Our First Visit to South Dakota
There was excitement and disappointment ... depending on who you ask.
After spending time in Colorado, we decided to head northeast. This was exciting because it was new territory for us. We’ve never been to Wyoming or the Dakotas, so it was thrilling to get up there and explore.
More adventure in Wyoming than we hoped for!
Our drive through Wyoming was a little more eventful than we would have liked. As we were driving along, having a good time, we came upon a huge caravan of oversized trucks. And when I say huge caravan, I mean there were several of them, but the oversized loads were the biggest we’d ever seen on the road! They literally took up the width of two lanes.
The bad part was that we got stuck behind them on a two-lane highway. So not only could we not get around, but oncoming traffic had to pull over to the side of the road, and the trucks had to move over as far as they could just for people to pass by on the other side. It was crazy.
Thankfully, we finally found an area where the road widened enough to allow for passing, and a few of us toward the front seized the opportunity to fly around them. We were SO glad to see them in our rearview mirror after driving 30mph for miles! We also encountered some fierce crosswinds and a little rain, but thankfully, we made it through and arrived in Rapid City, South Dakota.
Rapid City is a great place to visit.
The Rapid City area is a pretty cool place with lots of touristy things to do. We only spent a couple of days there, but we decided this was going on our list of places to return to. Because we had a timeline set for the first couple of months of our trip, with destinations to reach on specific dates, we couldn’t stay longer.
While on our trip to South Dakota, we had to see Mount Rushmore, of course. I’ve always wanted to visit and was excited to see it. James, on the other hand, walked up and looked at the mountain and was pretty much ready to go after that. lol! He said we could check it off the list and move on. I, however, wasn’t going to be satisfied quite so easily. ;)
There is a Presidential Trail that winds up toward the mountain, and we decided to walk it. I’m so glad we did, because we got great views of the carvings and saw it from different angles. It was also a pretty view looking out over the valley with the mountain to our backs.
I enjoyed visiting Mount Rushmore and loved the surrounding landscape and scenery. There were some beautiful trees, really cool-looking rocks, and, of course, seeing the presidents’ faces up close and in person is incredible. It just amazes me that someone was able to carve something like that out of a mountain and have it look just like them.
Before we left the Rapid City area, we also had to check out Sturgis and mark that off the list. James spent a little time in the Harley Davidson store and bought a few gifts for some friends who are die-hard Harley fans and motorcycle riders. It was cool to see but I was really thankful we weren’t there the week before when Sturgis was FULL of rowdy bikers. Haha!
Little House on the Prairie
Ever since childhood I’ve been a huge fan of Little House on the Prairie. It was such a wonderful show so when I found out we could visit the Laura Ingalls Wilder Historic Homes in De Smet, I knew I had to go. I wrote a review about it and shared a lot more info here if you’d like to learn more.
Badlands National Park was like another planet.
I really want to tell you more about our journey through The Badlands but think that will need to be its on post. Plus I have a bunch of photos to share. :) We will write about this experience this week.
After our trip to South Dakota, I would definitely recommend traveling there. The landscapes are beautiful, there are lots of things to see and do, and of course you get to see Mount Rushmore and check that off your bucket list.
If you’ve ever been to South Dakota, feel free to share what you’d recommend to our community.