Deadwood - Sturgis - Spearfish Canyon - Lead - Devil's Tower - Picnic Spring Campground, SD - Regent, ND

Tuesday, May 21 - Tuesday, May 28, 2024

On Wednesday, May 22 we hitched up and drove to Fish 'n Fry Campground near Deadwood, SD for three nights.  This campground had a pretty creek running through the back of it and our site backed up to the creek.  It had 50 amp electric and water.  This site didn't have sewer, however there was a dump station.  It was Passport America for only $26.50 per night.  They allow packages to be sent there so John is unwrapping all his goodies from Amazon.

On Thursday we drove through Deadwood, an old mining town, and stopped at the visitor's center.  Then we drove to Sturgis.  I wanted to go just to see it, but there was no way we were going in August for the motorcycle rally.  It was pretty quiet, even though it was Memorial Day weekend.

John bought a t-shirt and hat and I got my can coozie.  I collect those because they are small, don't weigh anything, are inexpensive, and I use them on my Yeti insulated cup.

After leaving Sturgis we went to Spearfish and did some grocery shopping (put the cold things in a cooler).  Then we drove through Spearfish Canyon.

I was a little disappointed.  It was pretty but nothing like what I expected.  There wasn't any signage to tell you where things were.  

The next stop was Lead (pronounced Leed).  We drove through the old mining town.  These mining towns were built down in the valley, so all the streets go up or down from the main street.  We stopped at the Sanford Lab Homestake Visitor Center.  The original ore body was discovered in 1876.  In 1877 the original claim was sold to George Hearst.  The Homestake Mine was in continuous operation for 126 years; over that time the miners extracted 41 million ounces of gold and 9 million ounces of silver.  They originally dug into the mountain, but then realized that the gold went very deep so they dug a pit.  It's a deep pit and we couldn't see all the way to the bottom of it.

If you look closely you can see small dots in the pit.  That was where the original shafts were.  After they closed the mine they started using the underground areas for scientific experiments.  There's a good website you can read if you're interested:  https://leadhistoricpreservation.org/about-lead/homestake-gold-mine

On Friday we went on a day trip to Devil's Tower.  It was a lot bigger than I had imagined.  It's 867' high from the visitor center to the summit.  It's 1,374 acres, about 2.15 square miles, and the first national monument, dedicated September 24, 1906 by Theodore Roosevelt.

We took the Tower Trail around the base, 1.7 miles.  I have to say this out of shape old girl did pretty good, although John could have done it twice in the time it took me to do it once.

John is looking good.  He's lost over 30 pounds!  Like his new hat?

The view from the trail was beautiful.

On Saturday we went to Picnic Spring Campground near Ludlow, SD.  I never knew the area north of the Black Hills was so unpopulated.  There weren't many campgrounds to choose from so we decided to try this forest service campground.  I was concerned that there wouldn't be any sites available because it was Memorial Day weekend but there were several.  It's dry camping, no hookups.  It was back about 5-1/2 miles on a gravel road, but really pretty.  We would go again.

We are heading for Theodore Roosevelt National Park.  Half of the sites in Cottonwood Campground are first come first serve.  We want to make sure we get in there on a weekday, so we decided to stop in Regent, ND at the south end of the Enchanted Highway.  We got to the Enchanted Highway Campground on Monday, May 27 and we're the only people here.  It's a little city campground with full hookups for $20 per night.

Here's the view from the window as I sit here writing this blog.

Today has been cleaning, laundry and blog day.  Tomorrow we'll go north and see all the sculptures on the Enchanted Highway.

Roving on...

"In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth".

Genesis 1:1

Nomad View in Buffalo National Grassland - Rapid City - Mt. Rushmore - Crazy Horse - Keystone, SD

Monday, May 13 - Monday, May 20, 2024

It's been a busy week again!

On Tuesday, May 14 we drove a few miles south of Wall to Nomad View, a very popular boondocking location on the edge (literally) of the Badlands.  When we got there it was cloudy and starting to rain.  The sun came out a little but then it was very windy all night, shaking the 5th wheel, which was a little nerve racking for me since the site wasn't level and the passenger side wheels weren't touching the ground.  The weather was going to be rainy for the next couple of days, so when we got up in the morning we decided to leave.  We'd 'been there, done that' and decided that was enough.  Maybe if we're in the area again and the weather is going to be  nice we'll try again.

We went to Lake Park Campground in Rapid City, SD for two nights.  It was full hookups but quite expensive at $74.35 per night, even with the Good Sam discount.  On Thursday we ran errands, got fuel and a car wash, and stocked up at Walmart.  The trees there had little flying sticky seeds that got on everything - 5th wheel, truck, clothes and shoes.  It was a pretty little campground with a very nice park a block away, but I don't know that we would return.

Friday we left for the big 21 mile trip to Holy Smoke Campground in Keystone, SD for five nights.  They had a special stay for four nights get the fifth one free.  Sounded like a deal to me!  It's full hookups for $44.18 per night, divided between the five nights (otherwise $50 per night).

Saturday we went on an all day tour with Black Hills Above and Beyond Tours.  It was well worth the $130 each.  Our tour guide, Karen, picked us up at the campground at 8:15.  There were three other people on the tour; a man from about an hour north of London in the U.K., and a couple from Utah.  Very nice people!

Our first stop was at Mt. Rushmore.  She gave us one hour to go through the visitor center, watch the film, take pictures, and of course visit the gift shop.  This is the first time either one of us have been in this part of the country and it's beautiful.

We're practicing our selfies.  Al least this one's better than the last one!  I'm not sure who those old people are though.

It was larger than I thought it would be.  Did you know that the 'stair steps' under Lincoln's chin were going to be his hand holding his lapel?  Originally they were going to carve the presidents from their waist up, but it didn't take them too long to decide that wasn't going to work!

From there we went Iron Mountain Road, with it's 'pigtail' bridges (they loop like a pig's tail) and granite tunnels.

All of the tunnels were designed to be able to see Mt. Rushmore going one way.

Iron Mountain Road competes with the Tail of the Dragon in North Carolina in relation to curves.  The Tail of the Dragon has 318 curves in 11 miles.  It was a beautiful drive!

On our way to lunch in Custer State Park Karen spotted some bison near a campground and pulled into the driveway.  I've seen bison, but never any this close.

He was a big one!  There was a cattle guard to keep them from going into the campground, but this guy figured that out and was headed for the campground when we left.

We went to the Game Lodge in Custer State Park for lunch.

John had a bison burger and I had bison stew.  I took a bite of John's burger and decided I like the stew better.  The burger had a little gamier taste.

After lunch we went on the Needles Highway.  The rock formations are beautiful!

Our next stop was the Needles Eye Tunnel.  It's 8' wide and 9'9" tall.

A lot of people think that the tunnel is the eye of the needle, but the tunnel is the Needles Eye Tunnel.  This is the Eye of the Needle.

We continued on the Needles Highway to Sylvan Lake, where we stopped for a few minutes.  It's a beautiful lake.  That weekend was free entrance and free fishing.  We saw a couple of guys that had several really nice trout.

From there we went to Crazy Horse Memorial.  She gave us a little over an hour to see the film, museum, other buildings, and of course Crazy Horse.

This is the model of what it will look like when it's finished.  You can see the sculpture so far in the background if you look close.  Remember, you can click on the pictures and make them larger.

From Crazy Horse we went back to Custer State Park to do the Wildlife Loop Road.  We saw prairie dogs, bluebirds, pronghorns...

...and donkeys!  These donkeys know that the tourists will feed and pet them.  Karen had some carrots and spinach for them.  She knew they liked the carrots and the spinach she had that was about to go bad.  She found out they don't like spinach.

Soon after we left the donkeys we went around a corner and there must have been a herd of at least 200 bison.  Most were mamas with their babies.  I've never been so close to so many bison.  Of course we had to stay in the van so the pictures we took have reflections on them.

It was after 6:00 by the time we got back to the campground.  What a wonderful day; so many memories!  If you're ever in the area take this tour; it's well worth it!

Sunday we took a picnic lunch and scouted out some boondocking locations in the Black Hills National Forest.  We haven't done that in a really long time and it was fun.  The weather forecast called for rain, and it started raining as we were leaving the last location.  Between Custer and Hill City the temperature dropped from 70 degrees to 33 degrees in less than 10 minutes, it started hailing and then big snow splatters hit the windshield.  We got through it and less than 5 minutes later the temperature was 58 degrees.  We've never experienced something like that before!

Today I spent on my computer figuring out where we're going from here, what we're going to do at our next stop, and working on the blog.  Tomorrow I'm going to relax!

We'll soon being roving on...

"In the beginning God created the heavens and the earth".

Genesis 1:1