Adventures in South Dakota!

What a day!

I woke up this morning in our hotel in Rapid City to a "smoky" weather report.  Thankfully it didn't seem too bad once we got outside.

We left our hotel and headed straight to Mount Rushmore.  We hoped that by going early in the day, we might beat the worst of the crowds.  I can only imagine what it's like later in the day!

When we left Mount Rushmore, we decided to head to Crazy Horse Mountain.  It wasn't too far away.  We knew we didn't have time to do the museum, so we just pulled in to see it, took a couple of pictures, and went on our way.

Pretty tunnel between Mount Rushmore and Crazy Horse Mountain - Miner's Gateway Tunnel

We left Crazy Horse and drove back toward Rapid City.  As we got on the bypass around Rapid City, I said to Mom, "It's crazy to me that you can have cows across the street from Walmart!"  I guess that's South Dakota for you? 

We drove about an hour until we came to Wall, South Dakota, the home of Wall Drug Store!  Mom had told me a few things about it, and there were a ZILLION billboards promoting it, but I wasn't quite sure what to expect.  I did not need to be in there long before I could say, "Been there, done that.  Let's get out of here!"  No purchases made... I didn't even walk through the whole thing.  So crowded - and just not my favorite scene in general.  We headed out quickly!

Mom drove from Mount Rushmore to Crazy Horse Mountain and then to Wall, SD.  Somewhere along the way, she hit 81 mph (when the speed limit was 80)! We thought that deserved photographic evidence.

Beautiful South Dakota hills in transit

After Wall Drug we headed for Badlands National Park.  So many gorgeous views that made it hard to choose which pictures to share!  The Badlands reminded me a bit of the Grand Canyon - though on a much smaller scale.

Literally the first thing we saw upon entry to the park were prairie dogs.  We listened to Oliver, our GyPSy app host, again to tour us around.  He told us to keep an eye out for the prairie dogs and sure enough, there they were!  I found this especially funny because on our Red Bus tour in Glacier National Park, our jammer would stop the bus, put it in the park, and tell us we could "prairie dog" which meant we could stand up and take pictures out of the roof of the bus.  

Just under three hours after leaving the Badlands, we arrived in Mitchell, SD, where we'd be staying the night.  Do you know what's in Mitchell?  You can see on the water tower below it says "Home of the Corn Palace."  

Now many of you might not know this about me, but I love corn.  If you asked me what my favorite food is, from the time I was a little girl until now, I'd tell you it is corn.  For one of my birthdays when I was younger, my childhood best friend gave me a 10 lb. can of corn.  He knew it would make me laugh, AND he knew I would eat it.  So call me nerdy (I'm fine with that), but I was super excited about going to the corn palace.  They have murals on the outside made out of corn!

The murals on the left and right (and the USA) are all made out of corn cobs.  

Other parts are made from husks, etc.

The side of the building... all those murals are made out of corn!

A video close-up so perhaps you can see the corn murals better

Another banner day for sure!  Mom informed me that her part of the itinerary - things she wanted to show me on this trip - has now wrapped up.  Still have two nights on the road after tonight - will see some friends along the way - but we are definitely making our way back to Indianapolis now... with one more new state tomorrow. :)