Monday, July 9, 2012

Day 20 - Badlands National Park (SD) to Devils Tower National Monument (WY)


Happy 4th of July!  No fireworks for us this year -- too much fire danger.  Ironically, if we’d stayed at Badlands, we could have gone to a great small town rodeo at Interior (just outside the park) and a fireworks show.  
We are heading on though and making our way to another favorite spot -- Devils Tower National Monument.  
The drive was insanely windy and by the time we got to Rapid City, Greg was pretty tired of fighting the steady headwind and gusts so we took a break.  Rapid City is the gateway to the Black Hills, Mount Rushmore, and Custer State Park.  There are a LOT of tourist traps in the area.  We’d heard about Bear Country USA -- a drive through animal park and decided it would be a fun way to wait out the wind.  
I’d love to show you some amazing shots that I took of some amazing animals like wolves, bears, big horn sheep, elk, rocky mountain goats, and more but . . . My computer ate the photographs and they are simply gone.  (Sadness!)  Suffice that it was really fun and we’d go back again.  (I'll scour Gage's pictures and Greg's and see if there is anything that I can salvage from what they did!)
We had lunch at Famous Dave’s and then continued on to Devils Tower National Monument -- without any wind!  Yay!
There is a really nice KOA campground at the edge of the park and we love staying there.  
Once we got settled in, the kids were able to swim, ride their bikes, play on the merry-go-round, and just have fun.  We hung out and read and relaxed.  
In the evening, the entertainment started.  We aren’t Joiners so we didn’t go over to the patio area for the free entertainment and bbq but we could hear the singing from our site.  It was karaoke . . . Some of the singers were okay and some where just not.  Wow.  
Happy 4th -- I always miss Boulder Creek with it’s amazing 4th of July parade but I love that we are out seeing America and what makes it great on our nation’s birthday!  That’s good, too!

Welcome to Wyoming!

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