film of oil and so is the entire front of the camper. What the.....? Bill looks under the truck and oil is dripping from somewhere on the rear axle. We had JUST had the trucked tuned up on Friday and were assured it was good to go for a nice, long road trip. I tell him that all the fluids had been topped off and we decide that maybe the transmission fluid was too full and it was spilling out as we climbed the mountains. After 915 miles we figured we'd let it sit overnight and take it out the next day and see how it did. Denial ain't just a river in Egypt ya know.

It takes about an hour to make camp, and set up the screen room. The kids are itching to get in the pool so once we are finally set up we head on over. We have to actually DRIVE to the pool because it is far enough away from our campsite that hoofing it was too much of a burden. Caty took a picture of our campsite while we were there. Our site was pretty cool. We were the last site on the campground - the one furthest north. There were no sites behind us or to the left of us. Our view to the rear was an open field (with a few completely psychotic red-winged blackbird that would dive bomb our heads if we got to close, which we often did) and then a pine forest at the base of a hill. To the left was a small road and then a big, open pasture. Much to Caty's delight, the horses from the riding stables would run behind our campsite and to that pasture every evening after riding ended for the day on their way to the barn. They had free range and would often stay to eat while passing through. Alex and Caty walked down there all the time to pet them. The horses were very people friendly and would walk up to them. Here is a picture of the pasture that is at the end of the road in the picture above:


Day two ends with a quick trip for some groceries, a campfire, and plans to visit Bear Country USA and Old MacDonald's Farm in the morning.