The Pitts Stop

 South Dakota

South Dakota  Wednesday, June 11, 2003

Our campground was only about a mile from the Missouri River - as soon as we headed west on Route 90 out of the campground, the flat country turned to rolling hills, but no trees anywhere.    Fifteen minutes later, back to the flat country.  We changed time zones again about halfway across South Dakota.  We had started seeing Wall Drugstore signs back in Minnesota and billboards every couple of miles all across South Dakota for Wall Drugstore.  We had stopped at the South Dakota visitor center and got a cd that has descriptions of various main routes through South Dakota plus one about Lewis and Clark’s journey.  We turn it back in at any rest center and you get the deposit back – all it costs is $5.00 – such a bargain!

We drove through the flat country under threat of rain and it finally became a bit hilly and the sky cleared.  We drove about 150 miles to the Badlands and entered the National Park.  We purchased the Golden Eagle Pass (over 62 years of age….) for $10 for a lifetime!  Last year, we purchased an annual pass for $65 for the national parks.  Another great bargain!    

After just a few minutes’ ride, suddenly huge gray/white buttes appeared – just incredible.    More like a moonscape – we felt like we were on a movie set.  There are all different rock shapes, some mounding, some sharp peaks and while most is a gray/white, there are bands of dark brown, orange, tan and pink/purple.  After settling in our  

              campground just beyond the park, we drove the scenic road through the park, stopping at lots of viewpoints.  

We ended up in Wall Drugstore where we had ice cream.  The store is the Midwestern version of “South of the Border” – selling every kind of touristy junk and it now occupies practically an entire city block.     

After getting a couple of tee shirts for Jack, we returned to the campground on the scenic road through the park and took lots of pictures (light is better late in the day) – hopefully we can include one picture with this journal.  We saw and heard lots of western meadowlarks, saw four antelope, a hawk, lots of pretty wildflowers, including blooming cactus and a prairie dog village – thousands of them!  Cute little guys, except they do carry diseases.  We have seen the spacious skies and amber waves of grain (ok, not amber yet – still green) and look forward to seeing the purple mountain majesties in a few days.

 South Dakota  Thursday, June 12, 2003

Last night we used the phone line in the laundry room to check email and send out yesterday’s journal.  This is a great campground – and a good thing, too.  Today I was supposed to get a FedEx related to work, but I found out this morning that it won’t arrive until 4pm – apparently FedEx’s guarantee to have overnight packages arrive by 10am does NOT pertain to Badlands, South Dakota.  So, we decided to stay here an extra day.  We wake up very early here – sunrise is just after 5am, plus our body clocks are still somewhere between east coast and central time while here we are in mountain time.  We drove the 4 miles back into the badlands park this morning and listened to a ranger talk on wildlife and did a short hike that led to the most fabulous views yet of this eerie landscape.  They let you hike right into the rock formations with the spires and gullies all lined horizontally with different bands of color. 

This was apparently the bottom of an ancient sea at first, then it drained and it was a jungle.  The jungle died out and then returned.  It died out again and has stayed extremely dry – each epoch created a different color soil that compacted into rock, and then portions eroded away, leaving only the hardest layers.  This is the top spot in the USA for fossils of lots of extinct animals, but no dinosaurs.  We visited the “Pig Dig” where folks are combing through the rocks with screwdrivers and small brushes looking for bones.  We came back to camp and Jack went for swim in the pool and I took a nap and did a little work.   We went back into the park again late afternoon for another hike and visited an original prairie sod  farmhouse cut into a hill with an earthen wall that had all kinds of original and household farm equipment as if someone had just walked out the door.  It was incredible that folks could live in such a place, especially here where the summers reach 110 and the winters go 30 below.  Made chicken on the grill for dinner, watched a little TV (very little as our antenna only pulls in two channels here and one isn’t very clear) and went to bed.  Tomorrow we’ll stop at Mt. Rushmore and then continue on towards Glacier Park in Montana.

South Dakota  Friday, June 13, 2003

Off to an early start this morning after visiting the computer room again this morning.  On the road about 8am and drove northwest on route 44 to Rapid City and then down route 16 to Mt. Rushmore.  We stopped for gas and we saw something that looked like snow on the side of the gas station.    We couldn’t figure out what it was, so Jack walked over and it was hail!  They had multiple inches of golf ball sized hail the night before and the accumulation on the roof slid off.  Another mystery solved. 

At the visitor’s center, we watched the movie about how Mt. Rushmore was made – more than 90% was sculpted by dynamite!  They built a full model and then scaled it up 12 times and applied it to the mountain.  They were precise enough with the dynamite that they used it even to sculpt the eyes, nose and cheekbones with requiring any further chiseling except to smooth out the stone.  The monument was much more impressive than we expected.  When we first saw it driving up the mountain, we both said we thought it was bigger!  But you can’t appreciate the scale and size until you get much closer.    

Had lunch at the dining room at the base of the mountain, and then were on the road again – west on route 90.    

A couple of hours traveling through hilly grazing country with many exits being dirt roads!  Clouds of dust billowed for miles behind trucks using these dirt roads.  Lots of heavy duty fencing along the road in places, but it had occasional gaps where the cattle actually were grazing between the simple wire fence along the road and these heavy wood fences.  We finally figured out they were probably snow fences – these things were mighty sturdy – must get some brutal snow storms here – we also figured that from the gates with flashing lights we would occasionally see that would close the interstate altogether!    

We’ve seen a few oil wells pumping and a coal strip mine. Whenever you see some trees, usually cottonwoods, you can bet there is a small creek nearby – everything else is just grazed grassland.  The creeks also have dozens of swallows flitting over the river – guess the good bugs are near the water.    

Just when we were getting mighty tired of the empty grasslands (about 4pm), suddenly the heavy clouds parted a bit with a little sun and snow-capped mountains (the Big Horns) appeared.  Truly beautiful and certainly a small snapshot of what we can expect to see over the next few weeks in Glacier, Banff and Jasper.  Our campground is at 4k feet in the foothills at the base of the Big Horn Mountains.  Nice park, lots of shade.  Days are warm 75-80, with evenings in the low 50s.  Every day we’ve seen threatening thunderstorms, but have managed to avoid rain the last few days (although some heavy rain would certainly do the bug juice and dust on the front of the RV some good).  On our way now to an “ice cream social” at the clubhouse at the campground “bring your bowl, your spoon and a dollar” – if I can get Jack away from the TV where he’s watching the rerun of the US Open.

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