Pierre, SD - June 23 - 25, 2005
We have been advised in books we have read and by those we have met to travel not on the interstates, but to take the "red" roads. In that spirit we selected South Dakota Route 34 to travel from Sturgis to Pierre, destination Oahe Downstream State Park. On the map SD34 looked like a major roadway, however, we probably only saw three vehicles for about 150 miles, then traffic picked up - maybe a dozen vehicles in 50 miles. It was a lovely drive over rolling green hills of pastureland, waving waves of grain, and yellow wildflowers, broken occasionally by silos and barns. Classic heartland.
We were very pleased when we arrived at Oahe Downstream State Park. It was located on the Missouri River just downstream from Oahe Dam (thus the name) and about 7 miles upstream of Pierre, the state capitol. The park was rolling grassland generously dotted by cottonwoods. It was beautiful - unless, of course, one is allergic to cottonwoods. Fortunately, neither of us is. The only drawback was the bugs. My goodness! South Dakota does have an abundant supply of fierce bugs! Our fun (or I should say Bill's fun) began immediately upon arriving.
We didn't mention it in our last journal, but when we were in Sturgis our satellite dish took a header. There was no real damage to the dish. A collapsing tripod leg was the problem. Through the use of clamps Bill was able to stabilize the tripod. Upon arriving at Oahe SP Bill setup the dish with the clamp in place on the problem tripod leg. He also got to sharpen his satellite pointing skills since for the first time we were among the trees with no apparent way to point through them. He had a small hole in the tree branches to point through and was very pleased with himself when he found the satellites quickly. Not so fast. While gloating in the trailer for all of 5 minutes, we heard a loud thump outside. Could it be? Nahhhh…. Yep, it was the satellite dish, once again resting peacefully on the ground. Seems ANOTHER tripod leg decided to give out. This time the damage was more significant. A precise pointing device mounted to the dish snapped off of its mount and a leg hinge was broken. Not one to let such things deter him, Bill replaced the broken hinge and once again tried to set up the dish, clamping everything in sight - including his jaw. It was entertaining to see him perform his circus act… holding the precise pointing device on the dish with one hand, turning the big dish and appropriate knobs with the other and slapping away mosquitoes/biting flies with… Well you get the idea. Ultimately he was successful, albeit somewhat bug bitten and a little drenched from the humidity. Susan kept her distance for a few hours for obvious reasons.
We were fortunate to be in the Pierre vicinity during the annual Oahe Festival, the BIG event of the year. One of the many events was the "Pet Race", which was hilarious. The race involved lining up dogs at one end of a 100-foot "track" and encouraging them to run to the other end. The first contestant over the line wins. There were three heats, one each for small, medium and large dogs. The funniest was the small dogs. There were about 10 contestants, and only one overly focused poodle actually made it over the line. The rest of the doxies, lhasa apsos and whatever were so excited and confused they just ran around in circle yipping and bumping into one another.
There were about six midsize contestants. The most amusing thing about that race was a beagle catching the scent of something (as beagles are apt to do) took off across the track nose to the ground, tripping two other dogs that were hell-bent on getting to the finish line. OK, so maybe you had to be there.
Mitchell, SD - June 25 - 28, 2005
This lifestyle can be very relaxing. Sometimes it is too relaxing and you lose sight of the obvious. Somehow, we forgot to make reservations for the busy 4th of July holiday period, so for the next week we were moving much more frequently than we prefer. Our next stop was Mitchell, home of the famous Corn Palace, and very close to our new hometown of Emery. We stayed at Lake Mitchell RV Park, which was very pretty, nearly vacant - except for the very big insects. [As an odd aside note, we find it curious that many folks in the state/county campgrounds where we have stayed start fires at their campsite. When the humidity and heat are high this behavior seems a little incongruous to us former California natives. Who knows maybe it keeps the bugs away?]
While in Mitchell, we visited our hometown, met our "postal assistants", registered to vote in South Dakota, visited Cabela's Sports Center (for industrial strength insect repellant), and visited the famous Corn Palace (must be famous if the billboards advertising it everywhere are any indication). The Corn Palace was originally built in 1892 to enable Mitchell to compete with Pierre in becoming the state's capitol. While the city lost its bid, the Corn Palace became a major draw and has hosted big name entertainers over the years. Each year the corn murals are replaced with natural grasses and over 275,000 ears of corn in eleven different colors.
Yankton, SD - June 28 - July 1, 2005
Once again we were off to the shores of the mighty Missouri where it forms the border with Nebraska. Chief White Crane State Park is the most beautiful park we have seen in our travels. It is situated on the beautiful, blue, Lake Yankton below Gavin Dam in the state's Lewis and Clark Region. The park is comprised of a wide expanse of lawn, a variety of large trees and bushes, swim beaches and bike paths. It is populated with white tail deer, bunnies, squirrels and lots of big bugs (a disturbingly common theme).
It was here that we got our first tornado watch warning. We were happily relaxing in the air-conditioned comfort of our trailer during the late morning/early afternoon humidity when we heard a knock at the door. The park staff dropped by to let us know of the risk of tornados in the area and pointing out where the FEMA-approved tornado shelter was and would we please use it if we heard the warning sirens sound. OH MY GAWD!!! We logged on to the Internet weather sites to check the impending disaster. Fortunately, it appeared the tornado risk was much greater to the south and east of us. Did I mention that we are formerly from California? That being the case our natural defense mechanisms kicked in and we decided to go shopping… to stock-up on supplies. No tornadoes came near our area (although some touched down in Minnesota to the east of us) and we found a store (much to Bill's delight) that had sourdough French bread. Just when we were starting to believe that sourdough does not rise east of Denver.
Salem, SD - July 1 - 5, 2005
With the 4th of July weekend arriving we were forced out of the already booked state park, so headed north to Salem. Salem was celebrating its 125th founding anniversary over the weekend and many of the folks in the CampAmerica RV Park were there for the events. On Sunday, July 3, we attended the parade - which was essentially tractors on parade - and the fireworks. For a town the size of Salem (pop. 1,300) the fireworks were very impressive. We backed the truck up ringside on the edge of a pasture, and watched the fireworks from chairs in the bed of the truck. The fireworks were bursting right overhead. Between explosions it was so quiet you could hear the embers sizzle, and the air so clear the fireworks were crystalline.
On July 4 we drove into Sioux Falls for dinner, then to the fairgrounds to hear the Sioux Falls Symphony followed by the fireworks. Wow! Neither of us recall seeing fireworks quite that spectacular.
Our next stop is Tea, SD, which is near Sioux Falls.
