Check off another one from my state capitols list!The rotunda.Rotunda close-up.Beautiful rotunda hall.Senate chamber – roll top desks!House of Representatives chamber – more roll top desks!Plaque on the capitol grounds.Fighting stallions sculpture on the grounds.South Dakota Governor’s Mansion. Governor Kristi Noem was unavailable for a photo with us.
Badlands National Park is incredible! Miles and miles of indescribable scenery. I’ll let the pictures do the talking, but even pictures do not do the Badlands justice. The panoramas are as far as the eye can see.Bighorn Sheep!This is what the dry ground here looks like.Full grown bighorn sheep.Another bighorn sheep.Young bighorn watching the sunset.As we leave the Badlands, we saw the only buffalo we saw in the Badlands. In fact, the only animals we saw in the Badlands were the Bighorn Sheep.
This is an incredible site. This visitor center is a museum and they show a 20 minute film that explains the nuclear program that used underground silos in South Dakota and throughout the Great Plains during the Cold War through the 1990s. The site actually consists of three different sites. This visitor center, the underground bunker, and the missile silo itself. We were unable to get tickets for the underground bunker, darn it!This is the missile silo for a Minuteman Missile.This is a disarmed Minuteman Missile in its actual underground silo.
Wall Drug has a fascinating history. Wall Drug Store got its start with the promise of free ice water – 1931. Original owner Ted Husted got the idea to offer free ice water to travelers to break up their long trip across South Dakota (and to get them to buy stuff at Wall Drug!). It turned free ice water into a million-dollar idea with a little determination, quick thinking and a lot of signs. More than 2 million visitors a year stop here for a meal or activity, 5 cent coffee, and ice water – which is still free.Here is one of the many Wall Drug highway signs we saw on the way to Wall.Here is what you see when you enter the main entrance. You could spend all day here touring the shops and displays.The Cafe at lunchtime is very busy.Wall Drug’s famous barbecue sandwich.Also, their famous hot roast beef sandwich. This was the best hot beef sandwich I have ever had!Wall Drug also has a chapel.And this sculpture can be yours for only $22,000!
Mt. Roosevelt, named for President Theodore Roosevelt.The Friendship Tower Mount Roosevelt Memorial.Deadwood resident Seth Bullock met the 26-year-old Theodore Roosevelt in 1884, shortly after Roosevelt moved out west. They became lifelong friends. When Roosevelt died in January 1919, Bullock commissioned this monument which was completed in July 1919. Bullock died in September 1919, and is buried in Deadwood’s Mt. Moriah cemetery on a high hill that had an unimpeded view of Mt. Roosevelt. If you ever have a chance, the story of their friendship is a pretty neat read.Not that many steps, but they are narrow and pretty steep.Views of the Black Hills from the top of the tower.Beautiful aspen trees.
