To The Badlands 19-21 Sept

We have passed through Minnesota and nearly all of South Dakota in the last 3 days. Miles upon miles upon miles of flat, flat, flat farmland and grassland with an incredible wind that one day went South to North and the next went North to South. It pushed the van across the road so that it was really quite hairy especially when a big lorry went past. We had made a sort of agreement with ourselves to take 20 days to get to Mount Rushmore, another 20 to the West Coast, another 20 down to the South and through all of California and the final 20 back East to Texas. We thought that if we didn't set ourselves some deadlines then we would end up missing out a whole load of stuff nearer the end of our trip. So to keep to that and to give ourselves time to see all that we want to in South Dakota we had a couple of days of just driving, eating and sleeping. So there isn't much to write about on the 19th and 20th of September. The only thing we did apart from driving was to stop to see some incredible views along the way, such as suddenly coming on the Misouri river and stopping to see the 'Corn Palace' in Mitchell. The corn palace was holding a Polka festival and their were a whole load of 'oldies' strutting their stuff out on a basketball court dancehall. It is called the corn palace because it has murals made from different coloured corn cobs on all the walls, and the outside of the building also has all the flowers stuck on the walls inbetween the murals. Apparently new murals are made every year. Then more monotonous and wind blown driving until the sun was too low in the sky to continue further West. But on the 21st - well that was far from monotonous. The Badlands... windswept, awesome, dramatic. The weather changed from one minute to the next, sunny, cloudy, showers, but always (ALWAYS) windy. The area was under water for millions of years which has laid down many sedimentary layers, and now the wind and water is slowly eroding the area (at about an inch a year) leaving an every changing landscape. Hard to describe but so amazing to see; the photos can't do it justice. The prairie dogs were so gorgeous, they wiggle their little black tails and do silly little jumps; they were being bothered by an eagle that kept swooping past so they were in and out of their burrows and squeeling like guinea pigs. After more than 3 hours on the 31 mile road through the badlands, endless stops and walks into the gulches, and feeling very windswept (you'll hear the wind on the videos) we reached Wall and decided to go and visit the 'drug store'. It is a shop that has been open since the 1890's but has been added to and added to. It had a load of old photos of both Indians and settlers, old musical instruments, a load of stuffed animals and a whole load of tat! It was fun looking around, trying on cowboy hats and just watching people. We have moved back yet another hour so now it is only 8pm but for us 9pm and with the load of driving that we have done I'm ready to sleep. Tomorrow we head a little further West to the Black Hills, Custer State Park, Wind Cave Park etc. 3 days left to make our 20 day deadline at Rushmore, and still so much to see and do! Tragic!