1 August 2024 Iron Mountain Loop

 The heat has been oppressive the last few days with temperatures over 100F with afternoon thunderstorms which has limited our activities. We don’t like leaving Keira alone for more than a couple of hours in case the power goes out in the RV park due to the heavy demands from all the air conditioners and definitely not when thunderstorms are blowing through. But today seemed like a reasonable day to head out. We decided to drive a loop over Iron Mountain into Keystone, then over to Hill City and back through Custer. We picked up Iron Mountain road just inside Custer State Park. It is a paved narrow winding road up to the top of Iron Mountain with views of Mount Rushmore. There are three one lane tunnels we had to pass through that were only 10 feet wide while the Behemoth is a little over 8 feet wide. So a close squeeze. There were a lot of motorcycles on the road even though the Sturgis Rally doesn’t start for two days. Some of the tighter turns were a bit scary with the Behemoth taking up the whole lane and sticking out over the center lines with motorcycles zooming around the corners very close to or even over the centerline. There were a couple of close calls that we’re sure scared them as much as it did us. There were also two pigtails we had to drive through coming out of one lane tunnels that were fun to negotiate. We stopped at several over looks to enjoy the scenery and the views of Mount Rushmore. We dropped into the small town of Keystone where we ate lunch on the edge of downtown. The downtown area was a sea of motorcycles and riders. After lunch, we headed on over to Hill City where we stopped at Naughti Winery where we did a wine tasting and relaxed with a glass of wine. The dry red wines were surprisingly good, but all of their grapes come from the Columbia River Valley, none are from South Dakota.  We drove through downtown Hill City and found the largest Smokey the Bear we had ever seen! From there we drove down to Custer and stopped at the Purple Pie Shop and each had a slice of delicious homemade pie for dinner (Leslie had Peach and David had Blueberry). As we were leaving Custer and heading back to Hermosa, we got lucky enough to see a beautiful doe and 2 twin fawns on the side of the road. The fawns were small and still had their spots!

Mount Rushmore from the top of Iron Mountain

Motorcycles lined up on Main Street of Keystone

Wine Tasting at Naughty Wines

Purple Pie Shop

Going through a tunnel on Iron Mountain Road

Now that is a BIG Smokey the Bear!

28 July 2024 South Dakota Wine Tasting

 

On the drive from Sioux Falls we noticed multiple signs for Firehouse Brewery. Each sign had an old antique fire truck parked by it. The signs said it was a brewery and winery. Intrigued, we headed into Rapid City to check it out and do some shopping while in town. The Firehouse is in an old firehouse from the early 1900s. They have a brewery with a restaurant, a gift shop and a Wine Tasting room. We stopped in the restaurant first to get something on our stomachs and to try their brews. The food and beer were excellent!  Then we wandered on over to the wine tasting room. We did a wine sampling of their reds and some of their whites and were very surprised! They were nice wines. Most of the wines are made with grapes brought in from the west coast since the Dakota winters are pretty harsh for grape vines. But they did have a couple of wines made only with cold hearty grapes from South Dakota that were interesting. So, we ended up buying half a case to take back to Texas.  

27 July 2024 Custer State Park

 One of the must do items in the Black Hills is to drive the Wild Life Loop in Custer State Park. We did it when we were here in 2018 and enjoyed being surrounded by buffalo! They have paved the loop since we were here last which cut down on the dust. We also did a few of the gravel roads to see if we could find the buffalo herd. We found several lone males lounging near the road and saw the herd of females up on a ridgeline in the distance. We also saw lots of prairie dogs. We stopped in the Bison Center to see the exhibits and walk through the gift shop. On the final stretch of the Wild Life Loop we found the wild burros with young up on the road. Leslie brought along some carrots just in case. We fed carrots to a couple of the burros that were willing to walk up to the truck. We eventually had to move on to give others the chance to see the burros close up. We then headed over to the town of Custer, where we stayed in 2018. We tried to stop at the Purple Pie Shop for some afternoon desert but the place was packed and there were no parking spots! Disappointed, we headed back to the Wanderer. 

Lone Male Buffalo resting in the shade

Herd of Buffalo on the ridge

Wild Burro Baby on the road

24 July 2024 Sturgis, Deadwood and Lead

 One of the things we did not get to do in 2018 was to visit Sturgis and Deadwood SD. Sturgis is famous for the huge motorcycle rally held in August every Year. Deadwood is famous for the outlaws that used to roam its streets. We really did not want to try and go to Sturgis during the rally since there will be hundreds of thousands of people and motorcycles during that week. So we went over early. There were a lot of vendors already setting up their tents. We wandered through the merchants, bought gifts and tee shirts, and had a late lunch at the Iron Horse Saloon. We then drove over to the historical mining town of Deadwood. Where Sturgis is definitely motorcyclist counter culture oriented, Deadwood is family oriented and surprisingly larger than Sturgis. We wandered through the stores and watched a reenactment of a shootout on main street. Since we were close, we drove through the small quiet town of Lead. Then took the backroads through the Black Hills to the Wanderer where we saw a large Big Horn Sheep down near the road. 

Sturgis South Dakota

Main Street Sturgus

Iron Horse Saloon

Deadwood South Dakota

Main Street Deadwood

Main Street Deadwood

Main Street Deadwood

Main Street Deadwood

Mountain Goat along the road to Lead

Mountain Goat along the road to Lead

22 July 2024 Salem to Hermosa SD

 Another long 324 mile day, straight west on I-90. We stopped for lunch at a rest stop overlooking the Missouri River with the beautiful Dignity of Earth and Sky statue. Then we stopped in Wall and went to the famous Wall Drug Store/mall to explore. We had heard about the Wall Drug Store for years. It is definitely a must stop tourist trap, even if you don’t buy anything! Then we swung on into Hermoza SD, which is halfway between the Black Hills and Rapid City, late in the afternoon. We are staying at the Heartland RV Resort (38.50 per night with the monthly rate). This is a huge RV Park with plenty of room. We’re not far from the Event Center where they serve breakfast every morning. David is definitely going to take advantage of that service! We are looking forward to staying in one place for a while after the last couple of weeks of traveling. 

Dignity of Earth and Sky statue

Wall Drugstore

Wall Drugstore

Wall Drugstore

Wall Drugstore

21 July 2024 Layover in Salem SD

 We did not plan much for today. We did drive into Salem to get fuel and a few grocery items. Then to Canistota to get a couple of items we could not find in Salem. Lots of cornfields and tiny dusty towns!

20 July 2024 Waukee IA to Salem SD

 The drive was pretty benign 322 miles first west on I-80 then North on I-29 to Sioux Falls to pick up I-90 west. The roads were in good shape. We did not see any flood damage along our route like we expected we would from the early summer floods in this area. We are staying at Dakota Sunsets RV Park and Campground ($54 per night). We stayed here back in 2018. It’s a quiet RV park, surrounded by corn fields about 2 miles off the interstate. Lots of rabbits that Keira wanted to chase after!