Friday, August 31, 2007

Vacation Post #4

As always, scroll down for earlier vacation posts

Our first stop of the day was Hawkeye Point, the highest point of Iowa. It is on a farm- pretty much in the owner's back yard. However, the owner is elderly and this year she recently moved elsewhere in town. The land was still being farmed adn the property looked like it was being maintained, so obviously someone is coming by the place. It will be interesting to see what happens in terms of high point access if she sells. (Some owners restrict access to select weekends which is a big pain if you are coming from far away. This was the case with Illinois.)

We then headed off towards South Dakota, where we would spend the rest of the day as well as the next.
Mitchell- home of the Corn Palace. Once considered as a posibility for the capital of South Dakota. This is a building used for basketball games, concerts, etc and the outside is decorated in corn and other plant material. Each year a different design is selected. Unfortunately the decorating was incomplete as they were preparing it for the upcoming festival. It was still pretty neat to see. Inside the building were pictures of other designs that they've had over the years.

After seeing all of Mitchell that we could (and there really isn't much to see other than the Corn Palace) we headed off to Wall, home of Wall Drug. Along the way we saw signs for the Pioneer Auto Museum. We decided to stop. Big mistake. The set up of this place was horrible. And the "informational" signs looked like something put together by a 10 year old. We definitely do NOT recommend this place. I think we left in less than an hour because it was that bad. The General Lee was pretty much the only good thing going for it.

We then continued on our way to Wall. We found a campground in town, about 2 blocks behind Wall Drug. It was a little sketchy looking, but it was cheap and convenient. After setting up the tent we crossed the train tracks and went to visit the Drug Store. Unfortunately, since it was later in the day, a number of the "attractions" seemed to be closed down for the day. That's ok though, we still seemed to get the flavor of the place. And here I am riding my first jackalope of the trip.

6 comments:

~Mel said...

"I am riding my first jackalope of the trip."

That sounds in-ter-es-ting! :)

Chris said...

Well, let's just say I rode more than one giant jackalope. who knew such things were possible! But you've seen the pictures, so this shouldn't be news to you.

Anonymous said...

Umm, being right next door to the Badlands, why didn't you camp there? Ok, so there's no water and you have to use an outhouse, but it was only like $10 and the scenery and bison are worth the lack of restroom facilites. We just used the bathrooms at Wall Drug.

Chris said...

$15 and right behind Wall Drug = very convenient. Besides, we didn't know where the camping was in the Badlands. And we were soon to get our share of bison in Yellowstone.

ChristyR said...

General Lee! Yes! Did you try doing a running leap into the driver's seat?

Vanessa B. said...

Hey, it's not a vacation until you've ridden a jackalope. And the General Lee? Very cool. Looks like an awesome trip!