Badlands and Black Hills—Driving

The road ahead

2019-08-26 Monday 

We had a long day of driving ahead of us today, so we tried to get up and out early. We did a pretty good job hooking up the Jeep, despite the muddy campground— it rained last night, and the campground had a lot of standing water in the grass, and puddles in the road. It wasn’t really mud— the ground in that part of Nebraska is pretty sandy, and the road was sand under gravel. In any case, we worked around the puddles, and got out at about 9:30. 

After that, it was just a long drive! We drove west through northern Nebraska, on a road which is a “scenic highway.” It was very pretty, although it wouldn’t knock anyone’s socks off, but it is pretty in a very mellow way. Lots of bales of hay rolled up, green fields, corn, and then toward the last section, an area known as the Sandhill region (more sand, I guess!) The hills were rolling hills and pretty.

We finally turned north toward South Dakota, after stopping at a Sinclair gas station. It was a bit retro—it had a dinosaur sculpture under the gas sign. We also noticed the price of gas was going up, which I expected. Anyway, we drove 8 miles north and were suddenly in South Dakota. I had originally thought of taking I-90 so we could shorten the trip, but Google maps told me that if we drove the scenic way, it was only about 10 minutes longer. So we drove parallel to I-90 on a road which went through some National Grasslands, with quite a bit of “Badlands” thrown in, and even a section of Badlands National Park (the scenery for those couple of short miles was spectacular.) We’ve been to Badlands NP before, so we didn’t feel too bad about not going up to the main part of the park. We also crossed into Mountain Time, so we are now 2 hours behind home.

Badlands

It *was* a long drive, but eventually we got to the Black Hills area, and followed our directions to Dutchman Campground, which is 6100 feet up in the Black Hills National Forest. The road was steep,

and I was having second thoughts about being so far from all the “touristy” things we might like to do (such as our definite plans for Custer State Park and Mount Rushmore.) It took us almost 30 minutes to get up here once we left the main road. Also, when we turned off to go into the park, there was a 1.5 mile unsaved road full of potholes, which were mostly full of water. So we arrived muddy as well.

But when we got here, we weren’t sorry— it is beautiful, and Joey especially loves being up in the pine forest on top of a mountain. We stopped at the camp host’s site briefly to get a map of the sites, and then came to look for one which might be reasonably level. We found one, but the road itself is very sloped, and we needed something flatter to unhook the Jeep. So pulling forward, we successfully blocked the road and wrestled with all the muddy connections, trying to hurry because of course someone came up behind us and wanted to get past.

Eventually we managed to get it all unhooked, and just then the camp host drove up. The site we’d picked was right next to a double site (which costs double per night), but he told us we could take the double site for the single price. We also got half-price because of our America the Beautiful senior passes, so our cost was a most reasonable $12/night. We have a view of the lake below us, we are surrounded by pine trees, and the campground is only about 1/4 full. So it’s incredibly quiet and beautiful. 

On the way through Hill City (the official address of the campground where we are), I saw a Visitor Center, so we will probably go there first tomorrow. There were also a couple of wineries, and I plan to pick up a couple of bottles of the local product for my son-in-law, the wine connoisseur. After that, I have no idea what we will be doing! I will figure that out once I visit the Visitor Center and get some suggestions. I’m sure, though, that it will be a lovely day.