South Dakota Trip 2013 - Day 3

Some rain overnight.  Small hail in the early morning hours.  Up early, but didn't get going until around 10:00am (nice).  Thunderstorms by that time.  Walked across the street to Tally's Silver Spoon for breakfast.

Rainy morning.  Statue.

Hotel Alex Johnson as seen from Tally's

After waiting about 20 min, 2 places at the bar opened up.  I had decaf coffee and beignet breakfast sliders, which were bacon, egg and cheddar on three sliced beignets, served on top of a little maple cream.  They were so good; cooked perfectly, the beignets were crisp and hot, not greasy or oily.  By the time we finished the rain had stopped, so we headed out toward Wind Cave National Park.



Drove down to and through Custer State Park to get to Wind Cave National Park.  You can drive through the park for free, but if you want to stop and do anything or drive the scenic Needles Highway you're supposed to pay a license fee and get a window sticker.  We were just driving through to start.

Custer State Park was the highlight of the trip, and it was originally even on our radar.  Just passing through was a beautiful drive on twisting wooded roads through the hills.  Lots of wild buffalo, prairie dogs, deer, pronghorn, and a couple of wild turkeys.  It was so quiet and the songbirds were all along the route.  Overcast, but no rain.  Took about an hour to drive through the park to the cave.  Lots of cabins, lodges, rock work and small lakes on the way.  If we come back to South Dakota again we will definitely stay in the park at a lodge or cabin.

Buffalo

Flowering Tree

Deer

Prairie Dogs in action

Those brown lumps by the road are buffalo lying down

Wind Cave National Park offers 3 different main tours at different times of the day.  We arrived in time to take the 2:30pm natural entrance cave tour.  After you purchase your ticket inside the information center, you head downstairs and outside down a concrete path.  This takes you to a little covered outdoor area where you wait for your tour to start.  While we were waiting for the guide to arrive I took a picture of some rain covered leaves.

Amazing what you can see when you look down

The view while waiting for the tour to start

There was a little boy running around and around and around the waiting area, and I joked to Todd that we could drink his blood to steal his energy (see, Todd's been binge-watching True Blood, and, oh never mind). Todd laughed, so we're both evil.

The cave tour was cool.  About an hour long.  I had not been in a cave since our family's summer vacation when I was, what, in elementary school, middle school?  I don't remember the year, but we spent a week touring different caves, the highlight of which was Mammoth Cave in Kentucky.  I think we also did Onyx Cave, Inner Space Caverns, and Natural Bridge Caverns, but I could be making the last one up.  I mean, it's an actual cave, I just can't say for sure we went there then.  It's funny, I remember the caves and the tours, how I thought the "cave bacon" formations were cool, how the "bottomless pit" scared me, and asking my parents too loudly how the large woman made it through the "fat man's misery" section (I really wanted to know!), but I don't remember any of the in-between stuff on the trip like the hotels - did we swim?, or where we ate, or what we were doing when we weren't touring the cave.  I guess I've kept the highlight reel and chucked the b-roll footage.  I feel like the kid with the pinhead in the Far Side cartoon who raises his hand in class and asks to be excused stating his brain is full.  God only knows what keeping that memory of the 25-year old comic strip has probably displaced upstairs.  Priorities, brain!  Keep the important stuff!

The natural entrance to Wind Cave was a hole in the ground about 2 feet in diameter.  The story goes that in 1880 a couple of kids heard a whooshing noise in the woods.  Instead of fearing it was Bigfoot the way man was meant to do, they headed toward the noise and found this hole blowing wind out of it (hence the name, wind cave).  So one guy threw his hat in.  It came blowing back out a minute later.  The next day they went back to show someone, and this time the hole sucked the hat in.  We learned that barometric pressure makes the air blow outward at up to 70mph during low pressure systems, and inward during high pressure systems.  It sucks, it blows, it's science!

Our guide and the natural entrance to the cave

It wasn't until 1890 when a 16 year old kid re-discovered the hole and crawled down it to explore with a candle and string.  Spooky.  He eventually explored more and more and started leading tours.  $2 would get you a coach from Hill City and a tour (we were asked to imagine men in their coats and top hats, or ladies in their full dresses exploring the cave by candlelight).

The guide led us back up the path where she unlocked the entrance.  We went through a revolving door and down many, many steps in a steep decline.  Wind Cave is one of, if not the largest, collection of "box work" in the world.  Box work is limestone sediment that has formed a criss-cross pattern on the ceiling.  No stalagmites or stalactites though - not enough water.  I whanged my head at one point on a outcropping while walking downward and looking over my shoulder at the same time.  Raised a large bump (like in a cartoon, it felt like) with a little blood.  Ouch.

This is box work

The little girl behind us on the tour kept oohing and aahing and saying "Mommy, look at this!", or Mommy, look at that!"  Her enthusiasm was very cute.  The biker woman in front of Todd kept turning around to take pictures facing the way we had come, and kept setting off her flash in Todd's eyes.  He was not happy, but I thought it was funny.  Probably due to the head injury.

At the end of the tour we came back up to the surface in an elevator, 10 people at a time.  It was an old-timey elevator that had a pointer above the door indicating the floor the elevator was currently on. It was cool because those of us that were waiting could see the hand moving back and forth as the elevator travelled up and down.

When we came out of the cave the sun was out.

Beautiful weather - for now

After the cave, we drove back into Custer State Park and stopped at a scenic overlook.  In the distance we could see dark clouds rolling in.

Mountain man Todd

Something's coming

We continued driving and stopped at Legion Lake to pay our license fee, because we wanted to spend more time there exploring.  By this time it was becoming overcast and the temperature was dropping.

Legion Lake.  And something's coming.

Then we drove the Needles Highway - a twisting, climbing road with tunnels - up towards Sylvan Lake.

White birch trees, I think

One of the many tunnels

The sky is worsening.  On another day we would climb the trail up through those spires

On the drive it started raining heavily, then very heavily, and as we approached Sylvan Lake it started to hail on and off.  The hail was pea-sized and a little slushy.  It became a very tense drive, as there was no place to go for shelter.

Oh *%@#!  It's here.

Another tunnel - they're only big enough for one car, so we couldn't hole up there

We finally came to the lake and some parking spots.  I directed Todd to a place right at the end under the canopy of trees, and we waited out the storm.  During breaks in the hail we both took turns trudging off to the bathroom under the umbrella.

"Neither snow, nor rain, nor..."

Sylvan Lake

It took about 30 minutes for it to pass enough for us to feel comfortable getting back on the road, even though it was still raining somewhat.  We continued the loop around to exit the park and headed back to Rapid City.

Another tunnel

It was about 8:00pm when we got back to town.  We parked the car then walked a block to the Firehouse Brewing Company for dinner.  The pub/restaurant/brewery is located downtown in the original city firehouse.  We sat at the bar and ordered a couple of their beers. I had the apple cider ale, and omg it was excellent.  It's a light ale served on ice that has a distinct cider taste.  I had another one with dinner (and just sitting here at home thinking about it now, my mouth is watering for another - if you know me, you know I'm not a big drinker, but that beer, omg).  For dinner I had Rancher's Pie, which is a shepherd's pie of "garlic mashed potatoes, a layer of beef, and vegetables are baked under a broiler then topped with a brown sauce and garnished with Parmesan cheese and green onions. $12.95"  For a cold and rainy night it was hot and brown and delicious and perfect!

After we wound down with dinner and drinks, we walked to our hotel and turned in for the night.