Days 6 and 7: South Dakota, Wyoming, and Colorado

We stayed the night in Bowman.  It was a strange experience; a very small North Dakota town.  The small hotel was filled on a weekday night in September.  When we arrived at around 6 pm, there were a couple trucks in the parking lot.  We went to one of the two restaurants in town (a good deal for dinner), went to the local laundromat, and back to the hotel.  When pulling into the parking lot around 8:30 pm, it was full of trucks,  We suspect the oil workers were staying as far as 1.5 hours away at this hotel because there just wasn't anywhere else to stay.  The place was so quiet...we didn't hear anyone get up in the morning and they were all gone by 6 am.  At the laundromat, there were signs posted on some of the washers/dryers:  Oil Clothes to be Washed Here.  I am not exactly sure what this economic boom is going to do to North Dakota - or what it will be like when it ends, but I suspect it is messing with the economy there quite a bit.

Anyhow - we started back towards the Black Hills and decided to to the Harney Peak hike starting from Sylvan Lake.  What a charming area of Custer State Park.

Those living in the Midwest are dealing with the Emerald Ash Borer...those in the mountains are dealing with the Mountain Pine Beetle.   We have seen it in Colorado in past years - devastating.  Some areas of the Black Hills are hard hit too.

You can see in this picture how the trees are dead.

But, there were areas still full of life too.  It is only a matter of time.

The Harney Peak trail was a loop...up it went.  About 3.5 miles from the trailhead - and up at the highest point in South Dakota - you will find the Harney Peak Lookout.  This structure is massive...and to think it is on the top of a mountain fairly far from a road...

Pretty incredible.  I think this was my favorite hike of the trip.

When we were going up, towards the top there was a group of five people and three dogs.  We were having trouble passing all of them as they were quite spread out.  The girl in back was slow...the ones in front were fast...and the dogs were running between all of us off leash.  Rob did notice one of the dogs had a tuxedo on.

We got to the top before they did.  The views were wonderful.  We stopped for a cookie and then started back down.

As we were starting down, they were just getting there (there are several levels to explore at the lookout).  Anyhow, they were arranging themselves out on the patio.  Sure enough - two of them were getting married!  One was the official, and the other two witness.  (The slow girl in the back was a witness which better explains why she was hiking with the others).

Anyhow, we started down when another couple we passed on the way up was arriving.  We told them to be mindful as there was a wedding in progress.  The woman looked at me hopefully and asked, "...is there cake?".

After Harney Peak, we went to Mt. Rushmore.   Stinkin' $11 to park - are you kidding me?!   The money isn't even going to NPS - it is going to a concessionaire.

We had been here once before, so it was interesting to see how it changed.  Well - the faces didn't...but the grounds did.  We spend a bit of time in the exhibits and watching the video.  A very nice visit.

We stayed the night in Custer at a reasonable Comfort Inn with a fabulous pool - even I was swimming.  We had probably the best dinner of the trip in a small burger joint off the main road...very reasonable...very good...a delicious pumpkin bar for dessert.  It makes us realize how expensive things in Chicago are.  I will say - South and North Dakota do desserts much better than here in Illinois.

In the morning, we knew we had a six or so hour drive back to Colorado - but had planned to spend the morning at Wind Cave.  At this time of year, you don't really have a choice about tours.  You take the next one...and for us that was the first one - The Natural Entrance tour.  It was good.  Not a huge cave...or highly decorated...but the main feature was boxwork as shown in this image.

We had a good group - and a good ranger - so we had fun on the tour.  The have some nice displays at the visitor center and we saw the video too.   I wish we would have had more time on some of the trails above ground...lots of wildlife here...prairie dogs and bison are what we did see...

One quick stop at Fort Laramie on the way back to Denver.

Really - we just spend a short time in the visitor center, used the restrooms, and stretched our legs...an hour or two here would have been nice.  It was a pretty hot and sunny day.  While the Black Hills had 8" of snow a week before we were there, they were having record highs the days after we left.

Back in Denver, we had a wonderful view of the mountains from the hotel room.  So, we ordered a local pizza, and watched the sunset from the 9th floor overlooking the city and mountains...a nice end to the trip.  The hotel also had a wonderful pool which was nice!