Saturday in the Black Hills

note: no Internet connection Saturday

Collect Moment, 

Not Things

We awoke to a cloudy, cool day with the temperatures in the 40s. We hiked our hosts’ property, walking the old train bed all of the way to the adjacent property owned by the National Forest Service.

You can see our house in this picture I took from the hill. We have a small apartment in the front right corner of this building. It's the apartment our hosts lived in while building their home. 

This was the playground in case we were bored!

On down the track...

A stand of Aspen trees

We didn't climb the hill to the left; a mountain lion lives up there and we thought it best to not go there!

Looking back at the pond.

The rock was shale, I think.

When we returned, our hosts, Doug and Denise, invited us into their home. We spent the rest of the morning visiting. We asked and they gave us suggestions for places to eat lunch. 

We enjoyed lunch at the Deadwood Lodge.  After eating, we decided to donate just a little money to the Lodge via the Casino.  We won a little but lost more. Thank goodness we have limits!

We drove to Historic Main Street and wandered the street. We were in Deadwood about 35 years ago – now there are gaming establishments everywhere with a few t-shirt shops, motels and restaurants interspersed. We bought a few groceries and then headed home through the fog.

We learned a little history...

 

and even saw a stagecoach.

The rest of my afternoon consisted of a nap, a good book, and not much else – not a bad way to spend a cold, dreary Saturday!

Our VRBO rental is here in Nemo, SD. We loved being out in the country and had superb hosts. Our time in the Black Hills is about over - tomorrow we'll head east.

Friday in the Black Hills, SD

Note: We have very limited Internet so posts will be whenever I can make it happen.

Study nature, 

love nature, 

stay close to nature. 

It will never fail you. 

                           - Frank Lloyd Wright.

It was a little cooler this morning and partly cloudy. We headed south to Custer State Park and Mt. Rushmore. We crossed Pactola Lake.

A little further on, we were stopped by a flagger right by Horse Thief Resort.

I quickly took this photo before we moved. 

Of course, I didn't realize we wouldn't be moving for over 1/2 hour. They were working on the road ahead and totally closed the road for a while so they could work. 

We passed through a lot of tunnels today. Some were quite tight.

Sylvan Lake was gorgeous and by this time the temperatures were in the 80s.

We traveled the Needles Highway.

We had to beware of pedestrians in tunnels.

The Needles Highway ran into the Wildlife Loop Road of Custer State Park. We drove quite a while and saw a couple of antelope and 3 buffalo. When we got to the Visitor Station, we were talking with one of the Park employees and she told us that there were two buffalo herds down Fisherman Flats Road. So we decided to drive that gravel road. It was lengthy and we began to wonder but then we saw a herd in the distance - too far away to get pictures. We continued on and there was another herd that Ray could capture with a large lens. We figured we were getting close to the end of the road when we encountered a third herd right next to the road!

I loved seeing the calves.

On the return trip from Fisherman Flats, Ray spotted this lone tree on the horizon. I had to have a picture.

When we got back on the Wildlife Loop Road, it finally happened - we got caught in a buffalo jam! Actually it was only one buffalo. A motto from a resort here is "May you get caught in many buffalo jams."

The buffalo decided to finally move off of the road and graze.

We stopped at The State Game Lodge in Custer State Park for lunch and enjoyed a fantastic buffet. Amazingly, the dessert was our least favorite part of the meal!

We continued on towards Mt. Rushmore.

That is Mt. Rushmore in the mountain on the top left. 

We had to negotiate a couple of pigtails.

The sun was so bright, it was hard to get good pictures.

Eventually we left the crowds and headed home and found yet another tunnel. I missed pictures of at least two tunnels today.

We got home just as the rain started - we had severe storm warnings with hail expected. Our hosts met us and cleared a space for us to put the jeep inside the big shed. Nice!

After the rain ended, we hiked to the pond to catch the sunset. The color looked better down the valley past the pond so that's where I too this photo.

Tomorrow we may hike that valley - it depends on the weather. It would be nice to enjoy some of the land/scenery right here.