South Dakota reprise

Another beautiful day for driving around --- kind of windy, but more from the south than the east so didn't impede driving progress too much. Again, I was impressed with the geography of South Dakota -- until you get to the eastern part, which is pretty blah...

Shy roadside antelope, might have been Wyoming or South Dakota?

I drove from Lusk, WY north into the Black Hills, so called because of the dark green spruce trees that cover their slopes and make the hills look "black" in the distance. Although a bit off the direct route between superchargers, no problem seeing both Crazy Horse and Mount Rushmore on the way to charge in Rapid City.

The face of the Crazy Horse monument is done, but about a zillion tons more rock to remove before his head and his horse emerge from the mountain! 

I can see faces in the rock cliffs adjacent to Honest Abe

Between Rapid City and the next charger in Murdo there is another Scenic Byway, this one Hwy 240 through Badlands National Park. On the way out I could see some vague rocky weirdness in the distance south of the interstate, so today I took this little detour (which really runs mostly parallel to the interstate, just wiggles around more) and was astonished.

I thought perhaps I had driven from South Dakota to the surface of the moon.

I honestly don't know if these colors were rocks or plants, but they were very unusual!

I did not see any bison except WAY far away, but the prairie dogs towns were right next to the road, and the little critters were popping up and down from their holes, whistling and chirping away...

I left the prairie dogs when this guy started swooping around, as I thought things might end badly and I wasn't mentally prepared for quite that much Circle Of Life this afternoon

Since the superchargers are a little further apart here and The Great Plains are kind of a windy place in general, had to spend more time at each charger today it seemed -- although it may just be that I'm impatient. Plus with 75mph speed limits you definitely use more watts than when it is 65 or 70. Should be home by tomorrow afternoon after about 4000 miles and 8 National Park stops! Thanks for following along!!