Oh, the joys of sleeping in. We didn't get up until 9:00 local time and decided we'd take it easy all day and see Mt. Rushmore on the way home the next day.
We spent the day walking around Deadwood. We walked around in some stores and in the 10 saloon where Wild Bill Hickok was killed. Over the door, on the inside of the building, they have his "death chair" on display.
Then we saw a tour bus which was leaving in about an hour. We walked a bit down the street and came to this building that says it was the site of the original 10 saloon and the place where Hickok was really shot. Ok, so we visited both death locations. This one was way more interesting, with detailed histories of the individuals involved in the murder and the two trials of Jack McCall.
We didn't get to finish reading before it was time to go back for the tour. We got the last two seats on the bus and off we went. There wasn't much to the tour at first. We learned that there are two creeks that meet under the street in town. Then we climbed up Mt. Moriah to the cemetary where Hickok and Calamity Jane are buried. The cemetary is 800 feet above Main Street. Very steep, narrow roads and we were in a big bus. The driver was very good.
We got out to climb up to Hickok's grave where everyone took pictures and then stood in the hot sun for half an hour or so while the guide talked about Hickok's life and times. The view was impressive. The tour guide told us they had to put concrete walls around all the graves to keep them from washing down the hill during storms. Gross. You know how they found out they needed those. Somebody's ancestors washed up downtown. They don't bury anyone in the cemetary anymore and that may be why.
Everyone who died in Deadwood was buried or reburied in the cemetary except the Catholics, who had their own cemetary. They originally buried some people elsewhere, but the town decided to build houses in that spot, so they moved the remains uphill. There are stories about how they missed some of the unmarked graves and built houses over them. Tour guide says it's a creepy neighborhood.
We ate a late lunch at what used to be the Gem Theater. That was pretty cool since the Gem is a major location in the show Deadwood.
Every building in Deadwood, with the possible exception of churches, has several slot machines, including the small grocery store. We lost 5 cents in nickel slots and that was enough gambling. One interesting fact about South Dakota: with legalized gambling, there are quite a few gas station/casinos in the state.
We left town and drove up to the Broken Boot gold mine for an underground tour. The tour guide wasn't too interested in being a guide. The first thing he told us is that since we had such a large group, we wouldn't stop in the first tunnel and he'd just explain it all later. I suppose it may have been because in large groups, there isn't room for everyone to see what he's talking about, but still, we didn't feel we were getting our money's worth. He even mentioned a couple places in the mine that some tour guides(but not him, obviously) would lead people into if they(the guides) felt like it. We were free to take pictures or rocks as we pleased. The tour was only about ten minutes, but it was kinda fun.
Then we drove up to Lead to see what was there. It's a small mining town where I guess the mine is still in operation. I saw a sign for a Catholic church and we thought we ought to go to mass so we drove around looking for the church. It took us half an hour just to find it, only to find out from a man in the parking lot that they moved the mass up a half hour so we were too late. He grew up in the town, though he now lives somewhere else, and he had no idea they would change the time. The didn't bother to change the signs along the road. So we gave up on mass and went back to the motel to rest and watch tv.
Thursday, July 28, 2005
Vacation: Day 2 (The Longest Day)
We wanted to get an early start, but the alarm didn't go off. So, off to Montana a little late. One of the first things you notice about a new geographical area is that it smells different. Wisconsin is like a giant air freshener compared to South Dakota. Not a really bad smell, but different. The only thing I can liken it to back home is the dead weed smell in November hayfields. But in the car, where we would spend most of the day, it made no difference.
We drove through the North East corner of Wyoming, which is fairly flat and has an unusual abundance of fresh-looking roadkill despite the lack of traffic. Mostly rabbits, I guess. We almost hit one ourselves. He bounded across our lane and sat stock-still in the middle of the left lane like he was just waiting to get hit. Once we saw a bald eagle having a roadkill breakfast. All the land off the highway is fenced, but we didn't see any cattle. Just alot of pronghorn deer.
There are almost no road signs in Wyoming. We joked about this early on, but later in the day it wouldn't be so funny. One of the first signs we saw in Montana was an anti-PETA sign. Needless to say, we liked Montana.
We got to the Little Big Horn monument at 10:00 am. There were no signs for it until we got there. The battlefield was interesting. Half the time we were on Indian land. It was a great history lesson for me as I knew very little about the battle. It would seem Custer's biggest mistake was not listening to his scouts. He was way outnumbered and couldn't possibly have won.
Billings was a nice little big town. It didn't really have a big town feel, but we didn't drive around much. We had a long way to drive yet to get to the alternate route for Bear Tooth Pass, which unfortunately was still closed. Everybody says you have to take it. Maybe another year...
We drove out into the Rocky Mountains, which were really cool. At the highest point, we were 8,000 feet above sea level. I've never seen a more beautiful shade of green than the trees we looked down on from up there. I hadn't seen the Rockies for many years so I was pretty happy with the trip.
Then we made the fateful decision to cut through the North East corner of Yellowstone National Park. It seemed the easiest way to get where we were going without turning aorund and driving back through the mountains. We figured at least we'd see new country this way.
The entrance fee was $20 and they gave us a newspaper and a map and a special road construction map. For our $20 we found out that the quick route we intended driving through the park was out of the question. One of the passes was out. So we had to drive all the way around the northern half of the park in a big 'C', then down to the East Entrance. Now the East Entrance, for some reason, closes daily at 8:00 pm. Here we are in the middle of the afternoon, driving down the two-lane road. It seemed we'd have plenty of time to get out of the park. We knew it would be very late when we got back to South Dakota.
Early on, we saw a Buffalo walking along the road and sometimes on the road itself. I got a picture of him out the car window. We're pretty sure he was trained to walk there, but it was still fun.
There were lots of trees on the drive, blocking our view of anything else the park may have had to offer. It's definitely a camper's park. The traffic was very slow and every now and then some nice person who realized he was holding things up for the rest of us would pull over in a byway and let us pass him.
Now it's getting on toward evening and with the slow traffic and occasional road construction, we're getting a little nervous about the time. We certainly didn't like the idea of being trapped in the park all night. Obviously we weren't taking time to enjoy the scenery. We were just happy to see landmarks along the route to the East Entrance and freedom. Nothing like impending captivity to make the world close in on you and move slower. I took to glaring at the traffic ahead of us and saying a prayer of thanks every time somebody pulled off the road. The most interesting site was Yellowstone Lake, which is huge. The beauty was kinda ruined by the smell of the sulfer in the water.
It seemed to us that if we were at or near the gate by 8:00, they couldn't very well keep us in. Around 7:30 pm, we were really close to getting out of "Hellowstone", as we now refer to it. Just 20 minutes with about 8 minutes of driving left. And traffic stops. Cars are stopped way ahead of us and we have no idea why. We had had to stop once before for a motorcycle accident in the park, but this was un unkown issue and who knew how long it would take? We got out to stretch and look around. Beautiful cliff right off the roadside. Another stranded traveller and I started feeding the friendly birds that had landed nearby. They like french fries, but I thought maybe they wouldn't be good for birds, so I pulled a sandwich apart and fed them bread.
We were standing around for nearly 20 minutes before the cars started moving again. The hold-up was a long stretch of one-lane road where something had washed out the other lane. We finally got out of the park at 8 minues to 8:00. It never felt so good to get out of a place.
Now for the long drive across Wyoming. It seemed to take forever just to get to Cody. The gas station had a piece of paper taped to the counter with distances from Cody to other places and we were 352 miles from Sturgis. We were going to get back so late it would be early. Then we had to pick a route. I picked what looked like a good route, only I failed to note the significance of the route's going through Big Horn National Forest. The only fun part of the drive through the Big Horn mountains was when we drove through a tunnel, right through a mountain. Then it was a lot of twisting, turning, climbing, more turning, winding roads. They just wouldn't ever end. Hours and hours of curves in the darkness, then the really curvy section at the end of the forest. We could see Sheridan, the next town, for a half-hour before we could get there. The Interstate seemed to always be just around the next curve. I started to hate Wyoming, curves, mountains, deer(we almost hit one), nightime, Yellowstone, but mostly Wyoming. And of course, there were almost no road signs. It seemed there was only one sign per 20 mile stretch and that's generous.
Having made our great escape from Yellowstone, we seemed doomed to eternity in Wyoming. Even when we were driving too fast, it took forever. We got back to Sturgis at 2:30 am local time. Since we were staying on our time, it was 3:30. We learned a big lesson about making up routes and plans as we go along. I wouldn't care if I never saw Wyoming again.
We drove through the North East corner of Wyoming, which is fairly flat and has an unusual abundance of fresh-looking roadkill despite the lack of traffic. Mostly rabbits, I guess. We almost hit one ourselves. He bounded across our lane and sat stock-still in the middle of the left lane like he was just waiting to get hit. Once we saw a bald eagle having a roadkill breakfast. All the land off the highway is fenced, but we didn't see any cattle. Just alot of pronghorn deer.
There are almost no road signs in Wyoming. We joked about this early on, but later in the day it wouldn't be so funny. One of the first signs we saw in Montana was an anti-PETA sign. Needless to say, we liked Montana.
We got to the Little Big Horn monument at 10:00 am. There were no signs for it until we got there. The battlefield was interesting. Half the time we were on Indian land. It was a great history lesson for me as I knew very little about the battle. It would seem Custer's biggest mistake was not listening to his scouts. He was way outnumbered and couldn't possibly have won.
Billings was a nice little big town. It didn't really have a big town feel, but we didn't drive around much. We had a long way to drive yet to get to the alternate route for Bear Tooth Pass, which unfortunately was still closed. Everybody says you have to take it. Maybe another year...
We drove out into the Rocky Mountains, which were really cool. At the highest point, we were 8,000 feet above sea level. I've never seen a more beautiful shade of green than the trees we looked down on from up there. I hadn't seen the Rockies for many years so I was pretty happy with the trip.
Then we made the fateful decision to cut through the North East corner of Yellowstone National Park. It seemed the easiest way to get where we were going without turning aorund and driving back through the mountains. We figured at least we'd see new country this way.
The entrance fee was $20 and they gave us a newspaper and a map and a special road construction map. For our $20 we found out that the quick route we intended driving through the park was out of the question. One of the passes was out. So we had to drive all the way around the northern half of the park in a big 'C', then down to the East Entrance. Now the East Entrance, for some reason, closes daily at 8:00 pm. Here we are in the middle of the afternoon, driving down the two-lane road. It seemed we'd have plenty of time to get out of the park. We knew it would be very late when we got back to South Dakota.
Early on, we saw a Buffalo walking along the road and sometimes on the road itself. I got a picture of him out the car window. We're pretty sure he was trained to walk there, but it was still fun.
There were lots of trees on the drive, blocking our view of anything else the park may have had to offer. It's definitely a camper's park. The traffic was very slow and every now and then some nice person who realized he was holding things up for the rest of us would pull over in a byway and let us pass him.
Now it's getting on toward evening and with the slow traffic and occasional road construction, we're getting a little nervous about the time. We certainly didn't like the idea of being trapped in the park all night. Obviously we weren't taking time to enjoy the scenery. We were just happy to see landmarks along the route to the East Entrance and freedom. Nothing like impending captivity to make the world close in on you and move slower. I took to glaring at the traffic ahead of us and saying a prayer of thanks every time somebody pulled off the road. The most interesting site was Yellowstone Lake, which is huge. The beauty was kinda ruined by the smell of the sulfer in the water.
It seemed to us that if we were at or near the gate by 8:00, they couldn't very well keep us in. Around 7:30 pm, we were really close to getting out of "Hellowstone", as we now refer to it. Just 20 minutes with about 8 minutes of driving left. And traffic stops. Cars are stopped way ahead of us and we have no idea why. We had had to stop once before for a motorcycle accident in the park, but this was un unkown issue and who knew how long it would take? We got out to stretch and look around. Beautiful cliff right off the roadside. Another stranded traveller and I started feeding the friendly birds that had landed nearby. They like french fries, but I thought maybe they wouldn't be good for birds, so I pulled a sandwich apart and fed them bread.
We were standing around for nearly 20 minutes before the cars started moving again. The hold-up was a long stretch of one-lane road where something had washed out the other lane. We finally got out of the park at 8 minues to 8:00. It never felt so good to get out of a place.
Now for the long drive across Wyoming. It seemed to take forever just to get to Cody. The gas station had a piece of paper taped to the counter with distances from Cody to other places and we were 352 miles from Sturgis. We were going to get back so late it would be early. Then we had to pick a route. I picked what looked like a good route, only I failed to note the significance of the route's going through Big Horn National Forest. The only fun part of the drive through the Big Horn mountains was when we drove through a tunnel, right through a mountain. Then it was a lot of twisting, turning, climbing, more turning, winding roads. They just wouldn't ever end. Hours and hours of curves in the darkness, then the really curvy section at the end of the forest. We could see Sheridan, the next town, for a half-hour before we could get there. The Interstate seemed to always be just around the next curve. I started to hate Wyoming, curves, mountains, deer(we almost hit one), nightime, Yellowstone, but mostly Wyoming. And of course, there were almost no road signs. It seemed there was only one sign per 20 mile stretch and that's generous.
Having made our great escape from Yellowstone, we seemed doomed to eternity in Wyoming. Even when we were driving too fast, it took forever. We got back to Sturgis at 2:30 am local time. Since we were staying on our time, it was 3:30. We learned a big lesson about making up routes and plans as we go along. I wouldn't care if I never saw Wyoming again.
Monday, July 25, 2005
Vacation: Day 1
My husband and I just got back from a 4-day vacation to the Black Hills country. Because there is so much to tell, I'm going to write about it in four long posts. Our plan was to drive out there. It was about 700 miles from home to Sturgis, SD where we were staying. We would drive out, maybe see the Badlands, see Deadwood. We would spend one day driving up into Montana to see the Little Big Horn, then over to Bear Tooth Pass which we were hoping had been repaired since the mudslide earlier, then a possible short visit to Yellowstone Park and back across Wyoming that night. Another day would be spent visiting Deadwood some more and seeing Mt. Rushmore and basically taking it easy. On day four, we would drive back, pick up our kids from Grandma's, where they were having a nice vacation from us, and spend a fifth day recovering from our trip.
The initial idea was to go to Deadwood. Hubby started watching the cable show of the same name and became fascinated with the idea of visiting the town. Then we added all the extra not-too-distant attractions.
We wanted to be on the road by 4:00 am, so we were up at about 3:30. I got sick first thing(stubborn case of morning sickness), but that wasn't too bad a thing because I usually only get sick once during the day.
We finished packing and rounded up everything we were going to take. Surprisingly, we managed not to forget anything. We were well prepared for our 12+ hour drive across the midwest.
Because we started so early, it would be at least 2 hours before we could have breakfast because almost everything opens at 6:00.
We got to Winona, MN somewhere around 5:00. We stopped there for gas because Minnesota gas is MUCH cheaper than Wisconsin gas. We made the mistake of pulling into the first station we saw. It was called Freedom. Just the one word: Freedom. Only after filling up did we discover there was a Conoco station just behind it and a little down the road a Kwik Trip, which we would have preferred because of the discount we could have gotten.
We're driving along when all of a sudden the check engine light comes on. So, we pull over and start reading through the owner's manual(yes, those things do come in handy once in awhile). One of the probable causes for the light coming on is low quality gas. We decided that was the problem and continued our trek. The manual said that if it were a poor gas issue, the light would go off eventually, though it may take an entire fresh tank of good gas to flush it out. At some point, the light did go off again. Lesson learned: do NOT stop for gas at a no-name station, especially one called Freedom.
It had just started raining when we found out what was wrong with the car. Awhile later, we drove through the heart of a nasty thunderstorm where visability was so low, we thought of pulling off to let the storm pass, but it didn't last too long. We stopped soon after at McDonald's in Austin, MN for breakfast. Nothing happened there, but it was the fist Sinclare station we saw. Sinclare uses only gas from North America. There are alot of restaraunt/gas stations in Minnesota.
It seemed to take forever to drive across Minnesota, though I'm sure it was only about 4 hours. The landscape is the same as Wisconsin, but their crops looked better because they've been getting more rain over there. The most exciting scenery was the nice looking corn.
We finally got to South Dakota, where the landscape doesn't change much until you're at least 100 miles into the state. Almost immediately after entering the state, we saw a sign for Wall Drug. Throughout the journey, we would see about a hundred Wall Drug signs, all talking about their free ice water, 5 cent coffee and how great the store is.
There wasn't much to see for most of the drive. We stopped in Mitchell and considered going to see the Corn Palace, a building made almost entirely out of corn, with everything in it also made of corn. We drove around town and past the Palace and decided we'd seen enough of it.
Nothing much changed until we crossed the Missouri and entered the real West. The river country was hilly and coming up to it from the East, it seemed the landscape changed almost instantly on the other side. It looked like the pictures we'd seen of Wyoming. After a few miles though, it turned back into the same landscape as before until we came to the Badlands.
We took a "loop" through part of the Badlands which was about 40 miles or so long. It was impressive at first and we took some pictures, but after the first 20 miles, everything looks the same and you're just waiting to see the Interstate again. We did stop at this place where Hubby took a very short, yet expensive helicopter "tour" of the Badlands. It lasted agbout two minutes, but he said it was really cool. I wasn't as eager to ride a helicopter as he was, so I passed.
We came off the loop at Wall, SD. Proud home of the infamous Wall Drug. Now after driving over 200 miles seeing signs about the place, you're brainwashed into going. We just had to stop and see what was so spectacular about it. It was once a regular old drug store and now is more like a mall. Lots of overpriced stuff. We didn't buy anything, but we looked around the whole place. Not once did anyone offer us free ice water, though it was heavily advertised. I suppose you had to ask for it.
After the not so impressive look at Wall Drug, we were back on the Interstate and we finally got to our motel at about 5:30 pm CDT. About halfway through South Dakota we change timezones, so technically, we checked in a about 4:30 pm. We drove down to Deadwood to scout for parking for later and located a few things we thought looked interesting. Then we declared the day over and went to bed early. We had a long day ahead of us.
To be continued....
The initial idea was to go to Deadwood. Hubby started watching the cable show of the same name and became fascinated with the idea of visiting the town. Then we added all the extra not-too-distant attractions.
We wanted to be on the road by 4:00 am, so we were up at about 3:30. I got sick first thing(stubborn case of morning sickness), but that wasn't too bad a thing because I usually only get sick once during the day.
We finished packing and rounded up everything we were going to take. Surprisingly, we managed not to forget anything. We were well prepared for our 12+ hour drive across the midwest.
Because we started so early, it would be at least 2 hours before we could have breakfast because almost everything opens at 6:00.
We got to Winona, MN somewhere around 5:00. We stopped there for gas because Minnesota gas is MUCH cheaper than Wisconsin gas. We made the mistake of pulling into the first station we saw. It was called Freedom. Just the one word: Freedom. Only after filling up did we discover there was a Conoco station just behind it and a little down the road a Kwik Trip, which we would have preferred because of the discount we could have gotten.
We're driving along when all of a sudden the check engine light comes on. So, we pull over and start reading through the owner's manual(yes, those things do come in handy once in awhile). One of the probable causes for the light coming on is low quality gas. We decided that was the problem and continued our trek. The manual said that if it were a poor gas issue, the light would go off eventually, though it may take an entire fresh tank of good gas to flush it out. At some point, the light did go off again. Lesson learned: do NOT stop for gas at a no-name station, especially one called Freedom.
It had just started raining when we found out what was wrong with the car. Awhile later, we drove through the heart of a nasty thunderstorm where visability was so low, we thought of pulling off to let the storm pass, but it didn't last too long. We stopped soon after at McDonald's in Austin, MN for breakfast. Nothing happened there, but it was the fist Sinclare station we saw. Sinclare uses only gas from North America. There are alot of restaraunt/gas stations in Minnesota.
It seemed to take forever to drive across Minnesota, though I'm sure it was only about 4 hours. The landscape is the same as Wisconsin, but their crops looked better because they've been getting more rain over there. The most exciting scenery was the nice looking corn.
We finally got to South Dakota, where the landscape doesn't change much until you're at least 100 miles into the state. Almost immediately after entering the state, we saw a sign for Wall Drug. Throughout the journey, we would see about a hundred Wall Drug signs, all talking about their free ice water, 5 cent coffee and how great the store is.
There wasn't much to see for most of the drive. We stopped in Mitchell and considered going to see the Corn Palace, a building made almost entirely out of corn, with everything in it also made of corn. We drove around town and past the Palace and decided we'd seen enough of it.
Nothing much changed until we crossed the Missouri and entered the real West. The river country was hilly and coming up to it from the East, it seemed the landscape changed almost instantly on the other side. It looked like the pictures we'd seen of Wyoming. After a few miles though, it turned back into the same landscape as before until we came to the Badlands.
We took a "loop" through part of the Badlands which was about 40 miles or so long. It was impressive at first and we took some pictures, but after the first 20 miles, everything looks the same and you're just waiting to see the Interstate again. We did stop at this place where Hubby took a very short, yet expensive helicopter "tour" of the Badlands. It lasted agbout two minutes, but he said it was really cool. I wasn't as eager to ride a helicopter as he was, so I passed.
We came off the loop at Wall, SD. Proud home of the infamous Wall Drug. Now after driving over 200 miles seeing signs about the place, you're brainwashed into going. We just had to stop and see what was so spectacular about it. It was once a regular old drug store and now is more like a mall. Lots of overpriced stuff. We didn't buy anything, but we looked around the whole place. Not once did anyone offer us free ice water, though it was heavily advertised. I suppose you had to ask for it.
After the not so impressive look at Wall Drug, we were back on the Interstate and we finally got to our motel at about 5:30 pm CDT. About halfway through South Dakota we change timezones, so technically, we checked in a about 4:30 pm. We drove down to Deadwood to scout for parking for later and located a few things we thought looked interesting. Then we declared the day over and went to bed early. We had a long day ahead of us.
To be continued....
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