by kenny

We left Valentine early in the morning and headed towards Badlands National Park. Since we had seen the geographical center of the contiguous Unites States we decided to go off course a bit to see the geographical center of the entire USA. In Belle Fourche, South Dakota is the geographical center monument/museum. The museum is very nice and so is the beautifully carved granite monument. However, it isn't the center! The center is 20 miles northwest. The monument was made to be more "tourist friendly" as the real center is on a dirt road marked by a red fence post. So we were pretty disappointed since we had already gone out of our way to see what we now know was fake, and didn't have the time to take the moho over a dirt road there and back. So we kicked the dirt off our feet and left the faker monument without even approaching it. Hrrumph!

So off to the Badlands. But before we got there we stopped at a prairie dog town that boasted the world's biggest prairie dog, which was a massive concrete prairie dog. We payed our $1 for a bag of peanuts and proceeded to feed all the prairie dogs we could see. But they were not too excited to see us as they get fed peanuts every day, all day, by all kinds of touristy people. We saw more peanut shells than we saw prairie dogs and we saw a lot of prairie dogs. They are cute and fun to watch, but after 5 minutes you are over it.

Upon entering Badlands National Park, we purchased a National Parks Annual Pass for $80. This is a great deal since are planning to visit several parks on our way to Oregon. It is proudly dangling from our mirror and I couldn't be happier with our decision. I love National Parks.

About the Badlands (2:30)


Badlands is a bizarre place because it is gorgeous and also just dry, hot, dirt. There are thousands of crazy beautiful rock formations and patches of wildflower prairies. It is constantly changing every year as rain storms come in and erode the landscape bringing out a rainbow of colors. We also got to see a bunch of bighorn sheep. French explorers gave it the name Badlands, but the Indians who lived and loved there called it home, and see nothing "bad" about it. There is a bit of a scandal about the land because it was essentially taken from them (oddly enough, not unlike the rest of this country). It was taken and given to settlers to be farmed, but they couldn't get the land to produce enough crops from them. All but a few gave up and left.

The road coming out of the Badlands leads straight into Wall Drug Store. There are signs all along the road advertising free ice water and 5 cent coffee. The story goes that Mr. Wall was down on his luck and ready to close up shop when he had the idea to put signs on the road advertising free ice water. Before he got back to the store he was already receiving customers to take him up on his free ice water. Now it is a required stop for roadside Americana fans. The place is massive! It is essentially a mini mall with a restaurant, chapel, massive jackalope, a gorilla playing piano, a hungry tyrannosaur, lots of kitsch, and free ice water. We stayed for the food and free ice water, then headed out of town towards Rapid City.

We pulled into Rapid City late but were pleasantly surprised that Mount Rushmore has lighting ceremony at night. So we headed straight away to the monument. It is a hilly and windy road and took us some time getting there especially when you get down in to Keystone and then have to go back up the mountain. We were so excited going up that hill to catch our first glimpse of Rushmore and then we came around the corner to see it in all its glory. And nothing. Laura and I looked at each with underwhelmed faces and thought, "It's really small."

There were lots of cars parked along the side of the road leading up to the memorial entrance. I recommend this option. Otherwise you $10 to park, and parking is not covered by an annual pass. Park on the side of the road, take a picture, and move on. Don't bother going into the memorial grounds. We still paid the $10 to park (memorial entrance is free) because we wanted to see the lighting ceremony. After seeing the lighting ceremony, my advice is the same. Move on.

We walked the pathway that takes you right to the side of the mountain for a closer look. It was impressive to think of human beings scaling the faces with jackhammers and carving the four presidents, but with this massive mountain as a backdrop... small. There is a museum to see, but we decided on ice cream instead, sat down, and waited for the lighting ceremony to start.

The lighting ceremony started at dusk and opened up with a word by word "poetic" explanation of the pledge of allegiance. "I: Me. Myself. An individual. Pledge: Swear to. Dedicate. Allegiance: Devotion...: And on and on. Then they gave some awards to a boy scout who was in attendance. A short documentary about the making Mount Rushmore narrated by James Earl Jones (which was the best part). A gradual lighting while America the Beautiful was being sung. Then... we left early. It was a little too patriotic for us. The mountain was seized from the Lakota tribe, even after they had been granted ownership of the Black Hills. It was sacred to them. Then we carved the faces of our presidents in it. At least this was mentioned in the documentary.