One Dae at a Time: Fall Break: South Dakota Road Trip

Fall road trip!

Asher has had a thing for South Dakota for a while now, and no one knows where it came from or why he talks about it. But if you ask him where he wants to go in this world, he says South Dakota. And we figured we could definitely make that happen for Fall Break. :)

DAY ONE:

Drive to Devil's Tour after school on Friday.

A random dinner of grinder salad and fruit in a random hotel (not our hotel) parking lot, halfway through our late 5-hour drive.

We left by 4:00 Friday when the boys came home from school and Michael came home from work. We had quite a drive to make up to our little lodge by Devil's Tour. We stopped halfway through the drive to have the boys eat dinner and get ready for bed in a random parking lot -- we just needed somewhere with a little lighting :) Not our fanciest dinner, but it got the job done.

DAY TWO:
Devil's Tower, drive through Montana to Theodore Roosevelt National Park in North Dakota

We woke up next to Devil's Tower (too dark to see it when we rolled in at 10:30) and Michael and Asher took a cold outdoor shower with a nice view :) We ate breakfast at the lodge that a nice young married couple owned, and then drove to the tower to walk around it. We met some nice people who shared their binoculars to point out some climbers and the old ladder systems that they used to use to climb the tower. I distinctly remember thinking Devil's Tower was SO COOL and SO BIG as a kid when we stopped here on a road trip. Our boys had fun learning about it and especially loved the Native American legends about the tower's origin, like the tower protecting the kids from a large bear. The visitor's center was open, thankfully, because I'm sure not many others will be during this government shutdown. Then we drove up north through Montana and into North Dakota to see Theodore Roosevelt National Park. We were listening to a book about his life on our drive and it made it interesting to learn more about him and the places he loved. The park was incredible -- totally exceeded our expectations. Wild horses, bison, beautiful views, and fun dinner in a saloon that night, then we drove 90 minutes south to sleep in a little South Dakota town on the way to Rapid City.

Not your average morning shower!

Breakfast with a view.

Love me a new state checked off for these guys.

They're so happy sticking out of the sunroof and looking for wildlife :)

The views on this little hike were so pretty!
Wild horses crossing a river, bison everywhere, beautiful colors, gorgeous sky.
We just loved it.

DAY THREE:

Deadwood, Rapid City exploring, Thai food

Today we had just a little driving to do to get to our three-night stop in Rapid City. We stopped in Deadwood -- a historic mining town that has been devastated by fire three times and honestly after visiting, not hard to see why. What a gross place. If I had to tell you my least favorite spot I've ever been in the United States of America I would tell you Deadwood, South Dakota. So how's that for getting my point across?

Then we went to Rapid City, where we found a really beautiful park and fed some ducks and geese before finding a delicious Thai restaurant for dinner. We made it back to get to bed at a good time for the little guys and get Westin watching football while Michael and I worked out at the hotel gym. We've been pretty darn consistent with a 6-week challenge we're doing and we wanted to keep it going on the nights we can on this trip!

A cougar and a cougar fan

Calamity Jane and Wild Bill Hickock

I loved this park. Honestly Deadwood was such a gross place, it felt so refreshing to walk around this beautiful spot and be with our boys.

DAY FOUR:

Watiki Waterpark and Mt. Rushmore!

We stayed a few nights with Rapid City as our home base so we could do some water park hours mixed with seeing the sights around the area. The first day we did half the day at the water park, then went to visit Mt. Rushmore. The visitor's center was closed because the government is shut down, which was disappointing. We were able to walk along the trail though and still read all the signs.

They have these random blow ups at different corners and at first I didn't understand,
but then I found my way back to our hotel room (this waterpark is in the middle of three connected hotels) using them as markers and I realized that's probably exactly why they're there :)

Camden particularly loved them and requested pictures by them haha.

Asher was not a fan of the slides (well, he wouldn't try them) but he liked standing here and watching Westin and Daddy go down this big red and blue one. He LOVED the lazy river and kids area though, so everyone was happy for hours at the water park!

Mt. Rushmore!
Devil's Tower seemed huge when I was a kid, and Mt. Rushmore seemed smaller than I expected.
I remembered those things, so on this trip, I was surprised how small Devil's Tower seemed and how big Mt. Rushmore was haha.

Mountain Goat!

We stopped at one of the many (so many) random tourist spots off the freeway and an older man taught the boys how to make rope. We almost stayed for a full Western dinner and program but Asher hadn't been feeling quite himself, so we decided to get him to bed early.

DAY FIVE:

Badlands National Park, Wall Drug, More Watiki Waterpark

Badlands was really cool! It exceeded all our expectations -- such interesting colors and views and we did a really fun hike with ladders that the boys loved. Plus tons of exploring off the trails that the boys could do for hours -- little caves to find and hills to climb and areas to explore. Their favorite hikes are when there's not one right way to get there and they can just kind of explore on their own.

After Badlands we stopped at a spot where you're allowed to feed prairie dogs and that was a serious highlight, let me tell you. We were all obsessed with them. Then we went to Wall Drug because it's iconic, but I would've rather stayed feeding the prairie dogs all day.

Walking over to a ram.

I just thought these colors were so beautiful.
I expected the Badlands to be much more desolate.

The worst.

Feeding the prairie dogs... the best. They were so cute and funny and their little squeaks made us laugh every single time.

DAY SIX:

Bear Country, Custer State Park, and that hike where we lost a kid...

I remember absolutely loving Bear Country as a kid so it was really fun to take the boys there. They loved it. We saw lots of wildlife, and their favorite was this little Pine Marten that was just sooo energetic. We all loved watching it.

We made it to Custer State Park and went on a really pretty hike, but Asher was still not feeling 100% so he didn't quite make it to the end. We decided to have Michael and the older boys head to the end (we didn't think it was far) and Westin would hurry back and switch me out with Asher so that I could hurry and see the cathedral rock formations at the end too. I waited a while and soon Camden and Bennett and Michael came around the corner. When we locked eyes we immediately both knew that Westin had gone the wrong way when he was making his way back to me. A couple other nice families were really helpful and kind, and in the end Michael was with Westin in just about 20 minutes. Westin had realized he wasn't recognizing where he was and knew he'd taken a wrong direction at a fork in the path, so he'd turned around and was making his way closer to Michael as Michael was backtracking to him. We drove to another trail end where a family had sent their teenager hurrying up the path to intercept Westin (if he had never turned around) and told them all was well. Everyone was so nice but man, that sick feeling in your stomach when a kid is missing is really, really terrible. Westin was kind of embarrassed and annoyed at the whole thing and I felt bad for him. I told him to find some symbols in the story and use it in a talk one day and he said, "ABSOLUTELY NOT," so, there you go :)

Sweet Asher. He usually keeps up with our crew remarkably well but he threw up a couple times on this trip at night and just seemed off. He kept up really well considering that.

Our pine marten friend. He was so, so cute.

We ended the rainy day watching National Treasure in our hotel room together and eating Oreos and milk. We thought they went to Mr. Rushmore in National Treasure but apparently that's the second one :)

DAY SEVEN:

Custer State Park, Wind Cave National Park, a redo of Crazy Horse

When we visited Crazy Horse a couple days ago it was incredibly foggy and you couldn't even see it from the viewing center. But today we drove by again and caught a glimpse. We waited out some rain in the morning to hopefully have better weather for some more exploring of Custer State Park. That park is really beautiful! The slow morning was fun on its own -- we had hot chocolate outside at our hotel, and finished National Treasure on the iPad in our car together before venturing out :) Wind Cave National park canceled our cave tour because all tours are closed during the government shutdown. This administration is the absolute worst. The visitors center was closed too, but we did do a trail along a river. The boys loved seeing a buffalo on the walk! They didn't so much love doing Wednesday sprints with Michael and me but we got it done :)

This spot was so pretty but we were COLD. I would totally come back here in the summer.

Spot Crazy Horse

DAY EIGHT:

Custer State Park, Wagon Wheel Tracks, Drive Home

We drove a little more through Custer State Park this morning and the boys were absolutely thrilled when a buffalo licked our car. Doesn't get much better than that. We stopped on our way home to see some spots where wagon wheel tracks are still visible. Our trip was one big circle so it felt nice to not have too far to drive home on our last day. This trip made me really excited for when we do Yellowstone sometime soon. My boys just love seeing animals, and it's really fun with them.