Day 21 - Eastward Ho We Go!

Woke up to snow, again.  It seemed like there was a little more than yesterday.  We were on the road by 7:30 am.  We decided that we wanted to stop by Wall Drug and Badlands National Park as we were heading east on I-90.    We limited ourselves to 45 minutes at Wall Drug because we knew we had miles to go today.  Carol has been looking for a hat (not a baseball cap) this whole trip.  He finally found one at Wall Drug.  He wore it the rest of the day and I think he looks quite handsome (I may be a little prejudice!) .

We drove the Badlands Loop which took about an hour and a half.  We enjoyed the wild scenery and even got to see a couple of big horned sheep.  We need to come back because we would have liked to take a trail or two but there just wasn't time.

Finally, we got back on I-90 and drove as hard as we could east.  One thing we noticed about South Dakota is that they raise a lot a wheat and hay.  We didn't see any evidence of irrigating what they grow so they must get enough rain and/or snow for their crops.  We did see lots of small ponds that looked very blue and clean but I think those are used for all the thousands of cattle we drove by.  We finally got past the rolling hills and the road straightened and flattened out.  We enjoyed the terrain even though it was farmland.

Stopping at Wall Drug and Badlands took more than two hours, and we are in CDT so we had to move our watches forward an hour.  We are camped at Sioux Falls, SD KOA.  We had wanted to make it into Minnesota but decided to stop and rest for the long day tomorrow.  We drove a little over 400 miles but it is still 600 miles from home so we will have to drive, drive, drive tomorrow.  We didn't unhook so we are hoping to get on the road by 6:30 am.  The goal is to get home and we will keep that in our minds as we drive east.

I am posting a few pictures of the Badlands, and the rest are miscellaneous pictures I took from the truck.   Tomorrow will be a long day so I may not write anything until the next day.  I do want to summarize some things and have other thoughts about the trip.

Badlands National Park, South Dakota