MY BOGGY BLOG: find your way through the murk

"South Dakota Takes Too Long..."

That title is actually a line from a song by Ellis, a wonderful local folk singer who DH and I have had the privilege of hearing many times and counting as a friend. That line kept running through my mind last weekend as we drove across the state for our South Dakota mini-vacation. Wow, how true! So much open land, so much driving without seeing anything at all! But luckily, even though we drove and drove and drove all over for 4 days, our kids are of an age where spending 9 hours in a car is no big deal.

We left Friday morning. Since we were driving right by Mankato, MN, DH kindly suggested we could drive by the Betsy-Tacy houses there, since II'm such a big fan and haven't seen all the restoration the houses have been undergoing. Both Betsy's house and Tacy's house looked fabulous, and I was impressed that DH remembered exactly how to drive to them (my sense of direction isn't that great). After this, we drove all across SD and listened to Harry Potter 7 on audio CD, arriving at the well-advertised Wall Drug about 7 pm. (Anyone who has driven across SD on I90 knows how well Wall Drug over-hypes themselves with countless signs.) We got out there and walked around, shopping the touristy mall and eating an adequate dinner in their restaurant. Oh, I forgot-- we did stop in Mitchell, SD, to drive by the Corn Palace, their big tourist attraction. DH wanted to just glimpse it, so we drove by (a Taj Mahal-looking building made of corn cobs, o-kay...) and got some coffee in town.

Arrived in Rapid City at our Microtel hotel aboout 9 pm. I was relieved to see that my rather elaborate process of choosing a hotel to stay at (involving reading reviews on several websites and making charts) had paid off, and our room was pleasant and clean and simple and not too expensive. We had 2 queen beds, and 1 queen bed for 3 teens can be tight, so it was nice to see that there was a long window seat with a comfy cushion that could be slept on too. Very small pool, but our kids weren't into swimming.

SATURDAY
We got up as early as we could (which wasn't that early!) for the hotel continental breakfast and to go on our sightseeing way. Our first stop was Bear Country USA-- a nature park that promised many wildlife sightings. You drive your car very slowly along a 3-mile road, woodsy and prairie settings for different animals. We saw several elk, which were very impressive with their amazing antlers. We saw a few different kinds of mountain goats, artic wolves, black wolves, a brown and a white buffalo, very friendly little burros who almost wouldn't let our car pass (animals are free to walk up to the road), a peacock, and then a large area with dozens of bears. We could hardly count them-- bears sleeping, bears lumbering, bears swimming in a pond, bears walking along the road and even a bear who started biting on the plastic cover of a tire on the back of this one SUV-- he kept biting and wouldn't let go, eve though the car tried to inch away. We got it on film! After the drive, you get out of your car and see animals in large pens-- many baby bears, porcupine, fox, otters, badgers, stuff like that. And of course a big gift shop.

After more driving, our next stop was Mount Rushmore, amazing to see after seeing pictures all my life. Younger DS put money in one of the binoculars and saw great details, like Roosevelt's glasses.

More driving and then it was Crazy Horse, another amazing site. We got to see a 20 min film about it that helped us know more of the background and details. I never know that the man who started and worked on Crazy Horse for 30 years before he died was Polish, and now some of his 10 children carry on with the project. He died before the face had any real definition, which is just tragic! The scope of this project is just mind-boggling... like the fact that the Mount Rushmore heads are just tiny in comparison to what this sculpture will be when done-- they could fit on Crazy Horse's shoulder, much smaller than his head.

More driving to get to Custer State Park. I'd heard it was gorgeous and that there were a few features we should see. We drove the 18 mile Wildlife Loop where we'd been assured we'd see amazing wildlife, like their buffalo herd which is one of the world's largest, or big-horn sheep, elk, carribou, prairie dogs, begging burros, birds, etc. Unfortunately, we went during a hot part of the afternoon and we hardly saw anything-- just a few deer and antelope. The drive is very pretty and changes scenery a lot, but it was disappointing to scan the landscape for an hour looking and looking and seeing nothing! Luckily we'd seen all those animals that morning at Bear Country.

We also drove on Needles Highway to leave Custer State Park, which is a 14 mile drive (on very windy mountain roads, we didn't realize) where the land formations are claimed to be amazing. We were starting to wonder where these needles were after we drove for a half and hour and didn't see anything. But then we did come to them-- massive granite pinnacles that look like tall columns on mountain peaks. Very impressive and we had to get out of the car to gaze in awe and take pictures. (Yay, we saw something!) And as we drove out of the park, we came across Sylvan Lake, which was also breath-taking-- a lake partially surrounded by gargantual boulders, so it looked other-worldly.

Then the long drive back to Rapid City, where we finished off our long day with a drive-in restaurant dinner, a stop a a bookstore, and the fervor of watching a late showing of the new Batman movie in its opening weekend.

SUNDAY
It was hard to decide what to do... there are so many places out there (all a long drive away from each other), and we didn't want to overdo it. So we settled on the Cosmos Mystery Tour, a silly touristy place that had a crooked house built on the slant of a hill, so your sense of gravity was thrown off. It was impossible to walk straight up and down, and at some points you could stand on the walls. They had a board slanting upward and they showed water and a ball running uphill. It was good for a laugh.

Next was driving out to the Badlands, which were about an hour outside of Rapid City. We drove on 2-lane 44, which was way off the beaten trail. There was N-O-T-H-I-N-G for miles and miles, just grassland stretching on and on. Of course, some of us got hungry and waited for the next town to stop and get something to eat. The first town the map showed was Scenic... we pulled in and saw one tiny street with old wooden shacks and a liquor store and some old-West type jail. It looked like a ghost town so we didn't bother stopping. Drive another half hour to the next town, called Interior, with an old sign boasting "Bar, Sandwiches, Pizza," so DH pulled in. It looked rather rundown but I imagined a seedy little diner with a waitress and some basic food. But it was definitely an old bar, smoky and dark with old vinyl booths, old-timers sitting at the bar yacking, and a cracked window for us to look out. We waited and no one acknowledged us sitting in the booth. After awhile, DH got us and went to the bar to ask, "We're looking for some food?" The guy at the bar laughed, said all he had were some DiGiorno pizzas he could heat up for us. "Anywhere else we could get something to eat?" Well, there was a lodge down the road but he didn't recommend it, since he'd gotten sick the last time he ate there. Otherwise there was nothing else around. "It don't pay to come to the Badlands hungry." DH thanked him and we slunk out. Funny thing was, I came across this article when I got home, a guy looking for food in the Badlands and ending up at the same place. Same people too, though he was offered a few more food items. Check it out!

We ended up driving into Badlands National Park and out the other side to find a glorified convenience store to eat at: hotdogs, nachos, pop. We were grateful!

And then we drove back through the park, which had more amazing land formations of a totally different kind. Dry, dusty, striated mountains that made it look like a desert scene, or something from Mars. Everything was pale and yet brilliant in the endlessly sunny sky. We got out and climbed some of the rock formations. I couldn't do much but the kids and DH went one or two stories up, and people were all over the mountians like ants on a hill. Some people climbed precariously high to overlook the deep canyons and it was scary to watch their kids sitting so close to dropoffs on this crumbly dry stone.

And then it was back to Rapid City, where we were just going to take it easy. After our long drive and a rest at the hotel, we went off to dinner at a restaurant in an old firehouse. We sat on the patio and listened to their live band made up of 10 highschool students playing big-band-jazzy stuff with their saxes, trombones, trumpets, guitar, drums and keyboard. Good food and the music was good too. After dinner we walked around downtown Rapid City to see the bronze, life-sized statues of presidents they have on many corners. Some ice cream, and then back to the hotel to sack out.

MONDAY
It was our long drive home, which Harry Potter 7 continued to help us through. This time we drove a different way so we could stop in De Smet, SD, for the Laura Ingalls Wilder sites. There were several buildings, and even though the kids protested about spending 90 minutes doing a tour, I think they did enjoy the historical aspect of it, though they've never been into the LIW books like I was. The tour guides did a great job of telling the stories so that those who weren't familiar with them could still get something out of it. We saw 2 school houses (one that the Ingalls had actually gone to school in, one a replica of where Laura had taught), and 2 houses (one the Ingalls had lived in on their claim, one Pa had built in town). It was so interesting to see the size of the rooms and imagine a family living is such close quarters... and to see where they'd actually lived.

After this more driving to get home at 10:30pm. It felt like we were gone longer than 4 days! So glad we had such a great trip.

(Note: The article on dining in Interior, SD, is copied in the "continued" section below, in case the link didn't work.)

In case the article about eating in Interior, SD, goes away, I've copied it here. It was published in Cottage Living April 22, 2008

On the Road: Desperation Dining (Interior, SD)
By David Hanson
My first Front Burner entry involves Twizzlers. And later Doritos plus Budweiser. It’s a long story that begins with a slow, pinkly smooth sunset over South Dakota’s Badlands. It ends with a quiet, blue-green sunrise over grasslands. I’ll stick to the food part.

With night falling and the asphalt between me and the nearest town/anything, Rapid City, South Dakota, stretching fast behind me, my lack of food didn’t concern me. I was aiming straight for the tiny town of Scenic. The New York Times has cited the Old Longhorn Saloon as having the best burger and coldest beer in the middle of nowhere. As the sky turned from dark purple to a matrix of stars so dense it looked silver, I pulled the last Twizzler from the dashboard and imagined bellying up to the bar beside tattooed Tony and his biker gang who call the saloon their local watering hole. But Scenic was dark as I approached, including the Old Longhorn Saloon. Closed on Mondays. It was Monday.

What does one do when the best/only saloon in the middle of nowhere is closed? Luckily, despite my increasingly frenzied state of mind, there aren’t many opportunities for a wrong turn in South Dakota. I tacked north for the next town, Interior.

B-A-R. Three red neon letters floated on a 50-feet pole in the night sky. If a child drew a bar like a child draws a house, it would look like this one: Plain, one-story, door in center, windows to side. Dark wood interior, pool table, long L-shaped bar, jukebox. A Lakota Sioux man sat on the L’s corner and a white man in all denim sat, slightly swaying, across from him. The bartender stood behind, hands resting on bar. At least, that’s how I remember it.

I threw a leg over a stool. They looked at me, smiled whiskey grins, and got back to their animated, old-time-friends conversation. I ordered a Budweiser and scanned for food options. The bartender, a very nice, sober man whose girlfriend was asleep in a corner booth, gave me the run-down: pizza, burger, burrito, all microwaved. I went with the Doritos dangling from the wall. Two bags. Two Buds. Dinner in Interior, SD.

I doubt B-A-R has a website and it has certainly never made a food blog. That makes sense. But it’s there when you need it.

For the rest of this story, including where I ended up sleeping, continue reading here. The only subsequent mentions of edibles are whiskey and powdered iced-tea, drank straight, 7 hours apart. But the views are amazing…

Posted by sapphire at July 24, 2008 3:52 PM