Day 8: Black Hills, SD - Theodore Roosevelt National Park, ND

Yesterday morning I woke up after a wonderful night's sleep (in Spring Creek Inn, a motel in Hill City, SD), packed my car up again, and headed north for the Spearfish Canyon Scenic Byway, one of two main attractions in the hills (the other being Needles Byway, which I drove on Sunday). It wasn't long before the scenery started transforming, and I realized that I was in SD at the exact perfect time of year.... One of the main features of the drive is the foliage, and it was unreal! I pulled off at the first stop of a few that a woman at the tourist information center had highlighted, and noticed a hiking path to the left. I decided to take the trail instead of driving to the falls, and what a good decision that turned out to be! The valley through which the short trail wound its way to the falls was incredible, with huge limestone cliffs and such vivid colors from the grasses and the foliage changing. The falls were small but pretty, and the walk made me feel really great!

I had this thought process where I felt like I would normally have not come on this trip. I am pretty lazy, with the whole "there is always tomorrow attitude". I think maybe all of us may be to some extent, but I have it worse than most. So I was wondering how I was standing in Spearfish Canyon, SD, on a month and a half road trip, solo, across America, without even a second thought! I felt this newly discovered mentality of 'get out and do it!', an urge to fight my inherent laziness and take advantage of every opportunity, and in the end it will all be worth it, and there will be no regrets! And so far on this trip, I have been living that way. Going on a hike, only to find out a half mile in that it was 6 miles of difficult terrain climbing the tallest mountain in the US east of the Rockies, and saying what the hell and continuing on the trail instead of turning back. And the views! Totally worth it!

After the hike to Roughlook Falls I continued on the byway, but it turned out to be much shorter than I had anticipated, so I drove north to Medora, ND and the entrance to Theodore Roosevelt National Park. The park has some similarities to Badlands, but there is much more life here... Green mixed with the browns, grays, and reds to make this park look a little closer to home than Badlands (which appears to be from Mars). I set up camp and read a book (first time this trip) until I fell asleep.

One interesting thing I noticed about the rural areas of the Dakotas (and Montana for that matter) on the drive was that there was nothing but prairie for miles and miles. No buildings, no people. But randomly there was a parking lot FULL of cars, in the middle of nowhere. I wondered where they all were? Also, a 'school bus stop ahead' sign, despite there being no houses. What's the deal?

Note: the temperature during the day was in the 80s. That night it dropped to below 30 degrees, and I was crying I was so cold.

Once again more photos can be found on my mac library, at
http://gallery.me.com/caseys_travels/100064