Day 4.4: Did You See the Sign for Wall Drug?

Leaving the Badlands dropped us off right at our final fun spot, Wall Drug.

Wall Drug is like the South of the Border of South Dakota, just a lot less tacky. It started as a simple drug store out in the middle of nowhere in 1931, and just grew from there. Now it's like an entire little Western town (geared towards tourists, of course), a collection of fun and unusual shops all lined up in a row.

And then there's Wall Drug itself. It's mainly like a mini-mall unto itself -- a mishmash of shops all stuck together, just added on wherever they wanted (our could) over the years. There's gift shops, a re-creation (I'm guessing) of the original pharmacy, a traveler's 

chapel, gem mining, a cafe decorated with paintings of cowboys and Native Americans (where they also feature handmade donuts), a water play area, an animatronic T-Rex, and the list goes on. Many of the walls are covered with framed b/w photos of actual cowboys and Native Americans. You could easily spend hours just looking at them all.

After a quick meal of burgers (no bison, yet) and a donut we all shared, we hit the road for the final stop of the night -- the Lodge at Custer State Park. It was back on I-90 again for another hour before finally turning off down a 2-lane road (and no more 75mph). Since the lodge is actually in the State Park, we were concerned about getting through the gate before they closed. No worries, though, because the park gatehouse was closed and there was no gate. Marsha had called the lodge a couple of times to ask about that and directions, so they knew us when we checked in.

They had also told us to watch out for free-roaming bison once we got in the park and, sure enough, we saw our first two just down the street from the lodge. Another great ending to a fantastic day.