Rapid City - Very Crose to Team America Worrd Porice Headquarters

We started out and headed West, all on Highway 90 today. We finally had a real destination, and a good day to drive there and enjoy ourselves on the way...

Our first stop was the world famous CORN PALACE http://www.cornpalace.com/ You would not believe this place, every year they redecorate the entire exterior with grasses, oats, rye, and about 275,000 ears of corn, in all these huge thematic murals - that's a shot of the facade.

After that, we did a quick detour into Prairie Homestead - mostly because I wanted to see the white prairie dogs and they have the largest white dog town in the world!! It's pretty cool, but the actual sod dwelling and farm from the 1909 era was worth checking out as well.Onward - we set our sights on the world famous Wall Drug. I'm not wasting my time explaining, so if you don't know the story of Free Ice Water, then check out www.walldrug.com This place really is world famous.

From one side of South Dakota to another; across into another time zone and our 4th state in 4 days! Not a bad drive at all - after you cross the Missouri River, you leave the MW glacier fields behind, and the terrain begins to change.

Just when you get the groove of it, BAM!!! The Badlands! Should be called the BADASSLANDS, it is so beautiful. The 30 mile drive through the National Park was the best part of the trip, yet.

Horrific gas figures, the wind was NOT at our backs...

4th fill

253 miles

40.797 gallons

$106.03

2.599/gallon

6.20 mpg (our worst yet!!! at least we knew it was coming)

5th fill

270 miles
36.652 gallons

$106.25

2.899/gallon (worst price yet)

7.37 mpg (and we felt relieved, how sad is that?)

For our 3 Menomonees, I guessed wrong with Sarah Earl - very sorry to our correct Sarah contestant; we did pick you up a prize at World Famous Wall Drug today. Correct Sarah, please make yourself known!!!

Roadkill:

30 yards of bloody mess

goose

skunk

deer

porcupine

Questions answered:

• We picked KOAs because they would mail us a nice published National guide to all the Kampgrounds with full listings. Then we found out that 75% had Internet, with about 50% having free wifi, so we got the membership card which pays for itself after 3 uses...


• They are clean, easy to find and quite friendly, so we see how we are doing, and then we pick one with wifi and head there (so you won't miss out!!)


• There are more police in MN than in every other state we have been in combined


• We are eating a lot of sandwiches - I had a childhood relapse and am eating Braunschweiger
  
• As much as we hope to read and watch DVDs, we are usually tired losers...
  

The RV is a piece of shit and is falling apart daily - thankfully we brought duct tape!! Duct Tape is like the Force; it has a dark side and a light side and in general it binds the entire universe together...

Best song for me today: Hey Ya, Outkast (I just can't get over 'shake it like a Polaroid picture')

Best song for Marge today: Blowout, The Crystal Method (while we were driving through the Badlands)

Best moment today: listening to an oldies station, and on comes "Do Wah Ditty Ditty Dum Ditty Do" and I'm thinking "who ever needs to hear this again" and we see a billboard for the Do Wah Ditty Diner - no shit!

Vanity Plates:

123 MR P

CBS 1

66 - c9

01 CENT (Jeanne, self-worth???)

KB0WOM (except the 0 was one of those Danish slashed O's - this was a MN plate, so go figure)

Finally, for those saddened by the roadkill, today we saw lot's of life, too - here's some charismatic mega-fauna:

So, tomorrow, we're on to the Faces on the Mountain - perhaps we will see Gary Johnston, or at least Michael Moore...

Harve