We have been seriously making up for lost time. My head spins a little when I think about it, but I'll try to encapsulate it all for you as accurately as possible.
On Monday we embarked from Cody, WY and drive three lovely hours east into the Big Horn National Forest. Climbing sharply to almost 10,000 feet in altitude, the landscape changed from rolling prairie to dense pine forests punctuated by enormous grey-black rocky mountain peaks, and the whole thing was scattered with little clusters of weed-like aspen trees. The pine beetles are bad here, they have badly thinned the forest in some places and dead trees, both standing and fallen, are littered everywhere.
Our first stop was Medicine Wheel, a national historic and sacred site, placed on the very top of a treeless peak. Nobody's exactly sure when its construction was completed, but it was used as a sacred holy site for the Native Americans for their four- to five-day vision quest ceremonies, probably for hundreds of years. Made of carefully placed local white stones, it is a stone circle built on the ground, about 100' in diameter, with an outer circle connected to an inner circle by straight lines. There are the remnants of five small wind-breaking round and sided structures (the very friendly and informative forest service employee had a word for them, which I have regrettably forgotten), of unknown significance - one of the structures aligns with the sun on the summer solstice, but that's all anyone can tell. It's protected by a wood and rope fence, onto which many small pieces of fabric and trinkets, each signifying an individual prayer given in reverence to The Mountain, have been tied. Native holy ceremonies are still held there occasionally.
The site is at the top of a 1.5 mile (or 3 miles round-trip) gravel path, which is uphill both ways due to the uphill-downhill-uphill nature of the landscape. I admit it was better going down than coming up, but to get such an eagles-eye view of the lush woods surrounding us, and the stark contrast of the naturally bone-white rock, I would say it was worth every step. To be in such a place felt to me very much the same as being inside a grand cathedral; the people's reverence and respect echoes in such a place. The natural vibrations in the earth and in the plants, normally vaguely present in different forms depending on your environment and the season, was completely still - as if the place was listening to you. Out of respect, I took no pictures of the site itself.
After seeing the sites, we headed onward to make camp for the night. We lucked out and scored a secluded campsite at the top of a hill, a good distance from any other camp sites. At the bottom of the hill on the far sides, a lake peeked through the trees. Our first night camping started well, lots of hot chocolate and roasted marshmallows (or flambe'd marshmallows in my case, as is my preference) by a fire-pit campfire, Chef Boyardee heated to bubbling on our propane stove. We delved into our books, Rich played a few gentle tunes on the guitar by firelight. But when the sun set and the stars came out, the temperature plummeted into the low 40's; Rich insisted that it wasn't cold, but I am well-versed in feeling cold and I know it when I feel it. The first night was a classic example of trial-and-error, as we zipped our sleeping bags together and tried very hard to convince ourselves that we were comfortable on the stiff foam sleeping mats. Another important lesson we learned the hard way was to always limit ourselves to ONE cup of hot cocoa before bed, as a full bladder and a camp toilet that's 500 feet away in frigid darkness both deters one from emptying it and also from sleeping.
It was a long night, and so the carryover fatigue has blurred Tuesday around the edges a bit.
We were packed up and on the road with freshly-brewed coffee (which I would not be caught dead without the supplies to make) by 9:30 am, the day was bright and clear - but still cold enough to spot your breath on the air. Our first stop was the nearest K-Mart (they still exist! I have a picture to prove it!) in which we bought a set of twin-sized air mattresses and a $1 box of generic-brand Pop Tarts, the breakfast of champions. Having descended from the mountains, the air warmed quite a bit and made our drive onwards to Devil's Tower much more enjoyable.
To say that Devil's Tower is striking would be understating things unjustly. Treeless and mountainless prairie on all sides, perhaps some low bluffs crested with some scraggly shrubs - and then, all of a sudden, the massive and looming chimney that is the Tower. As high as a mountain, but standing completely alone! It's no wonder that Speilberg says that the aliens will come pick us up there. The local Native legends say that the Tower began as a lowly tree stump, on which six sisters and their brother were playing; suddenly the brother became a bear and tried to kill them, but the Great Spirit (I'm paraphrasing that one, I think that this is perhaps not the correct deity; forgive me) spoke to the sisters and told them to take shelter atop the stump. The stump raised high into the air, and the bear clawed at the stump to get at the girls, leaving enormous grooves in the sides; the sisters were saved, and were raised up into the heavens to become the constellation Pleiades. An ancient wooden ladder used by the Native peoples can still be seen up near the summit via binoculars, but how it got there is absolutely a mystery to me. Scientific study, however, tells us that Devil's Tower is an igneous formation caused by a massive fountain of magma, spewing high into the air and creating the largest naturally-occurring vertical octagonal columns known to mankind.
Here we took another hike that was both up and downhill several times over, but only about 1.8 miles. The tower is surrounded on all sides by pine trees, which are dwarfed in its presence. We broke the rules about staying on the pathways only long enough to perch me on some rocks for a picture, during which a very generous woman stopped and offered to take a picture of the both of us; it's the first photo we have of the two of us since the holidays, and I'm grateful to her for staying longer than she had to in order to accommodate the operation of our finicky digital camera. I had cellular service just long enough to send a text message to some family before moving onwards into the wilderness.
We had intended to camp for the night near Devil's Tower, but seeing as how the place is completely desolate and treeless, not to mention crowded with seasonal tourists with their ugly and noisy RVs, we decided to press onwards and drive into the Black Hills National Forest. On a whim, we turned down a dirt road for what we thought would be 9 miles, but which actually ended up being closer to 20 miles. However, the drive was absolutely lovely - looking back now, I wish I'd been a little bit better rested so that I could have enjoyed it properly. It felt completely abandoned and overgrown with trees; rural farms and ranches, each with a little cluster of rectangular beehives, popped up every now and then along the side of the road. Little creeks and fresh-water marshes flowed through the open spaces, making the whole place incredibly lush. At one point, after reaching yet another sign that told us that we still had not yet reached the campsite, the thought occurred to me that I had seen that exact situation before in a cheap horror movie. But reach the campsite we did, it was blessedly empty, remote and quiet. The Black Hills is drought-ridden and run through by pine beetles, so no campfires whatsoever were allowed - which, no doubt, contributed heavily to the lack of other campers; The lack of company was fine by us. Once again we scored a lovely campsite, up at the top of a small but uninhabited campsite loop above another lake. It was not nearly as cold that night, and between the very comfortable air mattresses and the singing of the frogs in the lake, we had a wonderfully solid and refreshing night's sleep. (In individual sleeping bags. Not nearly as much cuddling can take place that way, but at least one does not have to be self-conscious about accidentally dutch-ovening their partner.) It was wonderful. I don't think I've ever slept so well.
This morning, Wednesday, we were woken before 7:00am by some angry squirrels' shouting match. (Which, of course, stopped completely right as we resigned ourselves to being awake and got up for the day.) We braved a camp toilet which smelled badly enough to scar the inside of my sinuses for the entire morning, and were packed up and moving before 8. We made excellent time, too!
The Black Hills are a very lovely drive, I recommend it for any who might consider it. It reminded me very much of the mid-mountain forests of Colorado, except that the road was constantly flanked by a small babbling creek. Remnants of mining settlements can still be seen by the roadside, little weather-beaten and dilapidated huts and shops hiding in the trees - there are a few little mountain hamlets left, dying remnants of gold rush boom towns. Deadwood is definitely one of these, although it's also most certainly the largest of them all. Considering the history there, we had hoped that Deadwood would be like a living museum, where some historic buildings had been preserved and their history displayed; We were disappointed to discover that it was very much a tourist destination, lousy with gift shops and cheap casinos. We were back on the road by 11:45, having seen all that we had cared to.
Mount Rushmore was reached by 1:00, and we were stunned when we were informed that we had to pay $11 in order to park our car! The monument can easily be seen from the highway in one particular spot, and in hindsight we should have pulled off and taken pictures from right there, for free. However, pay we did and we walked through the little park that surrounds the mountain. It's mostly made of concrete and expensive wooden walkways, and I would say that it would be more attractive to one who was very interested in American History. The carving is very large, yet somehow smaller than imagined from the closest public vantage point. The little park is quite sterile and politically correct, although there is a very small museum in which the final plaster casting of the concept can still be seen, in a 1":1' scale - it was quite interesting to see how the sculpture had been envisioned, and how it actually ended up.
Again, we were in and out in about 45 minutes, having seen all that we could get out of it and a little bit soured in mood by the expense. But we pressed northeast into Rapid City, and then beyond to the Badlands National Park.
What can I say about the Badlands, except that it's absolutely spectacular? It looks very much like the bottom of an ocean, jagged wind-carved peaks of soft sedimentary rock, vividly painted in shades of yellow, red, and taupe. Deep, deep crevasses in the landscape. I half expected to see fish swimming between the crags. Pictures couldn't possibly capture the splendor. Nor the heat - 101 degrees in the shade, according to a thermometer inside the very very tiny town of Interior, SD (population 67). Mind-numbingly hot, melting, scorching, blinding heat that actually gets worse than what we experienced.
We left the Badlands and arrived in Wall, home of the famous Wall Drug whose approximately 4.8 million aging billboards are a staple of rural midwest roadtrips, about 6 in the evening. After a trying, hot and dusty day like we had, we couldn't possibly conceive of gambling on finding an affordable campsite, so we caved and purchased a $50 room at a locally owned motel. The rooms are small but clean and well-tended, and there is free wireless internet for me to write you this blog post before all the details are lost in the messy swamp of my memory. A shower and some air conditioning has made new people of us. We are well prepared for the 10-hour push up to Fargo tomorrow.
I have many pictures and video to share, but alas, it is late now and I am a bit cross-eyed from forcing all of this out of my head in one go. I will update this blog post during my stay in Fargo this weekend with all of them.
Thank you for reading with us so far, it has been quite an adventure and it's only been three days. I am full of excitement for all that there is to come, and I look forward to sharing much more with you all if you would have me.
Stay well.
-G
