Today was an interesting day. First off we woke up before all the stoned bikers and made coffee, and slowly made our way out of town. We were south of Dead wood, and our first order of business was to see the infamous Mount Rushmore. Because it was so early we actually didn’t arrive when the place was open, yet I was able to find a parking spot and a way in, and we were the only people in the park for the early sunrise, and it was very good to see. I could only imagine how busy the park would be in such close proximity. Nonetheless after reading about the place, and taking the typical selfie we decided it was time to hit the road, and head eastward to the primary focus of the day….which is the Badlands of South Dakoda.
This national park is actually more unique in person than by photograph and is one the most interesting the national park system. It is called the badlands for the primitive landscape, but it truly is beautiful in its desolation. To get to this park we had to take a backroad from the interstate. This led us by huge fields of Sunflowers which was quite lovely to come across. We really enjoyed stopping and taking pictures of this, and after we got our fill of this it led us to the west ward entrance to the park. This was when things started to get interesting.
Ashley had already been to this park, but it was new territory to myself. She was almost a tour guide to me which rarely happens with how much I research about places. We did a few short hikes around the desolate towers of sandstone and took some pictures of the overlooks. The park itself doesn’t feature many varying landscapes yet had many different hikes. Whether you want a flat walkabout or an ascent of about 500ft there’s a trail for any type of hiker or back country camping. This was a nice surprise to stop here. After we drove the full park, we headed into the visitor center to learn about the place and get our National Park stamp.
It was at this time it was getting later in the day and thus time to head Eastward. We had to get to Ashleys dads house by the night time which was in a town of South Dakoda that was very primitive and small. We had to stop for dinner on the way at a plaza travel stop, with a nice buffett style restaurant. We headed eastward from there through the rain in the night and ended up at her dads around 10pm. This was my first time meeting him so it was a big night for me! All was good with that however, and we ended up having a few beers before the next day of hanging out at his house.
Today was a simple day as we were to spend time with her father. There was no sight seeing to be done, but rather time with him, as she had not seen him in a few years. He took us into town for breakfast and He was generous to pay for breakfast and then take us around the local areas. However it is South Dakoda, and it is not exactly a super exciting part of the country. Over all, the day was a decent day, and we decided to cook dinner with him and leave through the night to continue eastward into Minneapolis the next morning. We had to drive through the night with severe rain storms, but we were able to make it and successfully be safe by midnight.
EXPENSES
17.31 gas
13.51 coffee breakfast
24 cave tour
24 mammoth tour
2 coffee
19.94 lunch
11.10 gas
6.77 gas
5.25 sticker
48 dinner
2 gum
9.10 gas
Total – 182.98
Day 68 – August 6 – Ashleys Dad
64.79 groceries
Total – 64.79