Where to Now?

It’s been fun to watch people’s reaction when we tell them we decided to go to South Dakota for April break. It’s not what people expect for our travel plans, there are no palm trees in the Dakotas.

Up at 3 a.m.to begin the adventure to fulfill a childhood bucket list destination. I don’t know what or who inspired me to want to visit the Badlands.

We weren’t thinking about an April trip at all, but out of the blue we decided to take one and without consideration of other places we knew the Badlands was it.

I had my first vacation coffee with a view photo on the first leg. Had a neighbor in the window seat so I couldn’t snap the photo I had hoped for.

Our flights were on time. We landed in Chicago, grabbed some food and basically walked on to the second flight, to easy. We picked up our rental car from the friendliest agent. It dawned on me I could drop the guarded travel persona I take on and be cheerful. So far on day one people are way friendlier in South Dakota.

We couldn’t get into our rental till 4, we decided to hit my bucket list item, Badlands National Park. First stop though was Prairie Dog Town. We are in the off season so the store was closed but you could get close to those little critters.

The entrance to the Badlands was so close, I was giddy. I was ready to jump out and hug the ranger in the booth. We drove up to the first lookout and I actually started tearing up. It was a cloudy day, but still the beauty was breathtaking.

We decided to the drive the road through the park, stopping at only a few lookouts because we were getting tired, needed lunch and had grocery shopping to do. Also we were trying to beat the snowstorm that was coming for our area. We know we are returning for a full day this week to do the hikes.

Honestly a simple iphone couldn’t capture all the colors.

On our way out of the park we spotted female Bighorns grazing.

We exited the park, excited to return on a brighter day.

We had lunch in Rapid City, picked up coffee beans at Pure Bean (a must stop again), a chocolate store and a rundown Safeway.

We drove to our rental, an hour from Rapid City in the Black Hills. We encountered rain, sleet and snow on our drive. The winter storm has started. We are curious to see how much snow we will wake up to in the morning. At least the view should be pretty.

We don’t know what tomorrow will bring, it is all weather dependent. Will we be snowed in or not? The rental owners told us they don’t plow, hmmmm. Perhaps if we had know that when we were deciding on a rental, we would have booked elsewhere.

It’s always an adventure.