Day 1 – September 10,
2018 – Driving Across South Dakota
After a belated start this morning, we spent the day driving
down through Minnesota to I-90, then across all of South Dakota to Rapid City,
which will be our base for the next three days.
While we’ve driven this route several times before, there’s always
something new, memories rediscovered, sometimes boring but mostly
interesting. We drive past acres and
acres of corn and soybean fields dotted with treed homesteads, hundreds of grain bins, soy bean processing plants, ethanol plants, and hundreds of advertising signs along the freeway (especially
for Wall Drug and Firehouse Beer and Wine!).
Western South Dakota boasts of many hay fields, some just cut and windrowed
ready for baling, others peppered with large bales of hay. All this to feed the many herds of cattle,
mostly black angus and white face.
Of course, there was the obligatory stop in Mitchell to
visit the world’s only Corn Palace.
Murals of the area’s colorful history are created from various colored corn cobs, grasses, grains and straw, all from the local area. Every year the motif changes. It is an interesting site. Once we crossed
the Missouri River, the terrain changed considerably to bigger rolling hills
and deeper valleys, with trees being a rarity.
It became drier and more rugged as we approached the Badlands.
This adventure is to allow Fr Robert, our Kenyan friend,
experience the beauty of our vast country before he returns home. When comparing this country to his homeland,
he marveled at the large farms, the big herds of cattle and the many ponds
(he’s from a very arid area). It seems that with enough water, crops can be
grown anywhere. And, of course, there’s the excellent roads (I’ve driven on some of
their roads … our freeways are great!)!
It was a long day of traveling and we’re glad to be just
hanging out this evening. What a
Blessing to be able to enjoy life with a very good friend.
Day 2, September 11,
2018 – The Badlands
Today we backtrack east a bit, first to the infamous Wall
Drug. This one-block long mercantile and restaurant
was started in 1931 when Dorothy and Ted
Hustead purchased the only drug store in Wall, a town they settled in because
it was the only one in the vicinity with a Catholic Church where they could go
to Mass every day. After browsing through the shops, and little chapel, posing
for pictures with a few famous locals (Fr. Robert and the saloon girl, of all
people, plus, of course, the jackalope!), we savored our 5-cent coffee and
homemade donuts!
Then on to the Badlands National Park. We drove through the entire park, stopping
frequently to soak in the landscapes of peaks, gullies, buttes, the thousand
tints of colors along the cliffs and mounds, plus the wide prairies. Learning about the shaping of this area over
millions of years, the amazing findings of fossils of new species that
inhabited this area as well as the work being done to restore native animals
and grasses to this area was so fascinating.
We delighted in the many little prairie dogs that seemed to pose for us;
and a great bonus was spotting seven big-horned sheep on a cliff’s edge! Then, we no sooner left the sheep on the
cliff, that we encountered a mom and baby big-horn grazing along the side the
road, oblivious to us humans snapping pictures of them! And finally there was one lone bison that
crossed our path on the way out of the park. These are sites and experiences that
will not be found in Kenya. However, the very dusty and bumpy gravel road for
the last 20 miles and some of the more arid areas did remind Fr. Robert of his
home!
This evening we went to the Firehouse in Rapid City for
dinner. Great food, after which we did
the Firehouse wine tasting. It was a
very enjoyable time; and the wine was quite tasty, as we came home with a
couple bottles plus two beautiful Firehouse wine glasses!! God is good … All the time!
Day 3,
September 12, 2018 – The Black Hills
Today’s venture found us meandering through the beautiful
Black Hills with its high craggy mountains contrasted with the brilliant green
evergreen trees. Hill City has a western
flare to it, so it was interesting to walk down the old-time walkways in front
of the stores. Of course, the iconic
Mount Rushmore was amazing. We haven’t
been there since it was upgraded with the State flags greeting us and honoring
these four Presidents – Washington, Jefferson, Teddy Roosevelt and Lincoln. No
matter how many times we view it, one has to marvel at the ingenuity in
sculpturing these men in the mountainside.
Leaving Mount Rushmore brought us not only gorgeous vistas
but up and down a very windy road with several pigtail switchbacks … so
fun! Fr. Robert was amazed at the many,
many trees, and even more thrilled at the Needles Highway as we twisted and
turned, threading through one-lane tunnels in the granite mountain sides. The most amazing and one of the longest
tunnel is at the top near Black Elk Mountain, where we could get out and touch
some of the huge granite finger-like spires which grace all of the surrounding
mountain tops and sides. Fr. Robert was as giddy as I was passing so close to
these monstrosities!
We continued exploring the area by driving past the Crazy
Horse Monument, which doesn’t appear to be much different than when we saw it
4-5 years ago, or 30-40 years ago, for that matter; enjoying the rolling
grasslands, hills and valleys of Custer State Park though no buffalo were
sighted and a stopping at a cute grocery store for a little pizza and quiet
respite at such a serene site. The difference in geography between yesterday in
the Badlands and today in the Black Hills is like night and day … all within 50
miles of each other! Truly amazing, and
it’s been a delight sharing it with Fr. Robert!
Day 4, September 13,
2018 – Mountain Tops to Mountain Tops
We left Rapid City before the sun came up, making our way
westward. Our first stop was Devil’s
Tower in Wyoming. It was a very enjoyable ride through high rolling terrain,
and the wild animals were enjoying it too!
We saw over a dozen deer having breakfast along the road, a couple
antelope and a flock of wild Turkeys. Even
without any “close encounters”, the overwhelming star is the giant Devil’s Tower that rises 1,265 feet above the river level, dwarfing everything in sight, which includes the very tall pines ringing around its base. Then as we continued west on I90, we delighted
in seeing dozens and dozens of antelope also grazing in the open grassland andalong
the road’s edges. While Fr. Robert had
never seen antelope before, they are not unlike gazelles and Impalas, which are
plentiful in Kenya.
We veered off the freeway, taking a shortcut to Red Lodge;
and boy was this an exciting adventure.
The twists and turns of switchbacks took us up over 9,500 feet in the
beautiful Big Horn Mountains. Brilliant
yellow popular leaves in front of deep forest green trees in front of massive multi-colored
stone mountain tops provided a stunning picture. Driving along the tops of the mountains
provided a variety of vistas of deep valleys, yellow grass on rounded tops all
dotted with evergreen trees. Of course,
on the other side of the mountain range, we descended down, down, down by
turning this way and that over and over and over again … wheee! (At least when Bob’s driving. Father said “wow” a lot, being totally in awe of
the sites; but he jokingly says he was praying too that we wouldn’t fall off
the steep edges!)
But the excitement was not over. Once we left Red Lodge, we headed to the
Beartooth Pass, which took us to Yellowstone National Park’s Northeast
entrance. If you’ve never taken this
route, I’d say it’s a must do. If the
Big Horn Mountains are big and beautiful, the mountains of Beartooth Pass are
gigantic and phenomenal! Shimmying up to 10,949 feet along a zig-zag road
clinging to the mountain side is no small feat.
The valley below gets smaller and smaller the higher we go, but the jagged
mountain tops with scattered pockets of snow become closer and closer and more
magnificent. There are only craggy rocks
at the treeless top, and the gusty wind was biting as we took the obligatory
pictures by the elevation sign! And as
before, what goes up must come down … and so we did, still reveling in the
glory of it all. This experience cannot
be captured on film. It cannot adequately be put into words. It has to be
experienced. As Father said, this is simply out of this world and something he
probably will never experience again. I
couldn’t agree more.
The absolute beauty of the mountains, valleys, ravines, lakes and rivers continued as we made our way to Yellowstone and drove across the Park on the north side. As it is getting toward evening, many people in the park were looking for wild animals along the Lamar Valley. While we were in a bit of a time crunch and didn’t stop to browse, we did see a couple herds of Bison, quite a few elk near the north park entrance and a dozen or so antelope in Gardiner.
So it’s been a long but exciting day. And to top it off, at our little abode for a
few days in a plateau of the Absaroka Mountains north of Yellowstone, we were
greeted by a momma mule deer and her three little ones. They didn’t seem to mind that we had invaded
their territory! We marvel at all this beautiful creation in our country; but more
importantly we marvel at the great gift we’ve been given to be able to meander
through it and savor it!
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