Bad Lands in Bad Weather.

At night, after a bunch of wind, in started raining…. Hard. Not great for vacationers, but according to the rangers, the area really needed the rain. It also helped bring out the colors in the landscape which was a bonus. It also allowed us to have a “slow morning” reading in bed and cooking a nice breakfast. As the rain continued through the late morning, we collected our laundry and went to the near by town of Wall, the home of the famous Wall Drug, and home to about 950 people. We found a laundromat and did two loads of laundry, did a small grocery trip, filled up the car with gas, had lunch out, and stopped by Wall Drug to see the grandaddy of all tourist traps. Didn’t find much we couldn’t live without, but did pick up a deck of cards, scissors, a cord lock for Melissa’s hat, and a bumper sticker for less than $8. The rain stopped in the afternoon and we drove back to our camper via a couple of nuclear missile silo’s which are now decommissioned and are open to visitors. Unfortunately, the are closed on Sundays and Mondays so we only got to see the outside of the silos, which are buried underground, so they look like a big concrete man hole cover with a mean looking fence around them, and a small visitor kiosk that we couldn’t get close enough to read since they were closed. One more pass through the Badlands National Park to check out a few more view points, a short hike, then back to the camper to cook the steak that we bought in Ohio. Not a bad day for a 3/4 wash-out.Read more