Return to South Dakota

We returned to South Dakota, to a nice campground we had been to before – Heartland RV Resort in Hermosa.  At this campground the hosts gave us ice cream sandwiches!  A first in over 130 campgrounds.  So nice!

We spent our first day in Hermosa watching the Senate Judiciary Hearing.  It was a difficult day.  In the late afternoon we made a quick trip to stock up on food and I used the convenient laundry at the campground.  Life goes on.

On Friday, we went to Wind Cave.  Our tour guide greeted us and we were pleasantly surprised to find that it was Ranger Ben from Kartchner Caverns.  Ben gives a great tour – entertaining and filled with info.  We caught up with him over lunch.  Ben’s on his way to Kartchner Caverns for the winter where he will bring our greetings to all our friends there.

After our great tour of Wind Cave which took us deep into a huge cave by way of over 700 steps, we visited Mammoth Site.  This site has hundreds of mammoth bones – both Columbian and Wooly mammoth species.  These big guys wandered into a muddy pool once upon a time and then couldn’t climb over the slippery edges so their remains remain intact there.  Many of the bones are perfectly preserved in almost full skeletal bodies.  Incredible!

We couldn’t pass up a chance to revisit Custer State Park.  Our plan was get up at dawn and see the annual Buffalo Round Up.  In this event, ranchers herd the bison into corrals.  Since the herds are doing well, in order to keep them healthy and thriving, the ranchers cull them.  They remove the old and sick bison who are then auctioned off – yes, to make bison burgers.

Well, we never really saw dawn that morning.  A quick peek out our bedroom window showed us rain and the low temperatures convinced is to stay in bed.  We did drive the Wildlife Loop later in the day and saw the bison up close in the corrals.  We went to the Arts Festival in the Park and met up with the Democrats at their booth.  We talked to them and they gave us information on voting for our State and Local candidates.  We mailed in our ballots a few days later.

I’m a little ashamed to state that I chose this opportunity to try my first bison burger at the festival.  It was pretty much like any cheeseburger I’ve eaten.

October started with a fun but busy day for us.  We went to the D.C. Historic Fish Hatchery in Spearfish Canyon, where we would love to volunteer one summer.  We enjoyed the interpretive guides the last time we were here and this time we met with the Volunteer Coordinator, who answered our questions and interviewed us for the positions.  We did our best to impress her and her staff and we’re hoping this gig works out in our future.  We saw the really nice camping sites along the Spearfish River in the Volunteer Village of the nearby city campground.  Looks like a great place to spend the summer!

We ate another great Mexican lunch at Barbacosa’s and explored Downtown Spearfish.  Then we went on a beautiful two mile hike to Roughlock Falls.  The weather was perfect – just a little cool but sunny.

We made a little detour to Belle Fourche, SD.  This is the designated center of the United States.  Of course to be the center you have to include Alaska and Hawaii.  There is an impressive monument where you can stand in the center and of course, take a photo in what seems to be the center of the country, but this monument is about 20 miles south of the actual center, which is inaccessible because it is on private property.  We met a couple there from Pittsburgh and they took our photo and we took theirs.  The Tri-State Museum (SD, MT, WY) on the property was closed so we will visit it another time.

It was a good stay in Hermosa but we heard that a wind storm was coming our way.  So we left extra early on Wednesday morning.  The winds were increasing but Doug was managing on the highway.   We stopped for just a few minutes at a rest stop.  The wind storm caught up with us.  I almost couldn’t walk back to the RV and in minutes after we got back on the highway, we heard a loud slapping sound along our driver’s side roof.

There was no way to stop along the highway.  Luckily there wasn’t much traffic.  We crawled along the shoulder at ten miles per hour to the first turn off.  We pulled into a KOA campground and I spoke to the owner.  He was closing down the campground for the season and was busy trying to get the few remaining campers out of the park so he could leave too.  He directed us to a large dirt parking area not too far away.

We limped into the dirt lot where a cattle car, another big truck and a small Class C were already huddled there.  The wind was crazy – bad enough to rock our RV.  Doug could see that the problem was the slide topper – a flap of awning material that serves as a cover to protect our slides when they are opened out.  The arm that prevents it from unrolling in the wind must have come unscrewed in the wind.

Doug called Tiffin (our RV manufacturer) for advice and together they came up with a repair with a wire coat hanger that we thought would work.   But no way could he climb up to the roof or use a ladder in that wind.  So we hunkered down in the 1880 Town Parking Lot.  We were just across the street from a local historic attraction with a gas station and convenience store.

Just to complicate things a bit, our tire sensor beeped us a message that our car’s tire was leaking.  We probably picked up a nail riding along the highway shoulder.  Doug walked to the convenience store where he got directions to a place in the next town where he could get the tire changed.  The wind and rain had mercifully died down just enough for us to unhitch and  put the spare on.  So Doug drove off to the town of Murdo.  I stayed in the rocking RV trying to quell my anxiety by crocheting.

When he came back with a fixed tire we re-hitched in the rain and walked over to the convenience store.  We spoke to the really nice owner who graciously told us not to worry about the No Overnight Parking – You Will Be Towed signs.  He invited us to stay the night – free.  We do meet the nicest people!  We bought some snacks in the store, went back into the RV without opening the sides, ate junk food and spent a safe, cozy night in the dirt lot.

By morning, all the other RVs and trucks were gone and so was most of the wind and rain.  I held the ladder; Doug made a secure repair and we were soon on our way again.  We never made it to our reserved site in Kennebec but were instead on our way to Sioux Falls.

We traveled to Sioux Falls along I-90.  Before we got there, we stopped at a rest stop in Chamberlain to see the Statue of Dignity – Of Earth and Sky.  It is a beautiful fifty foot stainless steel sculpture by Dale Lamphere to honor the cultures of the Lakotas and Dakotas.  It serves as a symbol of respect and promise for the future.  It was installed to celebrate the 125^th anniversary of South Dakota’s statehood in 2016.  It is beautiful, impressive and even has colored LED lights at night.  Along the view of the Missouri River right behind Dignity is a Lewis and Clark marker detailing the construction of the Memorial Bridge spanning the river.  Needless to say, it was one of the best rest stops we have been in.

Sioux Falls is our city of residence.  It’s where we get our mail and do our banking.  So we made a quick trip to Falls Park.  Our plan was to eat soup and bread in the café overlooking the falls.  We remembered our last delicious lunch there.  We also remembered the bitter cold there.  Alas, the café was closed for a private party and we had to settle for lunch somewhere else.  The falls are certainly worth seeing but hopefully next time we will be there when we can enjoy a nice walk without shivering.  The rock formations which create the falls through the Big Sioux River are Sioux Quartzite.  It’s silica-cemented sandstone – the oldest exposed rocks in South Dakota.  The rocks are all squared-cornered which is unusual for rocks pounded by a fast flowing river.  The Big Sioux River has flowed over these rocks for over 10,000 years but the rocks show little signs of erosion.

After a pretty but cold walk by the falls, we ran some errands.  We picked up our mail at Dakota Post, giving us a chance to thank the staff there for the excellent mail service they provide to us.  We went to our Sioux Falls Credit Union to make some changes to our account, visited Democratic Headquarters, found a well-stocked kitchen store for a few supplies and then did some food shopping.

Just a note – most places like banks in South Dakota don’t celebrate Columbus Day.  They instead celebrate Native American Day.

It was a short but productive trip to Sioux Falls and we said good-bye to South Dakota on Monday, October 8.