With less than 60 miles to go to
our destination, we were ready for this leg of the journey to finally be over;
we had after all been on the road for more than a week. I knew that once we landed in Rapid City we
could spread out, relax and enjoy some down time together before daddy had to
go back to work. There was a list of sights to see and things to do, and this
list was growing with all the billboards of local attractions that I hadn’t
found in my research of the area. This would of course all be determined by the
work that was to be found in the area, if you haven’t learned this about us
yet, it is that I target the free family friendly activities. This way of life
allows us to do more as a family together and enjoy more of the simple things
in life.
This
last leg was slow going as we were still steadily climbing higher in elevation
with every hill that we crawled over. Ol’Blue
just wasn’t used to the higher altitude and less oxygen just yet, but she pushed
forward like the workhorse we know she is.
The best sight we saw during these short 60 miles were the edge of the
Badlands, oh how I would have loved to have been able to drive through those
and enjoy that ruggedness on the edge of the prairie, but that would have to
wait, we had other plans for this day.
While
researching the area for campgrounds that were centrally located to where the
hubby may possibly be working I found one with a wonderful view of Rapid
City. What I didn’t know was the route
to get to this particular RV Park perched upon a very steep and high
hillside. The hubby managed to get the
rig through downtown without bouncing it off a telephone pole or street sign on
those narrow and congested streets. We were going good, hitting all the lights
on green. Looking ahead there was a huge hillside with a very steep grade to go
up, and only a traffic light between us and this said hill. While trying to get
the momentum up to make it up the hill, we watched the light cycle from green
to yellow and to red; losing every bit of the force we had to help get our huge
rig up the hill. As the light turned we
slowly trudged up the steep grade, crawling at only about 5mph, up, up and up.
Finally,
we could see the top, luckily the RV Park was ¾ of the way up this hill, and we
didn’t have to crawl all the way to the top. Turning into the park I started
rethinking the wonderful view. You see, in order to have this spectacular sight
outside of every window that seemed like you were perched on the edge of a
cliff, you actually had to carve a flat perch out of the steep hillside; it
felt as if there were a strong wind you would topple down the hill like
dominoes with stopping point in sight.
yeppers, I could see a wind blowing hard enough
to roll us right down this hill into those trees.
The
first site we parked in was close to the office and all of the traffic, the
only problem was backing the rig up a small incline into this site. We dumped all the transmission fluid once again;
you’d have thought we’d learned our lesson in Bear Creek, AL while attempting
the same feat. After refilling the fluids we could finally get backed in and
set up, ready to rest for a bit and enjoy this magnificent view laid out all
around us.
believe it or not but there were actually 5-7 sites below us,
if they were parked there, you'd see their rooftops,
pretty steep hill to carve an RV Park into
It
was time to plan out our weekend and be the tourists for a few days before
getting serious again. The lil one had acquired
a habit of looking at all the brochure racks in each new city and state that we
landed in, this is where we got a lot of our maps and information about the new
area; talking to the locals helps a lot too. The front desk was helpful too;
they informed us that the state and national parks were free for the next week;
until their summer season kicked off. It
didn’t take much to decide where we were headed next. On our list to do was
Custer State Park to see the buffalo, Crazy Horse and Mount Rushmore for the history
and lessons to be learned there. It was
time to rest and relax with dinner and a movie and dream of the sights to be
seen in the very near future.
Until next time….
“Travel makes one modest. You see
what a tiny place you occupy in the world.”
― Gustave Flaubert
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