Many a hearty laugh has been had by us over names like Pony Espresso, Jesusland, Jan’s Cut & Yak Hair Salon, The Lucky Chucker, and Born In A Barn, but one name has baffled us. Why, oh why is anything having to do with the U.S. named “Buffalo” when there are no buffalo in North America and there never have been?
“Bison Bill Cody” doesn’t have the same ring, we’ll give you that, but it, and the name of the town in Wyoming, would be more correct as “Bison,” not the name mistakenly given to the animal those of us of a certain age incorrectly grew up calling “buffalo.”
“Call me a buffalo. I dare you.”
None of that mattered too much when we paid a visit to Buffalo, partly on the suggestion of our RV driving instructor Geoff, who told us the Occidental Hotel there had a really cool saloon.
We’d make it our lunch stop, but first we took a little wander around town. Wyoming loves its metal sculptures and cut-outs, and Buffalo was no exception.
Ruthie wasn’t so sure about some of them.
“Ewe don’t smell right.”
The downtown area was pleasant, and while it wasn’t as jam-packed as Deadwood, it felt far more original, and we like that.
Not a Starbucks in sight
Known to the locals as “The Ox,” the Occidental Hotel was founded in 1880, and its saloon replaced a raggedy old bar in 1908. With its location at the foot of the Bighorn Mountains and central to the heavily-used Bozeman Trail, the hotel once played host to the likes of Buffalo Bill Cody, Calamity Jane, Butch Cassidy and the Sundance Kid, and, later, Teddy Roosevelt. It is now on the National Historical Register.
Open the door and this is your view
The saloon is chock-full of Wyoming stuff – animal heads and skulls (of course), antiques, period stained glass, and even bullet holes from some long-ago booze-fueled gunfight. The saloon is original, and we could almost imagine cowboys, rustlers, gamblers, and the lawful and lawless bellying up to the 25-foot bar, some for a shot of “liquid courage” as poker games sometimes went on for days.
We just wanted lunch, but with No Dogs Allowed, our dining took place in the back garden that sits along a river, where the hotel has live music every Thursday night.
We only had ourselves as entertainment that afternoon, along with Ruthie, who loved us when we gave her a fry, then ignored us when that was all she got.
“YES! YES, I WANT THAT!”
“I thought you people loved me.”
Luckily, we adore each other and are happy with our own company. Even luckier, two young children, their mother, and their grandparents showed up for an al fresco lunch, and we were treated to several rounds of Hide and Seek, during which the youngest cheated like crazy.
After Buffalo, we returned to Sheridan to see the famous King’s Saddlery & King’s Ropes, an institution in a town where even the kids are decked out in cowboy hats and boots. We stuck out like the boring-clothed tourists we are.
King’s is part Western-wear and tack shop, part saddle makers, part rope makers, and while we wouldn’t know a good saddle or rope from a bad one, they certainly had some superb examples of the craft.
It was nearly time to say “goodbye” to Sheridan, but we’d be doing it having made some new friends. There is nothing quite like adversity to help bring people together, and this time we were able to be on the giving end of “a friend in need.”
A massive storm rolled through a night or two ago, and our newest neighbor sprung a little leak. A couple three sites down had a tarp they could lend her, and we had Ruthie’s long leash, which would help tie the tarp down, plus a Disney Cruise Line towel to sop up some of the leakage. In the end, we had great conversations about each of our travels, where all of us were headed next, and which locations were in our Top Five.
You can just see Simon’s red rain jacket hood on the far rear side of the trailer
Our intrepid neighbor is heading to Alaska for work, and we wish her great success and safe travels. As luck would have it, the other couple showed up at our next campground a few nights after us, and we promised to get together and chat over a drink. But Simon bashed his noggin on one of the slide-outs before that could happen, with a little blood, a very sore neck, and an early bedtime being the unhappy result. We’re traveling roughly in the same direction, though, and we sincerely hope our paths cross again, next time with wine.
There isn’t really any way you can follow-up the magnificence of Yellowstone, but we were hopeful Glacier National Park would be the next best thing as we headed north back into Montana again.
We were already aware the only entry to the park between 6am and 3pm was by the National Parks Service’s reservation system, which had defeated us for months, but we had a back-up plan – Simon would try for a Red Bus tour on the fabled Going-to-the-Sun Road and Susan wouldn’t. After her nerve-shredding experience in the passenger seat in Nippy going over the 8,878ft Dunraven Pass in Yellowstone, she was more than happy to sit out anything that offered the prospect of mountain-edge driving.
We had snagged a four-night reservation at the Lake Five RV Resort well in advance, knowing how popular Glacier NP is these days, so we were right on the doorstep of the park’s west entrance (and there are only really two ways to see Glacier, from the east or west roads).
The view from the back of our spot at Lake Five RV Resort, with Glacier NP in the distance
The park was beautifully situated and we were able to get set up and then visit Glacier NP’s visitor center, taking the (short) scenic drive along Camas Road, and spending time in the delightful Apgar Visitor Center and Village, which is the heart of the park’s western side.
Just a week out from our arrival, we were able to snag a seat for Simon on the Xanterra Red Bus Tour from Apgar Visitor Center to the Logan Pass – the passage from west to east across the stunning Lewis range of the Rocky Mountains – but we were going to have to wing it for the rest of our four-day stay.
What we hadn’t counted on was the fact that there really isn’t a lot to do and see outside the West entrance to the park. There are no other major scenic drives beyond the park’s boundaries – other than the hilly, winding drive in from the town of Browning, which showcases the southern edge of the Lewis range and which we had already seen in reaching West Glacier.
One of the, ahem, highlights of the West Glacier area
There was also major reconstruction under way of the 10-mile stretch of road along Lake McDonald from the Visitor Center to the lower end of Going-to-the-Sun Road. Not only had the usual paved road been ripped up for replacement, leaving a crude, pitted dirt track in its place, the construction crew also seemed to have abandoned any attempt to keep down the clouds of dust in the afternoon, making it 10 miles of driving torture, especially with a low-slung car like Nippy.
To put it mildly, this was a shocking state of affairs for any park, let alone one of the NPS showcase parks, and to say it was inhibiting was a major understatement. We abandoned the road at the Lake McDonald Lodge, and limped back to the Visitor Center.
The rutted dust bowl of the “road” alongside Lake McDonald with its ongoing reconstruction
This left Simon’s trip on Going-to-the-Sun Road as our lone highlight of the visit. It turned out to be a pretty memorable highlight.
Now, GTTS Road is aptly named, albeit it isn’t quite what you think. It is actually named for the 9,647ft Going-to-the-Sun Mountain, the sacred peak of the Blackfeet Indians, and the rather tortuous translation of their word for it is actually “The-Face-of-Sour-Spirit-Who-Went-Back-to-The-Sun-After-His-Work-Was-Done Mountain.” More aptly, for first-time visitors to the road, it merely feels like you are going to the sun, such is the precarious nature of the precipitous passage up to the 6,646ft mountain pass.
The road dates back to 1932, when it was opened after an 11-year construction process that cost the lives of three workers (how it wasn’t any more is one of the minor miracles of the project). It wasn’t fully paved until 1956, and is one of the hardest routes in America to reopen after each winter, such is the nature of its extreme inaccessibility. Put simply, this road is scratched into the side of a near-vertical mountain wall with all the seeming permanence of an Etch-a-Sketch. How the engineers conceived it, let alone built it, absolutely boggles the mind.
A viable road or an unfeasible creation of an over-worked engineering mind? You decide…
But there it is – the only way to cross Glacier NP, on a winding, sketchy, winter-worn stretch of “road” that wouldn’t earn that designation in any other place on Earth.
Oh, and the iconic Red Bus vehicles – nicknamed the Rubies of the Rockies – that take you there (and back), are almost 90 years old. Really. OK, so they have been modified with modern engines, transmissions, and braking systems, but the basic vehicle was introduced in 1935 and each has chalked up around 200,000 miles since then.
The maximum length for all private vehicles is 21ft. The Red Buses are 25ft long. Yup. Go figure.
So, the basic equation is:
Rickety Road + Outrageous Drop + 90-Year-Old Over-Long Vehicle – New Engine = A Hair-Raising Experience for All Concerned (especially Susan waiting back at the Visitor Center, praying for my safe return).
(It should be added, however, that each vehicle has a 100 percent safety record throughout all those years and miles, and each driver is a specialist)
One of the original Red Bus fleet, which made its debut in 1935. Glacier National Park had 35 of the original 500 that were made for the NPS, and 33 are still in service
The journey from the Visitor Center to Logan Pass, and back, takes almost 3.5 hours. It reaches a top speed of a daring 45mph, and just 20mph on the seriously scary bits. Two red buses can pass each other on that cliff-edge monstrosity. With about six inches to spare. So, absolutely no worries for the passengers, especially Simon in the front seat next to the driver, with the grandstand view 3,300ft straight down the mountainside.
The first part of the journey is pretty gentle, through impressive cedar forest, alongside Avalanche Creek (nothing inhibiting in that name, either) and past several suitably scenic picnic areas. Then it reaches The Loop.
The full magnificence of Going To The Sun Road
This is the most critical feature of the entire Road, the only serious hairpin bend on the whole, implausible 50-mile route. It is the engineering pivot that allows the roadway to cling to its precipitous perch and provide access all the way to Logan Pass, which adds a resounding wide alpine plateau for a sizeable visitor center of its own, plus a variety of hiking trails which vary from gentle to “You’ve Got To Be Joking” (the latter for the Highline Trail, which is barely 4ft wide in parts and equally precarious, especially when you hear that the wildlife has right of way, and can include both bighorn sheep and black bears. Any takers…?).
That’s the Highline Trail, in that frail line30 yards above the road
But – and this is a seriously substantial adverb – none of that even begins to describe the utter, stonking majesty of this drive. The solidity of the buses, the assurance of the drivers, and the ability Simon has to be blissfully ignorant about the likely terminal nature of any vehicular mishaps make this a journey of total superlatives.
On each side, the mountain ranges seemingly reach up to levels normally reserved for stratospheric aircraft, including the heart-stopping Garden Wall that towers to 9,553ft and is the main conduit for GTTS Road, as well as the demarcation line for the Continental Divide. That’s right, this is where the North American continent is basically split into East and West, albeit that is primarily a geological term and not a regional designation, seeing as Montana is about as Wild West as it gets.
The stunning extent of the Garden Wall – and the Going-to-the-Sun Road crawling along it
The mountains are studded with breathtaking waterfalls at regular intervals, along with various overlooks to allow drivers to get out and confirm that, yes, that really IS a bugger of a long way down, and “Don’t look now Ethel, but the car brakes are over-heating.”
Seriously, driving these buses up there is something approaching an art form, and sometimes you’re not sure whether to gape at the mountain scenery or the driver’s nonchalant style as they narrate the full story of the Road and everything connected with it.
And that’s it. We comfortably made it there and back, our open-top vehicle providing the best possible viewpoint of the entire Glacier NP, along with regular stops when, on the command “Prairie Dogs Up!,” our 18 passengers all stood up through the open lattice-work of the bus to take photos and marvel at the increasingly insane drop on one side.
“Prairie dogs up!”
It was an experience of the utmost refinement and beauty, a combination of Evel Knievel and Bob Ross, with a dash of Errol Flynn thrown in for good measure. It called for extreme belief in the person behind the wheel, and a cavalier disregard for normal road safety. And it was totally, utterly, mind-blowingly brilliant.
This was the easiest decision we had to make. And yes, that’s a long line ahead of Simon. A locals’ favorite!
Sometimes you have to make hard choices. While there are times when you have to take a leap of faith, our decisions over the next few days would be based on both local knowledge and hard-earned first-hand reconnaissance.
Billings, Montana was supposed to be our next stop, but since we were running a day late we pushed on to Columbus, which we planned to use as a base from which to see the Pryor Mountain wild horses, Devil’s Canyon Overlook, Cody, Beartooth Pass, and Chief Joseph Scenic Byway.
We ruled out Pryor Mountain, a 204 mile round-trip in Nippy that sounded long but oh-so-scenic from the comfort of our house when we were making plans, but sounded truly awful when reality hit, then ruled out Beartooth Pass when it became obvious the sharp drop-offs, cliffside driving without barriers, and the sheer terror of it all were going to do Susan’s head in. Instead, we opted for the still-very-high-up Chief Joseph Scenic Byway, which gave us plenty of spectacular views without the threat of death.
A quick stop in Absarokee’s little downtown market for a bite of take-away lunch (two pizza sticks for Simon, one chicken strip for Susan, and a pot of potato salad to split) gave us the fuel needed to start ascending the mountain to Red Lodge, Montana, which bills itself as “The Gateway to Yellowstone Park.”
Feasting in the car . Rainstorms make everything taste better!
And it is a gateway…if you’re willing to brave the Beartooth Highway, a 69-mile twisting, turning, sharp-drop-off road that tops out at 10,947 feet (that’s 3,337 meters for our UK friends).
The trip to Red Lodge offered yet more rolling landscape dotted with green hills that led to sharp, craggy rock, and while the weather over the Beartooth mountains threatened a bit of rain, we only had a few spotty showers.
We stopped at the Visitor Center, which included a one-room cabin once owned by Liver Eating Johnston. There were people then and are people now who can live and thrive in a dirt-floor cabin, but we aren’t among them.
Photo taken through a glass door. Ignore the reflection on the right.
The Visitor Center host suggested we take a drive to Wild Bill Lake for a one-mile hike, then head up the Chief Joseph Scenic Byway, an alternative to the Beartooth Highway. The hike was a terrific suggestion, and we thoroughly enjoyed our walk, as did Ruthie, who got lots of love and attention from kids fishing along the lake.
Now, we’d been assured the Chief Joesph was tame, but over the course of the next week or so we’d learn that “tame” in Montana and Wyoming is not the same as “tame” in Michigan, Florida, or the UK. We would also learn that “rolling hills” mean something entirely different, too (steep grades both up and down, in quick succession).
None of that mattered as we wound up the mountainside, stopping at markers for the likes of Bear Creek Hill and Dead Indian Pass (elevation 8,000 feet). Naturally, Simon had to find the most precarious place on the whole mountain to lean out and peek over the edge, while Susan very sensibly waited in the car.
See that little strip of pavement way, way down, in the middle of the photo? That’s the road.
A marker at the summit tells the story of 600 members of the Nez Perce tribe, led by Lean Elk and Chief Joseph, who used the pass to escape the U.S. Army in 1877. At this point in their retreat, they were forced to leave an injured warrior, who was subsequently killed by U.S. scouts.
The byway eventually hooks up with the Beartooth Highway, so we retraced our route for the return trip and veered off at WY-120 heading to Cody, just 18 miles away.
Cody was busy, as we’d expected, and, inexplicably, with thoughts of a big, juicy Wyoming steak on our minds, we ended up at a German restaurant eating a kid’s portion of schnitzel and some sort of noodle dish with eggs and cheese. They were out of nearly all of their interesting beers, so we ended up with brews neither of us can remember. Life is funny sometimes.
What is this noodle, egg, and cheese food? We don’t know.
Can you really go wrong with half a schnitzel?
Fati took us to Livingston the next day, which served the dual purpose of getting us closer to Yellowstone National Park while also giving us the opportunity to decide on our best route to the West Yellowstone entrance through real-life experience. We could take Highway 191 from Bozeman, or, as had been suggested by the campground host, take the longer route down the 287 through Ennis. Our trusty Mountain Directory West showed 191 as the better route, but was local knowledge the real story?
The next morning we took advantage of the opportunity to do some sightseeing south of the city, heading to Chico Hot Springs. It was probably just an excuse to get so close to the Gardiner entry into Yellowstone that we couldn’t pass it up and would have to pop in for a look.
Cute little bar in Chico Hot Springs, but, of course, NO DOGS ALLOWED.
We’d been to Yellowstone before, and remembered the road from Gardiner into the park as being steep but nothing to bat an eye at in a car. In fact, it had been the only place we’d seen mountain goats the last time we were there, and we hoped to repeat that experience. What we hadn’t realized was, the road has been rebuilt in a new location since the flooding last year that washed out several roads in Yellowstone. Now it has such steep grades and such tight turns, even some of the park rangers would later tell us they preferred not to use it. We have no photos of this part of the journey, since Simon was gripping the steering wheel and Susan was white-knuckling Nippy’s armrests.
We were blissfully unaware of what lay ahead as we played around taking photos in front of the famous Arch, and when we did make the arduous climb up to Mammoth Hot Springs – punctuated by a few straggler elk – we were hugely relieved to reach the top, and not at all eager to make the trip back down.
It may have been a bit windy.
Why? Why do you people do this to me?
Still, there was no other choice, so down we went when we’d finished our nice little drive to view Mammoth’s glimmering travertine formations.
This isn’t travertine. This is elk.
This is elk and travertine.
This is us and travertine but no elk.
The next day, the 191 wound us through a valley in Gallatin National Forest and along the Gallatin River in Nippy, giving us the lay of the land. Simon was just slightly apprehensive about the drive when we’d have to make it with Fati, because of its sharp curves and very few passing lanes long enough for us to pull over and let other vehicles go by. Big benefit? No major grades. And what a road it turned out to be!
Every curve offered a view more superb than the next, and often we had river rafting tours and people out fly fishing alongside us.
We stopped for a peaceful picnic lunch along the riverside, where four fishermen were grilling whatever it was they’d caught. The scent of pine trees made it an idyllic setting, and we spent a fair bit of time enjoying the serenity.
Our picnic lunch didn’t include fresh-caught fish, but it did include a hiking boot used to hold down one side of our Christmas tablecloth.
We then returned to Livingston via Highway 287, and were hugely surprised to see one of the mountainsides along the road had come down due to a 7.5 magnitude earthquake, leaving a massive scar and an even bigger pile of rubble.
Lucky for us, this all happened in 1959, and whoever takes care of these sorts of catastrophes had created a charming visitor center for Earthquake Lake on top of the rubble, and on top of 14 people whose bodies were never recovered.
Dead trees still stand in the lake, and the hosts at the visitor center told us the concussion from the landslide was heard all the way into Yellowstone.
The visitor center monitors tremors, and we were told the seismograph is so sensitive it often records the footfalls of elk walking in the vicinity. The employees feel tremors several times a day, but they seemed happy with their jobs and their location, so nothing major appears to be on the horizon.
It was reassuring to hear, since we’d soon be spending a few days exploring Yellowstone.
In the end, we were glad we drove both highways to help our decision-making, and it turned out local knowledge didn’t stand up to the test. Highway 287 was gorgeous, but had so many long, steep grades that poor Simon was tuckered out by the time we returned to Fati that night.
Our decision had been made. Next stop, Fishing Bridge Campground in Yellowstone!
Our second month is in the books, and we are now 3,743 miles into the grand year’s adventure. The arrival of July 14 sees us having reached the magnificent Yellowstone National Park in the Northwest corner of Wyoming (albeit, a small part of it is in Southwest Montana). The driving has been astounding, the views panoramic, and the wildlife absolutely everywhere.
From Orlando to Yellowstone – a 3,743-mile adventure (s0 far!)
In truth, we HAVE slowed down in the second month. The first month chalked up a whopping 2,504 miles, meaning we’ve traveled just 1,239 miles in the second stanza of four weeks. In truth, we’ve gone much further than that with our localized sight-seeing in Nippy once we reach a new destination, but the official distance is measured by Fati’s odometer, and she says 3,743!
In the meantime, we’re considering our next move. In theory it is Glacier National Park in Northwest Montana, and then through Idaho to Washington and Oregon. But we have discovered something wonderfully captivating about Montana and Wyoming, hence we may well explore further here…
South Dakota is considered the Midwest, along with states like Michigan, Ohio, and Minnesota, but its relationship to those states ends at the invisible division. It’s not really the West, either, though larger-than-life historical characters spent an awful lot of time there. We were eager to get to know some of them, and to see their stomping grounds.
But first, we were off to discover the remains of the state’s long-gone wooly mammoths at the indoor museum and archeological dig, The Mammoth Site, home to the world’s largest collection of mammoth bones.
Originally, we weren’t going to bother, since Ruthie couldn’t go inside and the wild west was calling. But the day was plenty cool enough for her to spend a quick half-hour in the car with the windows rolled down, and the museum’s sign was very appealing.
We’d heard the curators had all been very excited about a recent find among the bones already uncovered at the indoor dig site, and who doesn’t want to see something that’s just been unearthed after spending time underground since the last Ice Age?
The bones are all in-situ, left in a sinkhole just as they were found so that they can tell the story of the animal just before and at the point of their death, along with how their bones rearranged as the earth moved and the ice retreated.
Mammoth skull and tusks
One such mammoth died with its head slumped against a hill, tusks up. When the wall collapsed, the mammoth’s bones disarticulated and moved backward, so that its head was now near its butt.
It’s hard to tell what’s going on here, but one tusk is on the left, the rest of the skull is near the rump
Another is Napoleon Bone-A-Part, the oldest mammoth in the sinkhole, as evidenced by his teeth and the depth at which he was found. He shuffled off this mortal coil at the age of 49, a relatively early demise for an animal that can live to age 60, but life was harsh then, so he may have been fairly lucky…until he fell into that sinkhole and his luck ran out.
The museum deserved more than 30 minutes of our time, but we wouldn’t leave Ruthie any longer, so we gave her a good walk around the grounds, then made our way toward Wind Cave National Park, which we’d missed when we got distracted by the bison herd along Custer State Park’s wildlife loop.
A visit to Wind Cave itself was not to be. The Visitor Center was packed, and the dog-friendly route we were told to take down to the cave was nowhere to be found. Instead, we took a one-mile hike up a hill, just to get some exercise, and hoped Wind Cave was boring enough that we hadn’t really missed anything.
A brewery in Custer had our name on it for lunch, with a dog-friendly back porch and an interesting menu. Simon opted for the bratwurst made with rattlesnake, rabbit, and pork, and Susan chose the wedge salad. No one cares what a wedge salad tastes like, so I’ll get straight to the interesting part: the rattlesnake and bunny brat tasted “like chicken,” Simon joked, but admitted it really just tasted like a meaty sausage, with no odd flavors. “I’d have it again,” he insists.
Would you eat this?
The town of Keystone held some appeal on paper, but the reality didn’t strike us as overly interesting when we arrived, so we drove around a little bit, then got some nice frozen coffee drinks, which captured the full attention of the family dog, who happens to be a whipped cream fanatic.
“Give me that.”
We would make a move to Sturgis Campground and RV Park in Sturgis, South Dakota, the next morning, just an hour or so drive up the highway. But not before a mobile tech showed up to fix our electric hot water situation. His comment, “You’re pretty lucky,” when he pulled out the charred remains of some wiring and the fried electric coil started a downward trend in our thinking, which would ramp up to 11 in the coming days.
Fried
But before that, we still had some interesting exploring to do, on the trail of long-gone wild west heroes.
Deadwood is such an iconic name in U.S. history, and we were eager to see it. The modern version, however, is so filled with tourist shops and slot machines that we found no real reason to give it any more time than a quick walk around the main street before heading up a rather steep hill to the town’s cemetery.
Deadwood. The first thing you see when you arrive is a Starbucks
Now, it’s probably not normal, but Susan loves cemeteries. Each headstone tells a story in miniature, like the gargoyles on European churches, and they set off a spark in her brain that is both enjoyable and convoluted. The story of the two people whose gravesites we came to see needs no imagination. Wild Bill Hickock and Mrs. M. E. Burke, also known as Martha Jane Canary but best known as Calamity Jane, have gone down in U.S. history as well-known and beloved figures.
After paying a whopping Senior rate of $2 each to get into the Mount Moriah Cemetery, we hiked up the hill to find their grave sites.
Even without any real interpretation, it was fascinating to see the place in which they found final rest. The gunslinger Wild Bill was shot while gambling in Saloon #10, which is still in Deadwood (sort of), though the name of the bar has been transferred to another bar across the street from the original. The pairs of aces and eights he was holding in his hand when he was shot in the back of the head is now known as the “Deadman’s Hand.”
Frontierswoman and sharpshooter Calamity Jane died of pneumonia and bowel inflammation after a hard-living, hard-drinking life. Finding any two sources that agree on the facts of her life is a daunting task indeed.
A bit further along in the hilltop cemetery, we found the overview of Deadwood Gulch, and several headstones for babies who departed life far too soon, some at or just before birth.
Deadwood Gulch
Sad as these tiny headstones’ stories were, another story of woe was about to play out back in town, and we grabbed a couple of curbside seats to watch it. I’m going to be very honest here and say I (Susan) have no idea at all what the story was about, beyond a little gunfight during which neither of the principles were hit, but the bartender took it in the leg. Still, the kids enjoyed it, and that’s what counts.
The real highlight of Deadwood, for us, was a visit to Chubby Chipmunk, recommended to us by our dear neighbors from back home. We did buy a six-pack, with Susan having reigned Simon in after his eye-wateringly expensive truffle debacle in Minnesota.
We devoured two of them right away, but doled out the rest over the course of a week. Truffles have never been a habit we want to get into, but so far, we appear to be failing miserably.
An enormous storm was rolling in as we departed Deadwood, but we’d gotten used to the changeable weather, and slept through the drama to awaken to the prospect of a fresh new day, and a whole new state.
The more we’ve toured, the more questions we’ve had, but that’s part of the point of travel, isn’t it? The boring stuff you learned in school was the hook on which you hung little bits of information that, hopefully, act as a starting point when you’re out in the world exploring.
Susan had constant flickers of those schooltime factoids when it came to places like South Dakota’s Wounded Knee and the events that happened all across this part of the country, but it was all told through the side that “won.” Simon’s point of reference was Westerns from television and movies. Neither of us felt we had a well-rounded story, and we were eager to learn more.
At times, things as simple as a sign had us scratching our heads. What the heck IS this? A roller coaster? A prisoner bus? What?!*
Our next-door neighbors from back home in Florida have a place in Rapid City, and they were there while we were in town and invited us over for dinner. They do a great deal of work with the tribes, teaching them how to play and appreciate music, and we spent several happy hours in their company, learning more about the local tribes and their history. They recommended a visit to The Journey Museum, and that was our next day’s morning stop.
The museum is thoughtfully presented, and while it includes sections on paleontology, geology, and archeology, we were there primarily for the Native American exhibits.
We’d been told it was difficult to get any kind of reliable history, as the tribes tended not to keep written records in the past, and nobody seemed to agree on what really happened versus what is perceived or idealized to have happened.
Like much of the area’s history, the museum’s Native American and Pioneer sections intersect. It was difficult in most cases to get a well-rounded understanding of the two culture’s realities when they came together or clashed, when the focus is inevitably more on their separate experiences than on a realistic view of “how we got to now.”
This is an example of a Native American “Winter Count,” which is a series of pictographs on buffalo hide that records important events that commemorate each year.
Even so, we really enjoyed the museum’s displays, and Susan was especially happy to see women represented as much as men (almost), with a heart-tugging exhibit that featured (in video style) an older woman talking about how girls were welcomed into womanhood within the tribe. She even sang a lullaby. So beautiful.
Today’s scenic drive was Iron Mountain Highway on our way to one of the country’s most iconic sites.
We won’t bore you with the outrageous “shortcut” our GPS took us on to get to Iron Mountain Highway, which was so long we began to wonder if we were already on that highway. Instead, we’ll show you a couple of examples of the grand views we had once we were on the right path again.
This is a small part of one of the “pigtail” bridges that wind you down the hillside. They’re shaped like…well…a curly pig tail.
Iron Mountain Highway doesn’t end with the view you’re about to see, but WOW! What a spectacular “reveal” for our next destination!
Can’t see it yet…
Aaaannnndddd…NOW!
Neither of us ever thought we’d ever be in a position to see Mount Rushmore, and standing there in front of George, Tom, Teddy, and Abe felt just a bit surreal. Considering their human rights records (not you, Abe), we had some mixed feelings before we got there. Once there, we felt a surge of pride and patriotism (in the best sense of that word).
We probably took 40 or 50 photos of the monument itself, but we’ll just share a few here, including a side view of our first President taken from a cut-out along the road once we left the park.
The weather was, shall we say, changeable.
That’s George, in the middle of the photo
A second drive along Needles Highway was a welcome journey as we made our way down into Custer National Park again, with a stop at one of its visitor centers to get a steer on where to see Bighhorn Sheep (we’d nearly given up on the elk, who, we were told, were spooked by the last few evenings’ thunderstorms and were in hiding), and the docent was right on target with her suggestion.
Squeezing the last drops out of Custer State Park, we drove one side of the Wildlife Loop again on our way back to Hermosa, and buffalo and pronghorn herds’ reliability held up.
But tonight we were treated to a spotting we didn’t expect at all. We watched this coyote for about fifteen minutes as he/she/they hunted, and our patience was rewarded with an up-close view as the coyote came up to the road, gave us a good look, then trotted away.
No zoom lens needed
It wasn’t an elk, but we felt, yet again, we’d been treated to something rare and special. What a great way to cap off a great day!
*That sign that had us wondering what it was trying to communicate is for a little tiny theater in the middle of absolutely nowhere. Cute!
Why were so many places across the country named after a man who lost one of history’s most infamous battles, a battle aimed at genocide of the native peoples? We don’t know, and we’re not in a position to right the historical wrong or re-frame the story, but we will say the State Park named for Lieutenant Colonel George A. Custer, better known as General Custer, is one hellofa fabulous park.
We could yammer on about the rolling hills and the lush greens that splash across the landscape, as if some insane artist with a passion for the verdant is forever in the process of painting and repainting according to the whims of sunlight and clouds.
We could wax poetic about the Black Hills specifically, and we could throw in the fact that “hills that are black” is the English translation of “Pahá Sápa,” from the Lakota language of the Sioux people, and that the Black Hills rightful return to the Sioux Nation is a long-standing, contested issue the Sioux are currently losing.
If we really wanted to get all up in ourselves, we’d casually toss in the utterly self-promoting comment that the book, Paha Sapa: Land of the Gods, mysteriously made it into the queue for The Jungle Cruise at Walt Disney World’s Magic Kingdom park, and therefore into Susan’s third edition of The Hidden Magic of Walt Disney World.
But we won’t spend time on those topics, because on our second full day in Hermosa we were all about animal tracking from the comfort and convenience of our car.
We had been lucky enough to see bighorn sheep in the Badlands, and you’ve already read about our encounters with bison in Theodore Roosevelt National Park, so today we were on a mission to track down a herd of majestic elk.
This isn’t an elk
We entered the park’s Wildlife Loop not far from our campground, and first up on our sightings checklist were the burros, fondly nicknamed the “begging burros” for their willingness to eat whatever you’ve brought them (more accurate than “willingness” is “insistence”). Hence, they’re super friendly, and come right up to you rather than waiting for you to approach them.
Their hearty ancestors were pressed into service nearly a century ago, toting tourists and their paraphernalia up Black Elk Peak from the Sylvan Lake Lodge. Only a small herd is left, but they’ve been roaming wild ever since their forebearers’ tourism-based employment end. Most of them are descendants of the originals, but a few of the burros are donated newcomers.
Having frittered away the morning working, it was well past lunchtime when we found ourselves caught up in another bison jam, so we got out our sandwiches and spent nearly an hour enjoying their wanderings, their playful calves, and one truly peevish specimen who wanted to pick a fight with everyone.
We don’t know what the deal is (probably salt from the roads?), but this herd also had a liking for licking cars, starting with the one parked in front of us. And again, one of the bison gave us the stink-eye through the front window, then spent about five long, long, long minutes alongside Nippy, deciding if it wanted to ram us or just move on.
Scary bison makes a decision
A certain dog in the back seat was riveted, but this time she didn’t bark. She just sat there making little huffing sounds, clearly aware now that the beasts surrounding us were much bigger than she is.
Must. Not. Bark!
We moved on when they moved on, and had a lone male on a side road nearly to ourselves as we made our way to Custer, with Needles Highway as our next major adventure.
We did stop at Calamity Jane Coffee Shop in the cute town of Custer to help Simon deal with his lack of caffeine, and while I’m not usually a coffee drinker, I got one anyway and it was honestly the best cup of mocha and Joe I’ve ever had. Sadly, Jane wasn’t on hand that day, but her employee was friendly and the bathroom was clean. Score!
Needles Highway is a 14-mile scenic drive punctuated by the most outrageous granite spires that were pushed up sideways by the forces of nature. Every turn reveals a thrilling aspect, and we goggled at the magnificence and took selfies like the tourists we are.
South Dakota’s governor, Peter Norbeck, mapped out the entire trail that would become Needles Highway on foot and on horseback. It’s so winding, and has so many tight turns, it takes nearly an hour to drive just 14 miles, even longer with stops for panoramic photos. But you want to go slow, because this is prime elk territory, and we’re out for elk sightings today. Right?
There are three tunnels along the highway, carved through the rock by wind, rain, and the area’s harsh winter weather. Each tunnel is impressive, but we’ve never seen a tunnel more impressive than the Needle’s Eye. Nippy is small, but Simon could touch the side of the Eye as we drove through.
We agreed we’d have to come back and do Needles again, next time stopping at the lovely Sylvan Lake for a stroll and a picnic lunch. When we finally did that a couple of days later, the weather suddenly turned freezing cold, and was hammering down with rain and pounding with thunder and lightning, so we sat in the car and had lunch while feeling very, very sorry for a bridal party running through the storm to get to the lake’s reception hall, with all the girls in sheer, sleeveless formalwear and the bride’s veil whipping in the wind.
This is what Sylvan Lake looked like three minutes before a massive thunderstorm hit
After Needles we went back to the Wildlife Loop, where the Visitor Center assured us we’d have a chance at spotting elk as dusk came on. Instead, we saw deer and lots of pronghorn, including the wonderful treat of a mama pronghorn and her baby, with daddy not far behind.
We made two more trips into Custer State Park after that, determined we’d see elk, but to no avail. To add insult to injury, a couple we got to chatting with at the campground said they’d seen a herd of elk right on the road the previous evening, at around 6:30 p.m., which was about 15 minutes before we arrived at the same spot that same evening.
Would it take until Yellowstone before we’d see elk, or would South Dakota be kinder to us than that? Either way, what a grand and exciting place for wildlife and for absolutely magnificent scenery. But Custer wasn’t done surprising us yet.
We entered the new-to-us state of South Dakota on June 19, eager to see more of the Dakotas after a fantastic stay in the northernmost state in the Midwest. We’ve got a week in Hermosa, then 3 full days in Sturgis, to see Custer State Park, Crazy Horse, the town of Custer, Deadwood, Badlands National Park, Needles Highway, and Six Grandfathers, now known as Mount Rushmore.
To break up the long trip from Medora to Hermosa, we had an overnight stop at Harvest Host location, Belle Valley Ancient Grains in Newell, SD, which felt incredibly rural but was just minutes off the highway heading south.
We learned about the ancient grains owner Brian is farming, and came away with whole Spelt and White Sonora Wheat that we’ll make into grain bowls and hot cereal.
The 1950s machine Brian uses to separate the grain from the waste, before putting it through high-tech machines that finish the job.
It’s hard to beat a stunning sunset over pastoral land
Then it was on to Hermosa, with a butt-clenching 11 miles through construction cones on a highway with a speed limit of 75mph. You can imagine the number of cars that passed us after the construction zone ended. We’ve decided their honking and single-finger salutes are congratulatory celebrations of how well we navigated a tight lane with harrowing twists and turns, and we felt very special indeed.
But enough of that, and on to the touring. We settled in at Heartland RV Park, enjoyed a pizza and live music at the campground’s event center, and had a relatively quiet night (rain is loud when you’re in a metal can), then made our way to Badlands National Park the next morning.
Happy boy!The karaoke was good, and the pizza was great!
It was quite cloudy and windy all day, but that didn’t deter us. We were on a mission to see something other than the rolling hills we’ve been driving over, and even before we reached the park, the landscaped changed. Immediately off the highway, the hillsides on either side of us opened to two massive valleys, with structures completely different to the ones we saw in Theodore Roosevelt.
For scale, that teeny tiny white dot you can barely see at the end of the dirt pathway on the far edge of the plateau is Simon, and a lady who had just come from the Black Hills is in the foreground.
We made a quick stop at the Visitor Center, where they told us we could find gas in the appealingly-named town of Scenic if we needed any, but when we found it, it had obviously been a dead town for years. Decades maybe. The gas station had a price of $5.55 per gallon, so we’re guessing the place drew its last breath back when Jimmy Carter was President. Luckily, Nippy is very sippy, so we didn’t need to fill up until evening.
Is Scenic scenic? You decide!
Once we reached the first outcroppings, it was obvious we were in an entirely new landscape. The peaks were sharper at the top and more angular as they descended, with a softer, more “melted” look when we got up close.
We were given a guide that showed what each later represented, moving from the oldest layers at the bottom to the youngest at the top.
The badlands here were created by runoff that washed into an inland sea as Colorado’s Rocky Mountains rose into existence. We could see the layers when we took a short hike into a wide canyon, and the ground we were walking on was primarily the finest silt imaginable. Just like walking on talcum powder.
The white pathway feels exactly like talcum powder
Other areas in the same canyon were like petrified mud, hard enough to create hills you could stand on but also dry and cracked on some surfaces.
This ancient sediment is described as “popcorn” rock
Even on that barren surface, the most delicate flowers have taken hold.
Another surprise were the “yellow mounds” (called paleosols) that were left when the inland sea drained away and chemicals from its plants left staining of yellow, red, purple, and gray. Against the cloudy sky, they’re less striking, but when sunlight hits them they positively shine.
Some yellow mounds we saw were only yellow, while most were multi-colored. We missed the sunlight photos, but you can imagine.
We could post a few hundred photos from the park, but we’ll spare you that and instead share a few from the absolutely bizarre town of Wall, our exit point from the park as we headed north to Hermosa.
Normally, commercials on TV and billboards along highways have zero impact on us. But Wall Drug Store is too smart for that, and the sheer number of billboards they’ve installed made it inevitable Simon would have to see what all the fuss was about.
Our introduction to Wall
Like Buc-ee’s, if you’ve been there, you know. Wall Drug Store is just…massive. Like, a full city block massive.
Not all of these storefronts are Wall Drug Store, but most of them are
Want a billion shot glasses, T-shirts, cups, mugs, magnets, and every other form of tourist crap you can imagine, all wrapped up in interactive stuff that includes a jackalope the kiddies can sit on, a gorilla animatronic playing a piano, and an insane trio-plus-one of mechanical cowboys singing in a wild-west setting of howling coyotes and an upset bear? Wall Drug Store has all of it and much, much more.
This is a terrible photo, but there was no way to avoid the glare. Still, it softens the full horror.
Why?
We didn’t buy anything. We didn’t even try the “free water” the store so proudly advertises on the front façade. But we’ll remember Wall Drugs with the same fondness we remember that wacky gas station with a beaver as its mascot.
Tomorrow (subject of our next blog) would see us making the first of many trips into Custer State Park, and we’ll just say that at $20 for a seven-day pass, we absolutely got our money’s worth.
Nobody should be smiling when encountering a sight like this
Simon loves the dark comedy movie, Fargo, with its relentlessly evil villains, the dogged heroine Marge, and that chipper no one who has ever seen the movie can forget. The Chipper prop now lives at the Fargo-Moorehead Visitor Center, and it was the reason we put Fargo on our Grand Adventure route.
We stayed at a Harvest Host in Minnesota the night before, celebrating Simon’s birthday in high style with cheese and bikkies (crackers for us U.S. folks) and a beer, since we had no access to electricity and didn’t want to use up our batteries (generators aren’t usually allowed at Harvest Hosts), plus we’d had a celebratory lunch and were too full for much more.
Birthday beer out there on the edge of the prairie (okay, right ON the prairie)
The host location was a farm with horses, goats, chickens, cats with newborn kittens, and a gangly, year-old dog named Pooh Bear.
It’s so soft!
We got to hold a three-day-old baby goat, meet the newborn kittens, and Simon, always ready to try his hand at something new, milked a mama goat.
We then spent the evening sitting on the front porch chatting with the owners, and felt it was exactly the kind of experience we were hoping to have during this journey.
The next morning we made the short trip into North Dakota, where we had another Harvest Host stay, this time at a winery, and while the sweet wines weren’t to our taste (neither was the eyelid tick), the food was good and we met another RVing couple who had come in from Oregon, which passed a happy couple of hours before heading back to the rig for the night, with a strong wind whipping through the prairie grasses as a small storm rolled past, which we loved.
Moody sky, but we only had a little bit of rain as the storm went past
Bismarck was our next destination, with a detour off the highway into Jamestown to see the World’s Largest Buffalo.
Imagine the droppings….
The roadside attraction included a touristy town with stagecoach rides, and it made for a nice diversion on our way to Bismarck.
We woke up early and headed back to Fargo for a photo op with the infamous Chipper. If you don’t know the movie Fargo, it’s the means through which the hapless main character gets turned into the human equivalent of ground beef, thanks to a crazy man with a passion for gruesome murders [Note: Leg in Chipper = hint].
Non-gory recreation of a very gory scene
The Coen brothers (Fargo’s producers and directors) signed the Chipper, but there was no way to get a photo of their signatures without glare, so here they are, just as obscure and unfathomable as the movie the brothers created.
Appropriately scrawled across the “exit”” end of the chipper, where whatever you shove into it blows out. Across the snow. All bloody.
Our next campground (with full hookups!) was Hillcrest Acres in Bismarck, a small, pretty place appropriately located on a hill, a forerunner to the scenery we’d see as we drove around the area for the next few days.
Fati getting comfortable
Countless times, we wondered how those hills (variously called “buttes,” “hills,” “points,” and “ridges”) formed, why most were grassy but some were bare, and why glacial movement made North Dakota so undulating, but Michigan so flat. Wind and water played their part, but we’d like to talk with a geologist to find out more. That’s one of the beauties of travel; it inspires curiosity.
These odd outcroppings are everywhere
Our first full day took us to Washburn, where we discovered the restored Fort Mandan, in an area the Lewis and Clark expedition spent the winter of 1804. The fort had various tiny rooms, such as quarters for soldiers, interpreters, and the captain, plus a smokehouse, blacksmith, and storage room.
Ruthie was absolutely captivated by the Sargent of the Guard’s quarters and didn’t want to leave. We don’t know why, but she was very clear about wanting to stay.
We tried not to read too much into it, but “past lives” certainly came to mind
She was less captivated by the statue remembering Seaman, the faithful Newfoundland dog who traveled with the expedition, but she dutifully sat for a quick picture.
A short stroll beyond the statue rewarded us with our first up-close view of the Missouri River, whose waters were low and many big sandbars could be seen. We would cross over the Missouri several times in the following days.
Just a short drive away from the fort was the Knife River Indian Villages National Historic Site (using their cultural terminology, not the terminology we might have chosen), with a recreation of a Native American earthlodge that marks the area many tribes used as a trading center.
A buffalo hide acts as the doorway into the lodge, and inside the temperature is about 10 degrees cooler. A deep, smokey smell permeates, which gave us a small sense of what living inside it would have been like. Ruthie lost her mind in there, loving all the new sniffs.
Ignore the man pants and man shirt
The visitor center here was superb, giving an excellent overview of two tribes and their lifestyles. Although the day was cool and we could safely leave Ruthie in the car for a short time, we had to turn down the host’s offer to watch a movie, as our Floridian sensibilities made us uncomfortable leaving her for very long. But the exhibits were terrific, and we felt we learned more about the people who once lived there.
We drove further west for Lake Sakakawea (pronounced here as Sah-KAH-kuh-WEE-uh, not Sack-a-juh-WAY-uh), a huge lake set below stark cliffsides, which must be ideal for boating on summer weekends. The history of the lake is, predictably, one of eminent domain, force, and the subsequent throwing-of-a-bone in naming it after a famous figure who (it is my opinion) probably had as little say in her destiny as the land that now holds the lake named for her did.
A small slice of Lake Sakakawea
This is the site of two-mile-long Garrison Dam, a three-part set of structures built by the U.S. Corp of Engineering in 1953, that includes a pump station…
…the dam itself…
…and a spillway that helps route water back into the Missouri when levels get too high. Neither of us are geeky in that way, but it was truly fascinating, and we spent a fair bit of time pointing and saying, “I wonder what that’s for….”
North Dakota’s oldest state park, Fort Abraham Lincoln State Park ($7 to enter), was our next stop, with three re-created blockhouses overlooking the Missouri River. On breezy summer days, the many narrow lookout windows must have afforded an excellent breeze. In winter, it must have been cold enough to freeze the brass whatsits off a monkey.
One of the three blockhouses
There are several of these narrow windows all around the blockhouse, some with fabulous views
On-A-Slant Indian Village was within the park’s boundaries, too, and the earthlodges here were beautifully displayed, along with panels that described life in the Mandan tribe village from 1575-1781.
We were captivated by the idea that boys in the Mandan culture learned to shoot with accuracy by playing a game that involved throwing a hoop into the river and shooting an arrow into its moving center. According to an exhibit we saw, it was their belief that the dead buffalo they found floating in the river with each spring thaw were a result of these games. All of the children would have been treated to funny stories that told important tales.
On the way out of the park, Simon made a quick right turn when he saw a sign for Custer’s House. We couldn’t take Ruthie in it, so we agreed Simon would check out the house while Ruthie and I waited in the car with the air conditioner on.
Spot the docent? No, you don’t, and neither did Susan
Twenty minutes later he was still standing on the house’s porch, so the following phone call ensued:
Susan: Hey. What’s going on? Simon: Oh. Yes. It’s nice to hear from you. Uh-huh. I’ll let you know when I’m there. Susan: What the hell are you talking about? I can see you standing on the porch, so I’ll certainly see you when you get back. Simon: Okay, thanks! All the best. Bye for now.
When he got back to the car, he detailed the conversation a docent sitting on the porch (whom I couldn’t see) had at him. Not with him, at him. Simon asked what rank Custer was during the war, and 20 minutes later he knew everything from Custer’s blood type to his favorite dessert and whether he preferred tighty-whities or boxer-briefs. (Okay, not really, but the docent talked for a full 20 minutes, and Simon had to pretend I was someone important so as to break off the dissertation gently and with respect).
For those who cannot bear not knowing, it turns out Custer was a Lieutenant Colonel during the battle at Little Bighorn, but was a General during the Civil War and was allowed to keep that designation as an honorary title when that bloody war ended.
We finished the day at Standing Rock, an important stop along the Native American Scenic Byway. Our goal was to visit Sitting Bull’s burial site, which we found after many wrong turns, having blown past it on the way into town. Most people probably do that, too. There is only a small sign on the side of the road that indicates where this great man’s resting place is (or rather, was; he’s since been moved at the request of his grandchildren).
The grand brochure we were given at the Fargo visitor center did not prepare us for what we found at Standing Rock. Perhaps we missed the highlights, though we’re not quite sure how we could have. Instead – and we’re assuming a LOT, all of which may be wrong – we found a town completely void of energy, as if a total lack of opportunity and a heaping helping of injustice held the place and its people in a state of downcast limbo. We’ll end our sweeping assumptions there, and, with heavy hearts filled with compassion, put our energy into hoping all good things come to the people who, by choice or by historical force, make it their home.
Want to see how far we’ve come in a month? This is the 31-day update of route – and distance – so far.
We now have a full month of our scheduled 12 officially in the books, and we have so far traveled a whopping 2,504 miles from home. We have crossed nine states, two time zones, and stayed in 14 different campgrounds and Harvest Host venues.
We have slowed down since our initial 7-day warp-speed approach (1,289 miles in that period; 1,215 in the 3 weeks since), and are paying more attention to savoring the sights as we travel. And we’re seeing some pretty stunning sights.
The route so far – 2,504 miles in 31 days, taking us from tropical Florida to the wide open spaces, and amazing scenery, of the Midwest and Northern Plains.
We are now in uncharted territory – for us – and ready for more adventures in the Dakotas, Montana and Wyoming. This is a hugely exciting part of the journey, with the areas rightly renowned for the wide open spaces of this huge country.
Having just arrived on the edge of The Badlands of North Dakota, the landscape is truly outlandish and full of intrigue. We’re here for the best part of a week, and will have a LOT more to report in due course.
The backdrop to our current spot in Medora, North Dakota, the Red Trail Campground, surrounded by the rugged scenery of The Badlands, and the gateway to Theodore Roosevelt National Park
For those keen on geography and geology, the term “Badlands” is a specific geologic feature of sedimentary rock erosion, and it creates some captivating and bizarre landscapes. We hope to see a lot of it in the next few days, as well as wildlife that should include bison, pronghorn antelope, bighorn sheep, deer, feral horses, and – Simon’s favorite – the prairie dog.
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