The Dakota's Capitols and Other Places on the Prairie

Hi there, welcome back. Our last chapter concluded on Monday, June 8^th, when we arrived in Pierre, South Dakota. We traveled to Pierre from Wall, South Dakota and settled into a nice spot at the River View RV Resort. On Tuesday we went out after lunch to do some exploring of Pierre. We have never been here before. We spent an hour or so driving around the main part of town, just getting a feel for the city. Pierre is not a large city, only about 14,000 population, the second smallest state capitol city in the U.S. Pierre was founded in 1880 in the Dakota Territory and became the capitol of South Dakota in 1889 when both North and South Dakota achieved statehood.

We stopped at the Chamber of Commerce and picked up some material and we did a little geocaching and got five new finds, along with one DNF. By that time the temperature was about 98, so we decided to quit caching for a while. We went into the capitol building, which opened in 1910, and did the self guided tour. It is a very pretty building with lots of marble staircases and trim, and very extensive and interesting mosaic floors.  The story in the guidebook is that when the capitol was being built they brought in 66 Italian artists experienced with mosaic tile.  Each of the artists was given a single blue stone, a color not used for any of the other tiles.  The artists could place these blue tiles anywhere they wanted.  Supposedly, only 55 of the 66 have been found.  Since the artists made no record of the tile placements, it is not known if they simply were not set, or if they are covered up by changes in wall placement over the years, or just haven't been found.  We were able to locate three of the tiles during our tour, but a single blue tile in a sea of tiles is a little hard to spot.

The second tile story relates to the renovation of the capitol building in the 1980's.  Workers were brought in to repair hundreds of feet of cracks in the mosaic floors, caused by settling of the building over the years. Each of these workers were given a small, heart shaped tile to place as a "signature stone."  These were of various colors.  We were able to find two of these, one white and one black.  The black one had a crack and the legend is that the worker had received a "dear John" letter while working on the building and had cracked his tile to symbolize his broken heart.  Maybe, maybe not, but it makes a nice story.  The entire interior of the capitol dome is stained glass, as are the ceilings in most of the other major rooms like the legislative chambers.  We had a very enjoyable hour or so walking around the building. After the capitol tour we did a driving tour of turn of the century mansions based on a booklet we got at the Chamber. This city has dozens of really fine examples of late 19^th and early 20^th century homes. Once our touring was done we did a Walmart run and then went back to the coach for the rest of the night.

Wednesday, June 10^th, it was raining on and off, and was likely to be doing that all day. We headed out after lunch and drove to the South Dakota Governor's Mansion, which is located across a small park and lake from the capitol building. We had discovered yesterday morning, while reading some of the tourist material the gal from the RV park gave us, that there were tours of the mansion, but only on Wednesday and you had to sign up at least a day in advance. We had called in our reservation and picked up our tickets at the Chamber of Commerce yesterday. The tour started at 1:00 and there were probably two dozen people on today's tour.

The first thing they had everyone do when they came into the foyer was to put on paper booties, like they wear in the operating room. Then, while we were all in the foyer, Linda Daugaard, the Governor's wife and the First Lady of South Dakota, came in with one of her young grandsons, and welcomed us to the tour. This is actually the residence of the sitting governor and his or her family, as well as a public building. One of the two volunteer guides explained that the house, which is about ten years old now, is just under 15,000 square feet and about a third of that is the private residence portion. That part, obviously, was not in the tour. The rest of the house is used for official functions and VIP guests.

This building is the third State-owned governor's residence to be in this location. The first was a fairly small wood house purchased by the State in 1925. In 1936 that building was sold and moved to another location in town. The new residence was built as part of the Works Progress Administration (WPA) and served as the official Residence until 2003. At that time it too was sold and moved, this one going to Rapid City, almost 200 miles southwest, where it became an events center. The newest residence is very pretty and is a combination of wood and stone construction, with aluminum siding, like many of the other houses in South Dakota.

The tour took us through the downstairs “great room”, which is basically a big dining/reception hall with a very beautiful two-sided fireplace in the center. There is also a big, commercial kitchen, which is used for events. The private residence side has it's own regular household kitchen for the first family. Upstairs on the public side are two VIP bedrooms and a sitting room. The residence side has five bedrooms for the family's use. We also saw the Governor's home office, which is in addition to his office at the State Capitol. The tour took a little over an hour and was very interesting.

After the tour we took a drive up to the Oahe Dam and Power Plant. Oahe dam is a Corps of Engineers project, built between 1948 and 1959. It is an earthen dam on the Missouri River, with a downstream power plant, and it creates Oahe Lake, the fourth largest man-made lake in the U.S. It stretches 231 miles north along the course of the river, reaching all the way to Bismarck, North Dakota. We drove along the top of the dam and around the power plant, getting a couple of geocaches in the process. We ended up with four new caches on the day. After touring for a while we headed back to the coach for cocktails and dinner and stayed in the rest of the night.

Thursday, June 11^th, I went out after lunch and took the Jeep to the dealer in Pierre for an oil change. The work took about ninety minutes and then I did a quick trip to Walmart for some things that we had forgotten the other day. Jackie spent the afternoon doing some administrative stuff related to her duties as a Regional Director for Monaco International. She was sending some letters out to new coach owners and that sort of thing. After I got back from my errands we spent the rest of the day and evening in the coach.

Friday, June 12^th, we left the RV park after lunch and went out for a final day of caching and exploring Pierre. We were able to get five new finds, and two DNFs, for the afternoon. We stopped at the mall and walked the length of it just for the exercise. It is not a huge mall and the anchor stores are Penny's and Kmart. We were able to find the Folger's Simply Smooth coffee that we drink at Kmart. We have had trouble finding it at food stores recently. On the way home we stopped at KFC and let the Colonel cook us dinner.

Saturday, June 13^th, another travel day in our push towards Madison, Wisconsin. We left Pierre a little after 10:00 and started north towards Menoken, North Dakota, a little town about ten miles east of Bismarck, North Dakota, the capitol of the state. This trip was just over 200 miles, longer than we have driven recently, and about at the edge of what we like to drive in a day. This trip was all non-freeway, U.S. 83 to be exact, and was two lane road for the most part. There was very little traffic and the weather was really nice, so it was an easy, enjoyable trip that took a little over four hours. We arrived at the Prairie Breeze RV park in Menoken about 2:30 or so and in ninety minutes we were all hooked up and settled in, just in time for a series of afternoon thundershowers. All of the storms missed direct hits on us, so all we got was rain and a light show from the distant thunderstorms. We will be here near Bismarck for another five day stay and are looking forward to exploring another place we have never been.

Sunday, June 14^th, Flag Day and the 240^th Anniversary of the United States Army. We headed out from the RV park after lunch and drove into Bismarck, about ten miles west. Bismarck is the Capitol of North Dakota and the second largest city after Fargo. The population is about 62,000, significantly larger than Pierre, South Dakota's capitol. The city was founded in 1872 as a rail stop on the Northern Pacific Line and was named after the then Chancellor of Germany, Otto von Bismarck, in hopes of attracting German investors and settlers to the area. We drove past the capitol building, which is a 19 story skyscraper and is the tallest building in the state. It does not have a dome and really doesn't resemble what most people think of as a capitol building. Locally it is known as the Skyscraper on the Prairie.

Our first stop was a laundromat, as we needed to do our laundry. After we did laundry we did a couple of geocaches, our first in North Dakota. We had two finds and one DNF before deciding to stop at Sam's Club and Walmart for some supplies. We finished everything up and were back home about 6:00 where we stayed in the rest of the night.

Monday, June 15^th, we left the coach about 12:30 and drove into Bismarck to the Bismarck-Mandan Elks Lodge for lunch. The Lodge does lunch five days a week and dinners six nights a week. It is Lodge #1199 and was chartered in 1910. They claim to be one of the largest lodges in the country with 4,500 members. They have a very nice, large building with great facilities. They have a big auditorium and ballroom, a huge bar, a very nice restaurant, exercise facilities, and large grounds. We heard they had RV parking, but didn't see them this trip. There were not very many people in the dining room for lunch and it was a buffet with one hot item, and a sandwich bar. The food was OK, but I probably wouldn't make it a regular place if I lived here. We were able to get a lodge pin for our banner since we have never visited this lodge before.

After lunch we went out to do some geocaching. We had a great afternoon, getting 14 new finds, including our number 7,100, as well as one new DNF. After caching we stopped at Sam's Club again to get a couple of clothing items that we saw yesterday. After that stop we headed back home and stayed in for the rest of the day.

Tuesday, June 16^th, my oldest daughter Tye's birthday. Happy birthday! Today is also the 45^th anniversary of the day I was sworn in as a Maricopa County Deputy Sheriff in Phoenix. Wow, time flies. It had been raining most of the night and was still raining in the morning. The forecast called for rain most of the day. No storms, just a lot of steady rain. We decided to still go out and do some exploring, trying to go to inside places. We drove into Bismarck and headed to the capitol grounds so we could go inside the capitol building. We arrived just in time to catch one of the free tours around the inside of the capitol.

The building, as I said earlier, is the tallest in the state and was opened in 1934. It was built after the original capitol building was completely destroyed by fire in December 1930. The building has an art deco motif with lots of granite, exotic woods from all over the country, and lots of polished brass. It has an understated elegance, but is clear that functionality came first in the design. We were able to go into both the Senate and House chambers since the North Dakota legislature only meets for 80 days every two years, unless the Governor calls a special session. A true “citizen legislature.” We were also able to go into the Supreme Court courtroom as there were no hearings going on. The final stop was the observation floor on the 18^th floor of the tower. It was too bad that it was so cloudy and rainy as the views must be spectacular when the weather is clear. We spent an hour or so in the building, looking at pictures and walking around.

After we left the capitol building we drove to the former Governor's Mansion, about a mile from the capitol. It is now a museum that is open to public. The site consists of a large two and one-half story, restored Victorian house and a carriage house. Constructed in 1884, it housed 20 chief executives between 1893 and 1960. There are various room exhibits featuring the restoration process, architectural style changes, and furniture used by several governors. This house was the North Dakota governors' residence from 1893 to 1960. It was built in 1884 as a private residence and sold to the state for $5,000 in 1893.

In 1975 the State of North Dakota gave the State Historical Society the house with the hope that it would operate as a historic house museum. Extensive research and restoration has been completed, restoring the house to its former appearance as it might have been in 1893. Throughout the house are restoration features which are highlighted to show visitors what work has been done. One of the more interesting of these are frames on the wall in which they

preserved the various layers of wallpaper used in the particular room. The old wallpaper was never removed, just covered over, so they are able to “drill down” to the various layers. We spent a half hour or so walking around the house, all the way up to the attic. We had also driven by the current governor's residence, which is located on the capitol grounds, and just looks like a nice, big brick ranch style home. They don't give tours of the current residence.

After the old governor's mansion we drove around downtown for a while and then stopped a big antique mall. We were shopping in there for about ninety minutes. I was finally able to find a reasonably priced example of the Jim Beam Elks decanter. When we first went full time I had both of the Jim Beam decanters dedicated to the Elks, but one of them got broken not too long after we started. I have seen a few in stores, but most wanted forty dollars or more. This one was $12, so it went home with us. When we were done with the antique store we headed back to the coach and stayed in the rest of the night.

Wednesday, June 17^th, we went out after lunch to visit the zoo. The weather forecast was for partly cloudy and cool, but no rain. The zoo in Bismarck is called The Dakota Zoo and is located on the west side of the city, adjacent to the Missouri River. The zoo was founded as a non-profit private entity in 1961 with fewer than 100 animals. Over the years additional land was donated by the City of Bismarck and the zoo now has over 600 animals of 125 species on 90 acres of land. It is still primarily supported by a non-profit foundation through donations and memberships to the zoo.

Once we got into the park we took the tram ride through the entire facility, which took about a half hour. Once we got off the tram we walked around most of the exhibits and watched the animals. Since it is spring time there were a lot of baby animals, which are always fun to watch, especially the monkey babies. The Dakota Zoo does not have some of the larger animals, such as elephants, giraffes and bears. They did have a couple of grizzlies, but no other bears. Most of their big animals are the ungulates, moose, elk, deer, antelope, and mountain sheep and goats. They do have a nice selection of big cats, Bengals, both white and regular, cougars, and bobcats. No lions though. We spent about three hours in the zoo, enjoying the animals. They also have a lot of barnyard animals for the kids (and animal lovers like us) to pet. A couple of miniature horses and donkeys, pigs and goats.

After the zoo we went to the mall and walked around for a while doing some window shopping and killing time before going to the Elks Lodge for dinner. We went into the Elks around 6:15 or so and ate in the dining room. They have an extensive menu and serve six nights a week. I had the liver and onions, which was outstanding. Jackie had the local Walleye and enjoyed it as well. We had an appetizer of chicken gizzards, which were tasty and inexpensive. We were very happy with the food, although the service left a little to be desired. I think we had a new server. We finished dinner around 8:00 and headed back to the coach, very full of food, and stayed in the rest of the evening.

Thursday, June 18^th, another travel day. We were packed up and on the road by 10:30 or so. We were traveling 87 miles east today to Jamestown, North Dakota. We had some rain showers early in the morning and a brief period of rain while on the road, but the closer we got to Jamestown the clearer it got. By the time we got to Jamestown and checked into the Jamestown Campground the sun was out and it was just partly cloudy.

Unlike many of our stops recently, we have been to Jamestown before, back in 2005, our first year on the road. We were on our way to our first FMCA rally in Minot, North Dakota, in August and we stopped here in Jamestown for a couple nights to meet up with a group of friends from Southern California. We then all traveled to Minot together, and stayed together for a couple of weeks while we toured the Black Hills after the rally. We had even stayed in this same campground on that trip.

Jamestown was founded in 1872 as a railroad stop and is the ninth largest city in North Dakota with just under 16,000 population. It is primarily an industrial and agricultural support center, having easy access to the main northern rail line. There are a couple of museums and they boast the world's largest buffalo, a huge cement structure that we have pictures of from our first visit here in 2005. We will be here for three days before moving on to Fargo, North Dakota. After we got settled in we did a Walmart run and then relaxed in the coach the rest of the day.

Friday, June 19^th, we left the coach after lunch and went out to explore and do some geocaching. We had a decent afternoon, finding nine new geocaches and two DNFs for our efforts. We also spent some time driving around Jamestown, checking out the small downtown and some of the neighborhoods. While driving around we were pleased, and surprised, to find an Elks Lodge near downtown. I say surprised because when we were here ten years ago we were with a large group of friends, all of whom were Elks. Had there been an Elks Lodge here then, I have no doubt we would have gone, and we hadn't.

We stopped at the Lodge, which is in a commercial building, to see if they had hours posted. The door was unlocked, so I went in and checked out the place. There didn't appear to be anyone around until I found the Secretary of the Lodge in her office. The bar wasn't open yet, but we talked and I told her about being here ten years ago and not seeing a Lodge. She said that was about the time the Lodge sold it's old building downtown and was without a home for a few years. She said they had been in this building for about four years. I was able to get a lodge pin for our banner from her.

We continued our touring until about 4:30, when we went back to the Elks for a drink. There were quite a few people in the bar and one of the older members, a guy named Tex, talked to us for a while. He was an old time member, former ER for a couple of terms, and he confirmed what the Secretary told me, that the lodge was closed for a while. We had a couple of drinks, one of which was on the house, and left after about an hour. We went back to the coach and stayed in the rest of the night.

Saturday, June 20^th, we went out after lunch to do some caching and exploring. We were able to get eight caches and two DNFs for the afternoon. We also spent a little time at the Frontier Fort, a tourist attraction featuring an ersatz western town, a buffalo herd, and the giant cement buffalo. We wandered through a few shops and watched their mock gunfight for a while. It was really more of a street play and it got a little boring. We ended up leaving before the lead started flying. After we got back to the coach we just relaxed the rest of the day.

Sunday, June 21^st, Happy Father's Day! Today was a travel day for us. We were packed up and on the road by 10:30, headed to Fargo, North Dakota, about 90 miles east. We arrived at the Red River Valley Fairgrounds RV park about 12:30 and got settled into a nice spot overlooking a big green field. We were originally going to stay here for five days, but when I checked in I noticed that the fee was $30 a day, but only $120 a week. Five days at the daily rate would have been $150. I paid for the week, if we decide to leave early, we still save money. We have some slack in the schedule and will probably stay for the whole week, depending on the weather. After we got setup we stayed in for the rest of the day, taking care of some home chores.

Our arrival here marks a good point to publish this episode. It has been almost two weeks since the last chapter was put up. Until next time, remember the words of well known travel writer, Rolf Potts. “Long-term travel doesn’t require a massive bundle of cash; it requires only that we walk through the world in a more deliberate way.” Good thing, because we can't find our massive bundle of cash. See ya soon.

Exploring the Prairie and the Northern Plains

Hello again friends. Our last episode ended on Friday, May 22nd, when we arrived in Casper, Wyoming and settled into the Fort Caspar Campground for a four day stay. Casper is the second-largest city in Wyoming, with a population of over 55,000. Casper is nicknamed "The Oil City" and has a long history of oil boom town and cowboy culture, dating back to development of the nearby Salt Creek Oil Field, starting in about 1890. The town was initially founded as a rail stop a few years before the discovery of the oil fields. The name comes from Fort Caspar, which was founded in the mid 1800's during the Indian Wars and the migration west along the Oregon Trail. The Fort was closed a few years later but the name stuck when the city was founded. I couldn't find any documentation regarding how the name became spelled with an “E” rather than an “A”. In the last 25 years there have also been significant nearby discoveries of coal and uranium which has become a big part of the local economy also.

Saturday, May 23rd, we left the coach around noon and went out for lunch, some exploring, and, of course, some geocaching. We stopped at a Mexican restaurant called Guadalajara which had been advertised in the information from the campground. It was a large, nicely decorated place that reminded me of a Garcia's or one of the other large chain places. It is a local chain with four locations in Wyoming and Colorado. The service was good and the food was plentiful and very good. I had the usual mix of enchilada, relleno and taco and the food was as good as any in Arizona or California. Jackie had machaca and she thought it was good, although perhaps slightly overcooked.

After lunch we went out to explore the downtown area and do some geocaching. We got seven new finds and one DNF before the rain started again and we continued our sightseeing in the rain. We found the Elks Lodge in a nice old brick building downtown, but unfortunately, it was closed for the entire holiday weekend, so we would not be able to visit. After an hour or so of driving around town we headed back to the coach for the rest of the day. We discovered that after the many, many days of rain we seemed to have developed a small leak in the ceiling of the coach. Not in one of the slides, but rather right in the middle of the coach. I suspect that the caulking around one of the vents or skylights has started to leak. It was not a lot of water coming in, but we had to put out some towels to keep the floor dry.

Sunday, May 24th, we had a little rain overnight, but there were actually patches of blue sky when we woke up. I went out and got a Sunday paper and we had a nice morning with the paper, the Sunday news shows and coffee. After lunch we went out with still partly cloudy skies. Our first stop was the nearby County Fairgrounds for the annual Casper Car Show. We had seen a bunch of the cars yesterday parked at a “cruise in” on one of the downtown streets, but we hadn't been able to find close parking, so we didn't stop. Today was the actual car show at the fairgrounds so we stopped and spent an hour or so walking around looking at the cars. It was the usual mix of street rods, restored old cars and newer hot cars. After the car show we set out to do some geocaching. We were able to get three new finds before the rain came down off the mountain and we had to quit. We decided to stop at Walmart before heading home to get some supplies. After Walmart we headed back to the coach where we stayed in for the rest of the day.

Monday, May 25th, Memorial Day. Although the skies were still cloudy when we got up, we hadn't had any rain all night. After lunch we went out to do some geocaching and had a pretty good afternoon. In a few hours we got a dozen new finds and one DNF. After caching we hit a couple of grocery stores, still looking for our brand of coffee. We then headed back to the coach and stayed in the rest of the evening. We only had a couple of sprinkles all day, a nice change.

Tuesday, May 26th, another travel day. We actually woke up to mostly clear skies and lots of sun. We were packed up and on the road by about 10:30, continuing north on Interstate 25 to our next destination, Buffalo, Wyoming. Buffalo is a small town on the front range of the Big Horn Mountains. It was founded in the mid 1800's mostly as a cattle town. In the late 1800's it was the center of the Johnson County war, which pitted the cattle barons, expanding their operations west from the plains, against local small ranchers and homesteaders. Today the town's economic engine is methane gas from the coal fields surrounding the area. The population of Buffalo is about 5,000. We arrived at the Deer Park RV park about 12:30 and got settled into a very nice site. We decided to just stay in and enjoy the nice weather, so we hung around the coach the rest of the day.

Wednesday, May 27th, the morning was pretty clear and there had been no rain overnight. Since it was dry I ran into town in the morning and got some caulk and went up on the roof and sealed a couple of areas I though might be the source of our small leak. We left the coach after lunch to do some exploring of Buffalo and some geocaching. We have never been to this part of Wyoming, so we were looking forward to checking out the town. The downtown is small, but very quaint. There are a dozen or so late 19th century buildings along main street and some really nice homes from that same era. Most everywhere we went in town it appeared that people took really good care of their property and it was a very nice place.

There were not a lot of caches in town, but in the course of the afternoon we were able to get seven new finds. One of them took us to the original Fort McKinney site just west of town. The site is now occupied by the Wyoming Veteran's Home and still uses the fort's original hospital building as part of the complex. One of the caches took us about ten miles south of town, out in the open range, where we got a good, close look at some of the many antelope wandering the area. We also saw a couple of deer wandering around the grounds of the RV park. After caching we headed back to the motor home and relaxed the rest of the night.

Thursday, May 28th, we woke up to another cool but fairly clear day. We went into town and had lunch at a place called Taco John's. They are a big fast food chain in this part of the country and would be comparable to Taco Bell or Del Taco. The food was OK, I would put it between Del Taco, my favorite, and Taco Bell, not so much. After lunch we drove downtown and parked and spent a couple hours in the afternoon walking around, going into antique shops and just

enjoying this very nice, small town. We went into the historic Occidental Hotel to look around. The lobby of the hotel takes you right back to the turn of the century. The hotel was established in Buffalo in 1880 in a log and lumber building. Between 1903 and 1910 the large, brick building was built that now houses the hotel. We had a good time looking at all the historic pictures on the walls of the downstairs hallways. The saloon has dozens of stuffed animals and heads on the walls and really pretty back bar. Among the guests of the Occidental have been Buffalo Bill Cody, Calamity Jane, Presidents Teddy Roosevelt and Herbert Hoover, and Ernest Hemingway. Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid were frequent visitors as their hideout, the “Hole in the Wall” was not too far outside of Buffalo up in the Big Horn Mountains. We had an enjoyable afternoon exploring the town. After our tour we went back to to the coach and spent the rest of the evening watching TV.

Friday, May 29th, we woke up to a fairly clear day after a night of steady rain. The good thing is that there was no water in the coach, so I must have fixed the leak the other day. Yea! After lunch we went out and did our laundry. We finished about 3:00 and were going to go do some errands, but when we got everything packed in the car it wouldn't start, the battery was dead. I had noticed that it was a little slow starting the last few days, but I attributed it to the cold weather. A guy at the laundry had a big Dodge truck and he jumped us to get us started. I dropped Jackie and the laundry off at the coach and went to the NAPA store in town. They had one battery in my size, which I changed out right in front of the store. All better now. Yea again! After getting the car fixed I went back to the coach and we stayed in the rest of the evening.

Saturday, May 30th we woke up to blue skies and bright sun. Yea! Today is another travel day, so we were packed up and ready to go by about 10:00. This is the point in our travels where we make a right turn and start east again. Buffalo is at the intersection of I-25 and I-90, so we left the park and got on I-90, headed for Sturgis, South Dakota, about 185 miles east. The trip was uneventful except for the winds, which made driving tricky, and we arrived at the No Name City RV park a couple miles east of Sturgis, about 2:00. Odd name for an RV park, but a nice place with big, full hookup spots, lots of grass and a nice view of the green hills and forest across the freeway. It is close to the freeway, but there is no where near as much traffic as you find on freeways in places like California. There is also a railroad track right in front of us, but I think it is a spur line without a lot of traffic. One small train went by in the afternoon, nothing since.

Sturgis, of course, is best known for the huge motorcycle rally held usually the first full week in August. The rally began in 1938 and was originally based around riders who did stunts and held races. Over the years it has just grown into a gathering of motorcycle enthusiasts. Sturgis is a small town of less than 7,000 people, but hosts hundreds of thousands of guests during the rally. The average attendance is something over 400,000, but in 2000 there were 633,000 attendees. It is estimated that the rally brings in $800 million in revenue to the state, most along the 50 mile stretch of Interstate 90, from Spearfish to Rapid City. We will be here for five days, touring the Black Hills area. We have also never geocached in South Dakota, so it will be a new state for us. After we got setup we relaxed in the coach and let the wind blow.

Sunday, May 31st, we awoke to a bright, sunny morning and left the coach after lunch to do some exploring. We first headed for Deadwood, South Dakota, about 18 miles southwest in the Black Hills. Deadwood was founded in 1874 at the beginning of the Black Hills Gold Rush, which had it's start when General George Custer announced the discovery of Gold about 40 miles south. The town was located in Indian Territory, originally ceded to the Lakota Peoples, so it was basically lawless. The town struggled in the early 20th Century and was nearly destroyed by fire several times. It was declared a historic landmark in 1961 and in 1989 gambling was legalized in Deadwood and the town began to prosper. It is probably best known as the place where Wild Bill Hickok was killed in a local saloon in 1876. He is buried in the local cemetery, along with Calamity Jane and several other notable people of the time.

We arrived in Deadwood and went to the Deadwood Social Club for lunch. It was upstairs, over a casino in a turn of the century building. The lunch menu was somewhat limited, so I had a meatball sub and Jackie had a bison burger. I also had a cup of bison and rice soup, which was very good. The restaurant had high ratings, but we thought it was OK at best. My meatballs were tasty, but not much sauce. Jackie's burger was good, but the onion rings were greasy. It was a mixed bag, although the service was pretty good. After lunch we spent an hour or so walking around main street, checking out the casinos and doing some gaming. We didn't win anything, but had a good time.

We also did a couple of caches in Deadwood, our first South Dakota geocaches. We then went to Lead, pronounced “LEED”, the next town over which was also a gold mining town. We explored a little there and did a couple more geocaches before leaving the area and driving back to Spearfish via the Spearfish Canyon route. This scenic road goes from south of Deadwood-Lead up to Spearfish, a fairly big town on Interstate 90, about 25 miles west of Sturgis. We stopped in Spearfish to shop at Walmart, and also did a couple of caches there. We ended up with four new finds for the day. After shopping we went back to the coach and stayed in the rest of the night.

Monday, June 1st, was forecast to be the warmest day we have seen yet this year, in the low 80's. We left the coach after lunch to do some more geocaching and exploring. We cached the area around the RV park and then in towards Sturgis. I already provided some of the facts about Sturgis, but driving around town we really noticed how centered around the motorcycle culture the town is. Nearly everything in town has some reference to

motorcycles. The town has a half dozen bars, but they are HUGE. One took up an entire city block. There are also a lot of well maintained empty lots, which I am sure are there for parking during bike week. We had a good afternoon of caching, getting 14 new finds before we decided to call it a day and go back to the park. After we got back I spent a little time in the park's indoor hot tub and then we spent the rest of the afternoon and evening in the coach.

Tuesday, June 2nd, we left the coach after lunch and drove to Rapid City, about 24 miles east of the park. Rapid City is the second largest city in South Dakota, after Sioux Falls, with about 70,000 population. The town was founded in 1876 shortly after the discover of gold in the Black Hills and is known as the “Gateway to the Black Hills.” The main economic engines are tourism, light industry and nearby Ellsworth Air Force Base, formerly one of the Midwest’s ICBM bases, now home to the B-1 strategic bomber fleet. The city is famous for the great flood of 1972 when the Rapid Creek, from which the city takes it's name, flooded after more than 15 inches of rain fell in a few hours on the watershed. More than 250 people were killed in the flooding and nearly 1,500 homes destroyed.

We spent a couple of hours driving and walking around parts of Rapid City. We also did a couple of geocaches, but mostly just played tourist. We got back to the coach about 3:30 and I went to the hot tub again for a while. Around 8:00 we started getting a series of storms coming through the area, dropping a lot of rain, but thankfully no hail. We still have no new leaks, so the rain is confined to the outside. When we went to bed it was still raining, but about two in the morning I woke up and all was quiet. Wednesday we decided to just have a stay at home day. Both of us got a few chores done and I spent a little time in the hot tub again.

Thursday, June 4th, another travel day. Today is the tenth anniversary of our moving into the motor home full time. The house closed on the 3rd of June, 2005, and we took delivery of the coach on the 4th. We had to travel from Indio to Ehrenberg, Arizona with a professional driver in the coach, to take delivery. We signed the papers in the Wendy's at the Flying J Truck Stop, the driver unhooked his car from the back of the coach, handed me the keys to the motor home, and left. I had to drive the 100 miles from Ehrenberg back to Indio on my own, after never having driven anything bigger than our 27 foot Class C. That was ten years ago and we are still happily enjoying being “homeless” with our 40 foot shopping cart.

We packed up and left the RV park in Sturgis just before 11:00 and headed east on Interstate 90 again. Our destination was Wall, South Dakota, about 77 miles away. After a stop for fuel we arrived at the Sleepy Hollow RV park in Wall about 12:30 and quickly got settled in. It was an easy drive, with no rain for a change. We are going to be here in Wall for four days. Wall is a small town of less than 800 that was founded in 1918 as a railroad stop. Today is mostly known as the gateway to the South Dakota Badlands, and Wall Drug.

This small town drugstore made its first step towards fame when it was purchased by Ted Hustead in 1931. Hustead was a Nebraska native and pharmacist who was looking for a small town with a Catholic church in which to establish his business. He bought Wall Drug, located in Wall, which then had 231 people, in what he referred to as "the middle of nowhere," and strove to make a living. Being the recession, business was very slow until his wife, Dorothy, got the idea to advertise free ice water to thirsty travelers heading to the newly opened Mount Rushmore monument 60 miles to the west. From that time on business was brisk.

Wall Drug grew into a cowboy-themed shopping mall and department store. Wall Drug includes a western art museum, a chapel, and an 80-foot brontosaurus that can be seen right off Interstate 90. Wall Drug earns much of its fame from its self-promotion. Billboards advertising the establishment can be seen for hundreds of miles throughout South Dakota and the neighboring states. In addition, many visitors of Wall Drug have erected signs throughout the world announcing the miles to Wall Drug from famous locations, treating it as a geodesic datum. By 1981 Wall Drug was claiming it was giving away 20,000 cups of water per day during the peak tourist season, lasting from Memorial Day until Labor Day, and during the hottest days of the summer. Most of Wall Drug's advertisement billboards can be found on an approximately 650-mile-long stretch of Interstate 90 from Minnesota to Billings, Montana. Wall Drug spends an estimated $400,000 on billboards every year. On our trip from Sturgis there was at least a small billboard every quarter mile.

Wall Drug still offers free ice water, but as they have become more popular, they have started to offer free bumper stickers and signs to aid in promotion, and coffee for 5 cents. Some popular free bumper stickers read "Where the heck is Wall Drug?", "How many miles to Wall Drug?", and "Where in the world is Wall Drug?".

When the United States Air Force was still operating Minuteman missile silos in the western South Dakota plains, Wall Drug used to offer free coffee and donuts to service personnel if they stopped in on their way to or from Ellsworth Air Force Base 50 miles west of Wall. Wall Drug continues to offer free coffee and a donut to honeymooners, veterans, priests, hunters, truck drivers, and other travelers. We are also close to the Badlands National Park, a Minuteman Missile Museum, and a few other interesting areas. We are looking forward to our first stay in this area. After we got setup we stayed in for the rest of the day.

Friday, June 5th, we headed out after lunch to explore Wall, South Dakota. Since the town is only four square miles, we figured we could get it done in an afternoon. First stop was, of course, the Wall Drug Store, on main street. The “store” now takes up an entire city block with what is basically a giant souvenir shop. The interior is divided into a number of different shops, western wear, western art, souvenirs, clothing, a huge restaurant, and an actual drug store, although it is only a couple hundred square feet in size. They also have lots of tourist trap things like a huge, animated T-Rex, an eight foot jackalope, a lot of stuffed game animals, and a huge collection of historic photos from the central west area.

We spent about two hours in the Wall Drug store, then walked the two block main street, looking in all the other shops that have sprung up to soak up some of the Wall Drug business. It was interesting, but this is clearly a one time thing. It's a kitschy bit of Americana that you have to see once, but only once. Jackie was sort of expecting a giant hardware store of sorts, and was a little disappointed that it was just a tourist trap.

After touring the Wall Drug, and getting a tee shirt, of course, we went out to do some caching. Surprisingly, given the tourist pull of the town, there are very few caches around. We did three in town, including one at the Wall cemetery, and one next to the giant cement brontosaurus that sits next to the freeway, courtesy of Wall Drug. We then drove some of the back roads and found some really interesting little places. We did a couple caches in the town of Quinn, about fifteen miles east of Wall. This was a little farming community of a couple hundred. We then drove to Cottonwood, South Dakota, population 12, to do another cemetery cache. We had to DNF the cache, just couldn't find it, but found the town, or what's left of it, fascinating. I had to take a picture of the old wooden church, now abandoned that looks like a prop from a horror movie. We ended up with five finds for the afternoon before heading back to the coach for the rest of the night.

Saturday, June 6th, the 71st anniversary of the D-Day invasion that marked the beginning of the end of WWII. We left the coach a little after noon for day of exploration. We started by driving about 21 miles south of Wall on Interstate 90 and stopping at the Minuteman Missile National Historic Site. They are housed in a brand new visitor's center at exit 131, so new it hasn't even been formally dedicated yet. The visitors center has a few exhibits and a book shop, but the real interesting sites are the preserved Launch Control Center at exit 127 and the preserved Minuteman Missile silo at exit 116. Both of these were active parts of the system in the 60's and 70's. The park service now maintains the facilities and offers free public tours. We didn't do the tour since we have already been inside one of the old Titan sites in Arizona and since they all used pretty much the same 1950's design and hardware, we didn't need to do it again.

Our next stop was the Badlands National Park, where we went in the east entrance a few miles south of the freeway, also off exit 131. This park, which covers nearly 380 square miles, was established as a National Monument in 1929 and elevated to National Park status in 1978. The park protects a hundred mile long area of eroded prairie, composed of fairly soft soils, which has been carved into a series of mesas, pinnacles, peaks and steep canyons. It was known in frontier times as “the wall” because of the way it just appears on the prairie as you approach from the south. This is how the town of Wall, where we currently are, got it's name. We stopped at the visitor's center and learned about the park, how, when and why it became the way it is. We then drove the 35 mile interior loop road that goes back northwest and eventually leads back to the town of Wall. We spent a couple of hours in the park and took a lot of very neat pictures. It is quite a sight to see.

After we got back to town we stopped at the Visitor's Center for the National Grasslands, which is similar to a national forest, but for prairie lands. There are currently twenty National Grasslands protecting nearly 4 million acres of grasslands. The one in the area around Wall is know as the Buffalo Gap Grasslands and is about 700,000 acres in size. We also stopped at the museum in Wall dedicated to the Massacre at Wounded Knee. It was a very small museum and they wanted an admission fee, so we just browsed the gift shop and left.

The actual site of the Wounded Knee Massacre is on the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation, about 60 miles south of Wall. The Massacre occurred in 1890 when a regiment of U.S. Calvary attempted to disarm a large group of Lakota Indians. Fighting broke out and the Calvary ended up killing between 250 and 300 men, women and children. The Calvary lost about 25 soldiers in the battle. The reservation town of Wounded Knee was also the site of the 1973 standoff between Russell Means and other members of the American Indian Movement (AIM) and the FBI and Marshall's Service. That standoff ended after 71 days during which three people were killed and over a dozen injured in shooting incidents between the occupiers and the government. After a tribal elder was killed by a sniper the Indians called off the occupation and the government took control of the town. After our tours of the various natural and historical sights, we went back downtown and did a little more shopping before heading back to the coach for the rest of the night.

Sunday, June 7^th, we had a relaxing day at home. I went out and got the Sunday paper, the Rapid City paper, not the Wall one. I think the Wall paper only comes out once a week. We stayed in and got a few chores done and just relaxed. 

Monday was another travel day. We were packed up and on the road around 10:30, heading east on Interstate 90. Today's destination was Pierre, South Dakota, about 135 miles northeast of Wall. Pierre is the state capitol and is another place we have never been before. We will be there for five days. We arrived at the River View RV Park about 2:00, after having time traveled by passing into the Central Time Zone. This park is on a bluff about 200 feet above the Missouri River, overlooking the river and the City of Pierre on the opposite bank. We have some really nice views up here.

Our arrival here in Pierre marks a good place to close out this chapter and get it published. Until next time remember not to be so busy watching out for what's just ahead of you that you don't take time to enjoy where you are. See ya soon.