We woke up pretty early to head to South Dakota. Much of the morning was spent driving through Minnesota, with brief stops at the cleanest & nicest gas station rest rooms you will likely find in the US. We continued to read American God, and had just gotten to a brief part about a man named Salim, when we pulled into Sioux Falls for Lunch. Ria said "I want to eat something you can't get anywhere else, and I'd really like it to be healthy" And there on our left appeared.
Who would have thought you could get Ethiopian in South Dakota? they had a nice little outdoor patio where we ate. 
The proprietor came out to talk with us at the end of lunch. He was very concerned with communication with Ethiopia, and getting the word out there to Americans. He gave me a website to link up to, and I will as soon as the stuff I mailed to myself at the end of the trip arrives at my apartment.We then traveled on along through South Dakota
We kept seeing signs for a corn palace, and learned that it was free to visit, so we made a brief stop to visit. The corn palace is actually in a gym which high school and college kids will play basketball in. Can you imagine playing for your high school team surrounded my giant corn designs?
After a few more hours on the road we stopped by a scenic view site where you could see wildflowers, and lands stretching out across SD, but the most impressive part for me was the wind. It didn't bowl you over, but it's presence was mighty. Ria decided to do a Kata.
We also discovered that wind makes Joey dirty.
She really needed her teeth brushed.We thought the views were impressive there, but then we got to badlands.
Ria was so overwhelmed she cried. I had the urge to go run around the top of the ledges, feel the wind and see the heights, but then I thought about the possibility of dying and decided against it. It was AMAZING. This was one of the best places to see on the trip in my opinion. I have a ridiculous amount of pictures, because I would drive, stick my camera out the window and just click, and most of them were pretty decent shots. However I will try to contain myself to only posting so many so they don't get boring. (My parents watched a slide show of all my pictures, and the badlands section was long enough for someone to cook dinner during it)
Sometimes erosion took the sides of something, but left the top to grow.We got there shortly before sunset, which made for some beautiful shadows.
You could travel on the walkway
But because it was already desert like,you could travel off the beaten path and explore.
do some real hands on stuff
The views and the paths were amazing.
Please pause for bunny.
And there was some variety to the landscape as well.
Camping at Sunset should have been one of the best experiences, except I got a little frustrated because my tent pole broke after the second time I used it. I got angry. Ria got creative, and sacrificed her tweezers. Again once the stuff I mailed arrives, I will be bringing the tent back to EMS to see if I can get a new pole. There is no way a tent pole should break that quickly.Still after my burst of anger and frustration, we did manage to get the tent set up, and caught the sunset before going to a talk given by the ranger.
Because it was so clear during the ranger's talk we could see the fireworks from Mt Rushmore that was miles away. They were a nice addition to the talk on clean air.By that time we were ready to try and get some sleep. There was a lot of wind, but I still slept pretty well, and I highly recommend Badlands as a camping spot.
Next up: 4th of July
No comments:
Post a Comment