August 8, 2010

August 8, 2010

Well all we saw were asses at Custer State Park in South Dakota. No, I am not referring to the Sturgis bikers that are dominating the tourist trade here. I am talking about the four-legged variety. We paid our entry fee and drove thru the Wildlife Loop at Custer. The park is beautiful and on our first trip we remembered seeing huge herds of buffalo crossing the road. This time they are nowhere to be seen. All we saw were a group of wild burros, descendents of pack animals released in the park. One donkey gave Aimee a little scare. As she fed one a slice of bread, it got so excited it almost jumped in the RV with her.

Slightly disappointed with Custer, we left the park and crossed into Wind Cave National Park. There is no entry fee and wouldn’t you know it, this is where all the buffalo are roaming. I even did the modern version of the cattle drive with them. For probably the next five miles I herded the bison down a narrow valley road with our RV. The line of cars behind me must have been very jealous.

Eventually the fun had to end and we stopped at Wind Cave’s Visitor Center. This National Park is a two-fer. It has great scenery and wildlife above ground and equally amazing views below. We took the hour and a half “natural entrance” tour. Wind Cave has none of the stalagmites and stalactites of normal caves. Instead it has long narrow passages filled with formations called “box work”. Wind Cave is about the only place this can be seen. Box Work is a honeycomb structure reminiscent of the nests of the mud-dauber wasp. In reality it is the eaten-away skeleton of an earlier mineral structure.

We had such a nice time at Wind Cave, we decided to spend the night at its campground. We are glad we did. The entire herd of buffalo from earlier in the afternoon ended up passing right by our campsite. Then after the evening ranger program, we enjoyed the moonless star-filled night sky seeing several shooting stars. The Milky Way was magnificent.