NICE RELAXING DAY

Saturday, July 7 – We did some hiking in the National Forest behind the campground this morning. Just a nice peaceful hike among the pine trees.

We did see some deer, some cows and horseback riders.

 

Bella taking the afternoon to relax.

Later in the afternoon, we stopped in on Mike and Pat McFall of Mike and Pat's Travels. We saw them at their home, The Ranch, at the Escapee's North Ranch Park in Congress, AZ, in April of this year. They have a place here, The Cabin, in Custer, SD, where they spend their summers.

We enjoyed getting to know Mike and Pat better and were thrilled to have a bowl of Ms. Pat's delicious buffalo taco soup....yummy! We visited for about three hours and with the night air getting chilly bid our farewells and headed home. Thanks for a great afternoon of conversation, laughter and answering our endless questions.

Thanks for stopping by. Hope to see y'all back real soon. Have a great day!

HIKING CUSTER STATE PARK TRAILS

Friday, July 8 – We hit the trails for hiking today! We drove over to Sylvan Lake to hike three trails in the area: The Sylvan Lake Shore Trail, Sunday Gulch Trail, and Harney Peak/Little Devil's Tower Trail. All in all,we hiked about 7 or 8 miles on trails rated Easy (2 miles), Moderate ( 3-4 miles), Strenuous (2 miles).

The Sunday Gulch Trail was the most unusual for us.

It was in a boulder field scattered along a stream descending into Sunday Gulch. The trail crosses a stream several times while passing over huge boulders.

Hikers use handrails fixed to the boulders to aid their decent.

Pretty slow going and actually easier climbing out then our decent into the gulch. It is a beautiful hike. We enjoyed the challenge for a couple miles.

The hike around Sylvan Lake was more a stroll but enjoyable.

This beautiful lake is nestled in the pine forest and is held back by a dam of huge boulders at its Northern end.

This is the wall of the dam.

Harney Peak/Little Devil's Tower Trail is rated strenuous, but we felt it was more in the moderate range.

The trail has been rerouted because of forest restoration after thinning to clear pine bore damage.

If you cannot read this easily, remember you can click on any photo to enlarge it.

Interestingly, Harney Peak is said to be the highest peak east of the Rockies. We did not finish this hike because it was getting late in the morning, and the trails were filling-up with families with kids.

We decided to turn around and hike to the peak some other morning.

We finished the day with a drive around the Custer State Park Wildlife Road.

We did see some Pronghorn, Bison, and wild donkeys.

Look who was holding up traffic.

He seems to be saying…Who you looking at?

The scenery was beautiful. Many meadows, pine trees and mountains.

We were a little disappointed in the wildlife viewing. The kids were loving the donkeys, but they seemed a little tame and staged to us.

We finished our day with a picnic lunch along a brook and headed home. A pretty nice day!

We did not go back to Mt. Rushmore last night for the night program. We had a huge thunderstorm with lighting. We have rescheduled this for Sunday evening.

SIDE NOTE: Many of you FMCA members have mentioned to us, either by email or comments on our blog, that you saw pictures of Paul in the most recent FMCA magazine, doing our residential refrigerator installation. Yep, that's him alright, but as you may have noticed, we did not write the article, but the author did use information directly from our blog posting.

Some months ago, Paul received an email requesting use of his installation pictures and directions for this type of refrigerator conversion and was promised he would receive credit by the author. We have not seen the article yet (We have not had our mail forwarded recently.) but understand no credit was given by the author. We did see the online article and did not see any notification of Paul's input. Interesting. Doubt we will do anything about the omission, but wanted readers to know....yes, that's Paul in the recent FMCA magazine and our installation story.

If you are interested in reading the post, you can find it here.

Thanks for stopping by. Hope to see y'all soon. Have a great day.

SCENIC DRIVE…NEEDLES HIGHWAY

Thursday, July 5 – We drove the Needles Highway this morning to enjoy the wonderful mountain vistas.

We no more pulled into Custer State Park and there was a Bison enjoying his breakfast. He was huge and right in one of the campgrounds. Crazy fella.

Not too far down the road we enjoyed watching a couple of deer for quite awhile. I think they were watching us pretty closely too!

We drove for miles on the scenic roadways which include the spectacular Needles Highway, Iron Mountain Road, and Peter Norbeck Scenic Highway.

What a beautiful drive among the towering pines that shelter the roadway and provide hidden space for the animals. When you stop and sit it is absolute quite. Not a sound but an occasional bird or breeze blowing a nearby tree. How calming.

The interesting mountains and rock formations climb out of the forest and tease you to find a face or other shape in their unusual crack or peaks.

If you are claustrophobic, don't do this drive. The tunnels are tight.

There are always the peeks of Mount Rushmore between several trees, over the ridge or through one of the tiny tunnels. It looks so much larger looming over the forest than when at the visitor's center.

The tunnel views are so amazing! At one spot, the trees were actually trimmed to provide a breath-taking view of the Presidents. WOW!

The famous double tunnel. Can you see the reward at the end of the second tunnel?

See it yet?

How about now?

We stopped briefly at Sylvan Lake to enjoy the view and entice us to return tomorrow for some hiking around this enchanting lake. There are several trails to enjoy, just in the lake area. We've selected three for our hiking.

We walked the streets of the historical and touristy town of Keystone.

There were thousands of people enjoying the sites of this tiny (population about 350) historical town. A gold mining boom town of the old west not only has a museum, was the home of Carrie Ingalls Swanzey of Little House on the Prairie fame, and 100's to tourist shops.

We especially enjoyed walking through the carver's yard to view some amazing works of art. There's even one for you Harley riders (gotta see this Duane).

This piece cost $4100.00

Arriving back at Custer, we spotted the “Custer sign” in the mountain towering over the town. We have to get back here after dark to see if it's lighted. As a matter of fact, that's our next adventure – Mount Rushmore at night!

Every night since we arrived, we have been treated to a gorgeous sunset. Last night was no exception.

Thanks for stopping by. Hope to see y'all back real soon. Have a great day!