TravelGuides

(TGA) - Travel - After stopping at Devils Tower we drove on southeast into South Dakota and the Black Hills. SD was still pretty much closed for the winter, but you could see how it would come to life, especially in August (?) when this part of the state hosts a huge, weeklong motorcycle rally. Oh, to be there in an RV when the hogs are rolling through!Our National Park senior pass (free admission virtually everywhere) didnt work at Mt. Rushmore; its a vendor-operated site. $10 to park on the top level of a several story parking garage, then a short walk to the viewing area, which had an outdoor mall-ish feel to it. D and I agreed that the four presidents looked pretty much as wed imagined, about the right scale. Spent some time at the exhibition hall and began to watch one of the documentaries offered continually in one of the four little theaters. We inadvertently picked one on Mt. Rushmores flora and fauna and decided we were too fried from the drive to sit there for ten minutes watching bubbling streams and chipmunks
.After leaving Rushmore we drove north along the eastern fringe of and picked up I-90 once again and drove (and drove and drove) east into the windy darkness. Out of Rapid City started seeing signs for "Wall Drug" in - naturally - Wall SD. Stopped there for dinner as it looked like the last oasis for over a hundred miles. I had the fishfood substitute. Total tourist kitsch, and we wound up not even eating at Wall Drug since their dining room closed at 6pm.Stayed the night at an RV park on the west bank of the Missouri River in a town called Oacama. Phantom operation - when we called the park from the road to confirm the placed be open we we arrived, the manager said just come on in as he had to go out (his daughters prom night) and pick a spot. We did, and wound up having to mail the park a check for the nights stay as no one ever showed up at the office the next morning as we left.Next day took us through Sioux Falls SD, then south through Souix City IA and east on I-80 to the Des Moines area. Many wind turbines in western Iowa, a nice lunch at a local joint, "The Embers," a quick pass through Winterset IA (birthplace of John Wayne and location of "The Bridges of Madison County" and a nights sleep at a KOA in Newton IA, just a nine iron from I-80
. Trucks roared by all night long, I think, but we were too tired to care.The next day, April 19th, had us passing through Ds college town, Fairfield, then down the west bank of the Mississippi River through Hannibal (Mark Twains birthplace), then a final tourist stop (at the Arch in St. Louis) before driving on to , arriving at around 1 in the morning.Safely home, and this once-in-a-lifetime trip came to a close.