The next day brought us to the Badlands National Park. We drove the ‘scenic’ route from Rapid City. We thought driving on I-90 was about the same view and only the last 15 miles or so get a little scenic. Our first hike was the Notch trail which involves climbing a log and cable ladder to a ledge area for some great views.
We checked out some of the other overlooks heading back to the main entrance as we wanted to go to the Minuteman Missile National Historic Site as well. The visitor center entrance is right across I-90 from the main entrance to the Badlands. There was a good movie about the Minuteman program and how the Great Plains were chosen for these missile silos. It was quite interesting for us as we grew up during the Cold War. Down the road about 15 miles is a launch facility where you can take a tour of what it was like to be a Missileer and be the one to actually launch a nuclear weapon. Tours for that were sold out months in advance for the time we were there, so maybe next time.
Big Horn Sheep; butt view of course
After that little detour it was back to the Badlands to do another short hike and check out some of the other overlooks. Again, the heat was taking it out of us, so, it was time to head to Wall, SD and the home of Wall Drugs for some much-needed ice cream. Wall Drugs has been in business over 80 years and still offers free ice water as it did all those years ago. It is definitely a site to see.
Will’s New Lady Friend 
We had a tour at Jewel Cave National Monument the next morning. The only way to visit the cave is on one of their ranger led tours. We took the Scenic Tour; it was nice to be somewhere cool. It’s 49 degrees in the cave year-round regardless of the temperature on the surface. There were a lot of stairs on this tour and Will did not like the wide-open expanse of the cave and having to down numerous flights of stairs.
Then it was on to Crazy Horse Memorial This is a monument still in process started by an agreement between Lakota Chief Henry Standing bear and the original sculptor Ziolkowski. The face of Crazy Horse was finally completed in 1998 after Ziolkowski started carving the mountain back in the late ‘40’s. The main area being worked on currently is the hand. There is a visitor center that has a nice movie on the history of the monument and there is also a viewing area on their patio.
The sculptor’s model 
For an extra $4/person you can also take a bus that takes you about a mile closer to the base of the monument. We thought it was worth the price and your bus driver will give you some additional information and answer any questions that you might have about the monument. Once complete, the carving will be the largest stone carving in the world. Our driver estimated it may be another 50 years before the entire carving is completed, but things are progressing faster with the advance in tools now being used and a carving team of 10 instead of just one man.
We then went over to Mount Rushmore, which is what most visitors come to see when in the Black Hills area. The monument itself is free, but they charge $10 for parking. The whole parking structure and grand view terrace area makes visiting the monument very easy. Most people tend to think that Mount Rushmore looks small in person. The noses on the faces of its presidents’ average about 20 feet long, so I wouldn’t say that it’s that tiny.
We also walked the Presidential trail as well. It is only about ½ mile long and gave us some different vantage points of the monument. You can also visit the sculptor’s studio which has a model of what the finish carving was supposed to look like.
We spent the next day exploring Custer State Park. Honestly, this park is great. And is far better than a number of National Parks that we’ve visited. We more or less followed the 1-day itinerary as suggested by the fullsuitcase.com site. It worked out great for us and we found that the majority of the traffic was coming in the opposite direction. The visitor center near the parks east entrance is worth a stop.
While driving the Wildlife Loop Road, we managed to see a pronghorn antelope right on the side of the road.
Then it was a stop to see the burros and finally one of my favorite traffic jams, the bison were blocking the road again.
We continued on to drive the Needles Highway to Sylvan Lake. Here’s a piece of the Needles Highway drive.
Sylvan Lake makes a great lunch spot and after our picnic lunch we did trail #4 to view the Cathedral Spires.
Found a couple of climbers on the spires.
We also did the Sylvan Lake Loop Trail. It’s listed as easy and stroller friendly. Just a side note, the entire loop is not stroller friendly. From the kayak rental clockwise to the back of the lake is stroller friendly.
For our final day in South Dakota, we made it to Wind Cave National Park. Again, if you want to visit the cave you must schedule a tour. We chose the Natural Entrance Tour. You enter through an airlock as we did in Jewel Cave as both caves are barometric pressure caves. Then you see an old wooden door and descend a number of flights of stairs. This cave has about 95% of the world’s boxwork. You might even be treated to a geology lesson set to the tune of Miley Cyrus’ Wrecking Ball. That’s what happens when you hire theater major as Park Rangers.
We went back to Custer State Park as we had tickets for a matinee performance at the Black Hills Playhouse. They were performing Something Rotten, which is a musical comedy and made for an enjoyable afternoon. We came out of the theater and were greeted by rain. Luckily, the rain stopped by the time we reached the Iron Mountain Highway for the last of our scenic drives. More one-way tunnels and pigtail bridges as the road was built to showcase Mt. Rushmore. It was really cool to drive through the tunnel and have it frame the iconic sculpture.
Our time in the Black Hills had come to an end. We moved on to North Platte, Nebraska for a couple of nights. There are two state parks in close proximality to North Platte that allow camping, Buffalo Bill State Park and Lake Maloney State Park. Neither park has advance reservations and they are instead on a first-come basis. Both seem to have a variety of different types of site offerings. We stayed at the Kansas Point campground on Lake Maloney. All the sites in this campground have electric and a number of the sites are waterfront. We arrived on a Thursday and got a nice site with some great shade. Weekends it does get quite a bit more crowded. It was slim pickin’s by late Friday afternoon.
Finally, it cooled off enough at night for us to try our new firepit.
While in North Platte we went to the Lincoln County Historical Museum which was quite interesting. One of the exhibits was about North Platte’s roll in WWII. Most of the troops were transported around the county on trains back then and the trains stopped in North Platte to take on water or other supplies. The townspeople ended up setting up a canteen in the train depot for the GI’s passing through. It was a short 10-minute stop for most of the trains, but the GI’s were given food, coffee, snacks, and some real hospitality, even if their train stopped in at 11pm. The canteen got generous donations both monetary and goods from local farmers during the 4 ½ years that the canteen operated.
Our last stop on this trip was Dodge City, Kansas. Dodge City was famous for its outlaws and was once the buffalo capital of the world. I guess now it would be one of the main cattle processing cities in the nation. There are two beef packing plants that combined process about 12,000 head of cattle per day. We also toured the Boot Hill Museum that has some great interactive displays and has a lot of history about Dodge City and its infamous residents. And of course, we couldn’t pass up dinner and a show at the Long Branch Saloon.
One of the 70 huge feedlots within 100 miles of Dodge City.
The daily gunfight.
Just waiting for the truck wash 
Doesn’t Diablo look spiffy?