Yahoo! We're here

Nobody is in a hurry to get anywhere this morning.  We're close enough to Yellowstone that we don't need to kill ourselves getting somewhere.  This morning its breakfast, pool, Buffalo Bill's Wild West Museum, and pick up some additional groceries.  We'll be camping for 10 straight nights.  We're all excited.

One small step for man, on giant step for campers from the East

The drive from the Big Horns to Cody was somewhat anxious.  There was literally 20,30,50 miles of nothing.  No cars in either direction and the sun going down.  You know there could be real danger if something happened.  You just have to trust that you car is good, directions are right and your timing is right.  I chose to leave for this trip at the end of June to maximize daylight hours.  I didn't want to drive in the night.  Today I needed ever minute of daylight.  We pulled into our hotel around 9:15pm.

The drive to Cody

The drive to Cody took much longer than I hoped.  Perhaps it was just too long after breaking camp, visiting Mt Rushmore and 500 miles of driving...not all at highway speeds.  Along the way we got caught in a hail storm.  It was bad.  The whack of the hail hitting the truck was unnerving.  Thankfully I spotted a large pine tree that I could pull my truck under to protect us from the hail.  We sat there for 20mins until the storm passed over us. 


After that it was blue skies all the way to Cody.  We had to drive though the Big Horn National Forest.  It was beautiful.  Saw a bunch of mule deer, a moose and a bison.  The scenery was amazing.

Mount Rushmore

I think we got here around 11am.  It was amazing.  It was hard to believe I was actually here.

Ugh.  Soo cheerful. He just drank a big thing of Gatorade.

We departed Mt. Rushmore around 2pm for the drive to Cody.

Badlands

After leaving the ghost town it was about a 45min drive to the Badlands.  This place was neat.  It was our 1st camping night of the trip so we had to setup camp.  No camp fires were allowed here because if an ember jumps out of the fire ring and catches the grass...the wind could take that fire everywhere.


There was absolutely no shade available.  You were in the sun.  1/2 day here was enough.

Our camp

This is how you make milk when you're in the middle of nowhere.

After dinner we went back for a hike when the sun was setting and not so hot.

The next morning we woke around 5:45 - 6am and started breaking down camp to get out of there.

Check out the pink and orange in the stone.

Off to Mt. Rushmore

Are you kidding me!?

In South Dakota we pulled off at the 1st available gas station which was around lunch time.  So we tailgated.  We got gas at this interesting place.  We had no clue, but we pulled into an authentic ghost town.  The place charged admission to view the town and all of the artifacts collected over the last 150years.  Did you know that "Dances with Wolves" was filmed around these parts?  We didn't.

 Check out this town!  So much fun!

 

 That was too much fun.  But a lot vacation still to be had so it was time to leave.