Day 5.1: Getting Loopy on Wildlife

Woke up this morning at the lodge in Custer State Park, then had an excellent breakfast in the hotel restaurant. Thanks to the crossing another time zone yesterday (without realizing it), we got up a little earlier than usual.

The lodge itself is great. Built in 1919 (with additional wings added later), it rightfully boasts that both Coolidge and Eisenhower have stayed there. Coolidge apparently for the whole summer.

First thing we did was drive the Wildlife Loop Road, a long, winding trek through the park, looking forward to seeing more buffalo and other critters. Since we saw a buffalo right near our hotel last night, we had high hopes on that front.

It was easy to tell where the animals were, because that's where all the cars were stopped. Our first sighting was several small antelope, followed by the Custer State Park Welcoming Committee -- a pack of burros that stood in the middle of the road, and even stuck their noses in car windows looking for a snack.

Further  down the loop, we finally saw a buffalo grazing, plus a whole colony of prairie dogs that were full of activity (which went a long way to make up for not stopping at a roadside prairie dog place -- complete with a six foot plastic one outside -- as we entered the Badlands yesterday).

We enjoyed the Wildlife Loop so much, we came back and did it again at the end of the day, as the sun was going down. We saw dozens and dozens of antelope this time, sometimes standing right by the car and in the middle of the road. The burros were off in the distance, and the prairie dogs out of sight. Just when we thought we wouldn't see any buffalo at all, we encountered one grazing right beside the road. He (and yes, we could tell it was a he) was so close, we could hear him chewing. That was incredible!

And after we left the park, we found yet another buffalo grazing near the road. We realized that for the wildlife, the park doesn't really have any boundaries. There's plenty of untamed land for them to roam for miles around.

The only (slight) downside to the whole experience was the mountain roads we took back to our next hotel in nearby Keystone (since we were unable to book the lodge for two nights). It was getting rather dark, and we slowly made our way around mountain hairpin turns. Much scarier than anything we've experienced in NC. But even worse were the many bridges down to one lane due to construction. We had to stop at each one, look to see if anyone else was coming, and then cross while hoping that no one else would do the same. Of course, after traveling down Iron Mountain Road earlier today (see upcoming post), that was just par for the course.

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.