I was up early, in time for a couple cups of coffee before sunrise. Kari was not far behind. We began the day here:
And ended it here, having driven 1040 miles in between.
We were done.
September 27
This was day we hit the wall, both literally and figuratively. Our destination was "the wall", a well known boondocking location. https://www.rvhive.com/boondocking-on-the-wall-overlooking-badlands-national-park/?amp Boondocking is camping with no services in a remote location. I had found this spot earlier in the trip and thought it looked really cool, truly a unique spot where it would be cool to hang for a night or two. I'd been looking forward to it for weeks. You park on cliffs looking into Badlands NP. You can see for miles and the views are just amazing.
The "wall" is located adjacent to the town of Wall. The two things the town is known for are the camping destination, and Wall Drug. Apparently Wall Drug draws a couple million visitors a year to town. It's kitsch on steroids. A poor man's Dollyworld if that even makes sense. They have an 80 foot brontosaurus, nuff said.
Knowing it was literally our last night to do something cool, I was dying to get to the campsite. Kari wanted to do Wall Drug. I'll just say, these conflicting desires did not mesh well. In battles between retail and nature, we often fall on opposite sides of the divide. We split the difference and did both. I'll make my case in pictures.
September 26
Morning dawned bright at the Windmill.
Our first mission of the day was to find a spot for Shirley that evening. We wanted to take a day exploring the area. We stopped at a Camping World store (likely a fate worse than death for many of you) to pick up a new power cord for Shirley-Mr Preparation had managed to fry our other one. Oops... Lo and behold, we discover that we can actually bunk at the store, they have a couple spots with hookups. 30 minutes and we were set up and outta there, headed to the Black Hills.
On the advice of a friend we were using an app called gypsy. It was a narrated driving tour that was gps enabled so it made navigation easy along with the info it provided. It kind of felt old personish, kind of akin to a guided bus tour in Europe. But driving was one of our few options with Kari's foot so it was perfect. Our first stop was the Crazy Horse Memorial https://crazyhorsememorial.org of which we had no clue before today. It turned out to be absolutely fascinating. They're in the process of creating the largest sculpture in the world, having begun in 1948. The head is the only part complete so far. The head is 87 feet tall, the entire sculpture will be 563 feet and will comprise the entire rock face below and to the right of the head as depicted in the second photo.
Next we were off to Custer State Park and the Black Hills. I've never been to this area, Kari was as a kid but had no real recollection. We were blown away with the beauty. A former governor marked the route of the main road on foot and horseback in the early 20th century. It's narrow and windy, with several tunnels and these cool "pigtail" bridges whose shape are kind of like a roller coaster corkscrew. There is also a "needles" section known for it's rock formations. No way Shirley would fit through these tunnels!
.jpg)
Our next stop was lunch at Blue Bell Lodge.
The park is known for it's bison herds and other critters, including wild burrows, who knew?
On the east side of the park, 3 tunnels frame Mt Rushmore as you drive towards it. Apparently this is how it was designed, with this route being the preferred entrance into the monument. It was an interesting engineering feat.
I have to admit I still don't get the point of Mt Rushmore. Nonetheless it's kind of cool, a dose of patriotism is always a healthy thing. After a short talk by a park ranger they flip the light switch on and play patriotic music. It was a fun night.
September 25
We headed out early. I had made a reservation at a joint a few hours west of Rapid City. We didn't know how far we'd get and I wanted to have somewhere to crash so we weren't scrambling as darkness fell.
Our route took us down the Wind River Range past Jackson, giving us one more glimpse of the incredible valleys bursting with their fall colors. I don't think the photos capture it well, but the undulating vegetation was really cool, it looked like a woven tapestry.
It was a long uneventful drive once we headed out of the mountains. Kari was stuck once more as I lapsed into my surly driving personality. I know what you're thinkin-how is that different than any other day? We listened to the Colts comeback win against the Chiefs, then a Hell & High Water podcast with Peter Baker & Susan Glasser discussing their new book. They're a married couple-he the NYT's chief White House correspondent and she a writer with the Atlantic. Both are great. We also listened to a Derek Thompson podcast on the plight of men in today's America. It was really interesting, although I've known men are pathetic creatures for quite some time.
A couple things hit me as we left the area. One was common with our midwestern region, one was not. The uncommon thing was the importance of water to the west, and how little us Great Lakes folks appreciate that. Reservoirs, irrigation, fire danger, etc. Water, or the lack thereof, is a big deal in these areas. Literally a daily issue. Given the rapid growth in many of those same areas, one wonders what our climate changes have in store for them in the next few decades. Watch for these issues to spill into the legislative arena as other regions ogle the Great Lakes-the world's largest group of freshwater lakes by surface area, comprising 21% of the worlds surface fresh water.
The second thing was that the west has the same economic transformation taking place as elsewhere in the US and other western countries-a transformation to a knowledge economy. The only difference is what the transformation is away from. For us it's manufacturing, for them it's mining, logging, and fishing. But the impacts are the same-never ending stretches of distressed and dying rural areas surrounding dots of thriving urban centers. This explains so much of our polarized politics. Here's a telling fact. The 509 counties Biden won comprise 71% of the nations GDP, the 2564 counties Trump won comprise the remaining 29%. The corresponding numbers in 2016 were 64%-36%. https://www.brookings.edu/blog/the-avenue/2020/11/09/biden-voting-counties-equal-70-of-americas-economy-what-does-this-mean-for-the-nations-political-economic-divide/ You've probably seen the red/blue maps, with the red areas dwarfing the blue areas geographically. In many ways our rural areas have become the new inner cities, with rampant economic distress, drug addiction, white washed windows, crime, failing schools, depression, suicides, etc. Similar periods in history (the agrarian to industrial economic transformation, etc) have given rise to populist politicians eager to capitalize on the inevitable cleavages these trends produce. Todays cleavages are particularly severe. We all have a responsibility to do our part in bridging them, in understanding the different world views these realities produce in our fellow Americans. Though hard at times, we must remember our real enemies are not fellow Americans, but those in other nations seeking to undermine liberal democracies.
Ok, sermon over. We needed to find a place to bunk for the evening. When we pulled into the campground I had reserved it was around 5 or 6 o'clock. We immediately agreed we should keep on driving since it was not the most enticing place and we weren't tired. So on we went to Rapid City with no destination in mind. Upon arrival we found it harder than expected to find a place. Long story, but we ended up at one of the mega truck stops, really.
The neighbor on our other side was a big rig with 6 new airstreams on it, giving Shirley some much needed kinship. Unfortunately we didn't get a picture snapped. It was tight quarters, not much space between rigs.
Cognitive dissonance set in. It was not one of our better sunsets...
September 24
Today was our last day in the Tetons, and marked the beginning of the end of our trip. Once we headed east, we were only planning a short stop in South Dakota at Badlands NP and the Black Hills on the way back to Indy. Though it was a bummer thinking of heading home, we also were getting the inevitable itch that comes toward the end of any adventure-you're just ready to be at home.
But we had a few more days in paradise and we didn't want them to go to waste. Colter Bay was a really cool campground. It was well laid out, and most importantly it sits on the shore of Jackson Lake with great views of the Tetons. I spent the afternoon by the lake, Kari joined me late afternoon. We timed the sunset perfectly, and I miraculously scoped an eagle with my binoculars while watching a couple kayakers-he flew right into my view and I tracked him with a big ole fish in his mouth. Pretty cool.
I even witnessed a wedding:
On another note, we've seen all sorts of camping rigs the last few months. Colter Bay had a particularly diverse assortment, and almost all were really nice. I suspect this area is kind of the Mecca for RV nerds. Below is a wacky one that was made by Blue Bird, the school bus company. I guess they're all fully custom and quite desirable. But we still love Shirley the most. She's been good to us the entire trip.
I lingered a few extra moments in the evening to drink in the views and vibes. We did some packing and hit the sack.
September 23
Kari's afflictions limited our options for places we could go, so I found a scenic drive from Moran to Dubois along the Wind River range. Once again the fall colors were amazing, as was the sagebrush, the forever fences, the ranches. But the highlight had to be the world's largest jackalope exhibit. We didn't go, but I was tempted, under the theory that anyone who actually did attend deserved to be exposed to covid.
We ended the day at the Jackson Lake Lodge bar, outside and way away from others so we were covid safe. Life was better after a beer, a wine, and a few appetizers.
Subscribe to:
Comments (Atom)