March | 2009 | Gas • Food • No Lodging | Life on the Road Chinatown Restaurant Birds March 20, 2009 Chinatown restaurants love to hang animal carcasses in their windows. Birds, in particular. Bad for the birds, good for the photography—and the eatin’. X Marks The Spot: South Dakota Signs March 16, 2009 Driving through South Dakota, eventually you notice the signs. It's not immediately clear what they mean, but they're all over the place. “X Marks The Spot,” they say. “Think! Drive Safely.” On the other side, the same design, but instead of “Think!” it's “Why Die?” Wall Drug March 14, 2009 You’ll see the signs for Wall Drug long before you get there. Hundreds of signs, for hundreds of miles in either direction of Wall, South Dakota, on Interstate 90. It's not just a drug store. Abandoned America: Twin Arrows, Arizona March 5, 2009 On Interstate 40, west of Winslow, Arizona, you’ll find Twin Arrows, an old Route 66 trading post.

Situated where the Route 66 alignment meets up with the Interstate, the trading post has its own highway exit, but has been abandoned for some years, the price of a gallon of gasoline forever frozen at $1.36. Fun with the DNG Profile Editor March 2, 2009 With the DNG Profile Editor, you can create camera profiles to be applied to your images in Lightroom or Camera Raw. As it turns out, we can abuse this feature to generate a profile that is intentionally wrong in exactly the way we want. The wonders of Wall Drug, South Dakota (in photos) - Pitstops for Kids The wonders of Wall Drug, South Dakota (in photos) September 21, 2015 by Amy Whitley 1 Comment Have you stopped at Wall Drug, in Wall, South Dakota? If you’ve driven along I-90 in either direction, even hundreds of miles out, you probably have stopped. This fantastical roadside pit stop is absolutely worth a stop, or even a detour, to explore with the kids. I was lucky enough to meet the third and fourth generation owners of Wall Drug , which is still owned by the original Hustead family.

The story of how this sprawling place came to be is as uplifting as the place itself: in the 1930’s, when Wall Drug was the very humble, one-room Hustead Drug Store owned by Ted and Dorothy Hustead, customers were scarce, due to the Depression and drought. Faced with closing their doors, Dorothy Hustead came up with the idea of offering free ice water to passing travelers. She put up a few roadside signs, and the rest is history. Today, roadside advertising is still the #1 way customers find Wall Drug, and trust me, these signs are abundant…and entertaining on the interstate. You can still get free ice water at Wall Drug, and coffee is still five cents. What else is there? Um…everything? There are departments for Western wear, jewelry, toys, clothing, candy, art, and more. There’s still a working pharmacy, plus a pharmacy museum of sorts, a mining attraction for kids, a play area with water features, a shooting gallery, an arcade, multiple dining options, a soda fountain, and thousands of historic photos of South Dakota history. Prepare to get lost a few times! Honestly, Wall Drug defies explanation, so we’ll show you the place in pictures.

Wondering where to stay while in Wall? Head to Ann’s Motel. This charming throwback to bygone eras of road trip travel lodges is clean and affordable, and best of all, Ann still checks you in with a real key and a friendly smile. Ann’s is just down the street from Wall Drug. While in the Wall area, definitely head to Badlands National Park! About the author AUTHOR: Amy Whitley is the founding editor of Pit Stops for Kids and content editor of Trekaroo. She writes on staff monthly as a family travel expert at Go Green Travel Green and Practical Travel Gear, and contributes to Outdoors NW as an outdoor adventure traveler. Find Amy at Google . 0 Miles to Wall Drug: A Half-Day at the World’s Largest Drugstore | Broadly All photos by Zoe Kauder Nalebuff 0 Miles to Wall Drug: A Half-Day at the World’s Largest Drugstore Aug 14 2015 In Wall, South Dakota, there's little difference between an uncanny roadside attraction and the entire town. A game I sometimes like to play with people is called Guess What Beyoncé Is Doing Right Now. I am reasonably certain I invented this game, which is actually two games.

The first game is to guess what American celebrity Beyoncé (net worth ~$450 million) is doing at any given moment. The second game is to estimate the likelihood that your guess is correct. I believe I can predict with about 85% certainty what any of my close friends is doing at a specified point in time. When they are not working 9-to-5 office jobs, they are generally eating food (at home or in public) or using a computer (at home or in public). For Beyoncé, my certainty drops to about 4%. At noon on a Tuesday, you might find her on a private jet to Ibiza, or caring for Blue in one of the 14 homes allegedly maintained by her and Jay-Z, or up in the studio recording her next triple-platinum album. Maybe she's in an underground government lab testing a great new drug that's yet to be released to the public. Maybe she is sleeping. I couldn't possibly know. More than 59 million Americans live in the areas with fewer than 2500 residents that the Census Bureau classifies as rural.

On my 629-mile eastbound drive across Wyoming into Wall, South Dakota, I did not see a single one of them. If I can predict the daily routine of Beyoncé with about 4% certainty, I suspect my odds of guessing the current preoccupation of a rural-dwelling American are even lower. Statistically, citizens of the Great Plains either drill oil, farm corn for Monsanto, or do an administrative task that contributes to either effort. Even knowing this information, I have no mental template for what their daily lives might look like. If you, like me, are a part of the 80.7% of Americans who did not grow up in an area classified as rural, then the drive into Wall is difficult to reckon with. First, there is the very blue sky, which is the same sky as any other American sky, except big. This Great Plains interstate sky is porn-knockers big, or cartoon-sandwich big, or any of the other types of overblown big which demand some skepticism about reality. The mid-grass prairie below is similarly uncanny, a shade of green so dense and bright I felt new sympathy for the ambitious projects undertaken by the artificial greens of lime-flavor and St.

Patrick's Day and the plastic grass that garnishes takeout sushi. We are on holiday in a desktop wallpaper, and for half a day we point our car at 90 mph towards a horizontal seam between blue and green, for high velocity is the only sane way to make sense of such alien scale. The surface of the moon might have seemed more familiar. If you miss your first billboard for Wall Drug (you won't), do not fret, for there are hundreds more. They populate the 650-mile span of I-90 that connects Montana to Minnesota, and each new sighting feels as thrilling as the last, a welcome commercial break from the stress of processing so much big. Sometimes the billboards ask, Have you dug Wall Drug? or implore things like DON'T MISS OUT. Other times they advertise amenities (Hot Coffee 5¢), or assert relevance (WALL DRUG as told by Good Morning America), or shout timely slogans out into the empty plains (YOLO Wall Drug). The first sign for the drugstore was erected in 1936 and advertised Free Ice Water to weary motorists.

Before this sign, Wall Drug was a dying pharmacy in the dying town of Wall, South Dakota (population 326, and waning). After the sign, the store survived as a result of a geographic coincidence that happened to situate Mount Rushmore 76 miles to the west. The nationalist road trip pilgrimage site opened in 1941 and provided Wall Drug with a consistent stream of thirsty passers-through. Today, however, the megastore thrives as a destination in its own right, a 76,000-square-foot, self-sustaining monument to something, though the nature of that something is not immediately clear. We arrive feeling not thirsty, but bitchy. The day before, a rock from a passing dump truck had shattered our sunroof, and nothing manufactures gratuitous resentment like having to yell for no reason over the flapflapflap of a duct-taped tarp in high-speed wind. With no rational recourse for our irritation, we drink the free paper cones of water curatively and set to planning our visit. First, we'll eat breakfast in the 520-seat Western Art Gallery Restaurant. Then, we'll part ways and wander the store's 20+ departments alone.

My first impulse was to understand the Western Art Gallery Restaurant as a sort of wild, wild counterpart to Cracker Barrel's gimmicky southern fare, but a survey of the menu makes clear that western modifies art gallery, not restaurant. On the eatery's walls you will find oil paintings of cowboys and Indians, as well as wooden plaques featuring local cattle brands; on the menu, you will find 75 food items, 68 of which feature a carbohydrate in the starring role. Of the seven non-carb food items, one is ice cream, five are side dishes (green beans, cottage cheese, garden salad, baked beans, cole slaw), and one is a crispy chicken entree salad. Though it is 1400 miles to the nearest ocean, the Western Art Gallery Restaurant proudly offers a fish and chips platter featuring deep-fried cod. Vegans, however, will be pleased to find a suitable garden burger.

The point of including this list is not to play the part of an Evian-drinking cartoon New Yorker, but instead to illustrate two truths that would become increasingly evident as my day there progresses: 1) Wall Drug meticulously casts the widest possible net in hopes of capturing the interest of every conceivable American tourist, and 2) whatever Wall Drug commemorates, it extends far beyond the classical tropes of the American West.

Here are some of the things for sale at Wall Drug: Authentic Stetson brand cowboy hats in many styles; a wide selection of Levi's jeans; novelty yellow road signs featuring warnings like Prairie Dog Crossing and Caution: Wine Zone; several types of collectable hematite crystal; collectible Native American artifacts, as well as "collectible" "Native American" "artifacts"; a toy rubber band launcher in the image of an Uzi submachine gun; the $115.95 Kershaw Rainbow Leek three-inch spring-assisted knife (2002 Blade Magazine Overall Knife of the Year); Batman throwing stars; Spongebob Squarepants Band-Aids; an assortment of politically ambiguous one-inch buttons with sayings like MARRIED ONCE IS THE NEW VIRGINITY and Here's a hot stock tip: PRISON INDUSTRIES; Founding Fathers shot glasses featuring Mount Rushmore; original Founding Fathers shot glasses featuring four men in Native American dress superimposed on Mount Rushmore; a 10"x12" cast-bronze sculpture by American artist Frederic Remington (b.

1861) entitled Coming Through the Rye, which depicts four cowboys on horseback shooting guns into the air, which retails for $1100; Wall Drug baseballs; Wall Drug magnets; Wall Drug T-shirts; Wall Drug snowglobes; Wall Drug flyswatters (comically large); Wall Drug flyswatters (1:1 scale); a cookbook of Wall Drug employees' favorite recipes; 2mg Loperamide Hydrochloride anti-diarrheal tablets; a paperweight made from a tarantula encased in lucite; and fish scales excised from the largest freshwater fish in the Amazon rainforest, a comparably extreme biome located over 4000 miles south.In the department called "Camp and Trail"I buy a magnet, some postcards, and two plastic Wall Drug sun visors. The man behind the register makes small talk with a level of authentic-seeming enthusiasm that far exceeds the normal amount of affective labor you'd expect from a theme park employee, or from any employee anywhere. Salt of the earth does not begin to articulate his vibe; this man is MSG of the earth, he is Dorito of the earth, if I am ever diagnosed with cancer I will call him first.

As he rings up my items, I ask about the legality of the various knives and sharp objects he sells. "Illegal?" he asks, like he has never heard this question, or like maybe he has heard it one million times. "Everything is legal in South Dakota, except for maybe high-heeled shoes." I am short-circuited by this show of folksiness. For most people over the age of 12, an enjoyable part of any tourist attraction is searching out the places where the managed experience breaks down. Certainly the Magic Kingdom is magical, but an even more magical adventure for me would be the chance to witness an in-costume Cinderella smoking a Newport out behind the Dippin' Dots stand. For the gently misanthropic vacationer, there is no greater souvenir than a condom in the lazy river or the memory of two colonial Williamsburg blacksmiths discussing MDMA. At Wall Drug, such seams are hard to come by. This is not to say that the store manufactures an airtight facsimile of the bygone American West, but rather the opposite:It is hard to tell which parts are real and which parts are for show. Is Wall Drug the Disneyland of the Great Plains?

Is it the bootstrapped dream of two homespun pharmacy owners? Is it just a giant store? Certainly, Wall Drug is a tourist trap, but it differs from other roadside attractions, like the World's Largest Ball of Twine, in that it makes no effort to hide its intention of separating you from your money. After all, it's a store, and a store by definition exists for the sole purpose of facilitating commerce. While the array of things to buy might be absurd and dizzying, prices at Wall Drug bear almost no resemblance to the $11 beer-type swindle we've been trained to expect at places where tourists tour. There is a satisfactory souvenir on offer at every price point. A traveler of average impulse control can expect to be on his way, thirst quenched, only $10 or $15 poorer. Wall Drug might be a scheme, but it's certainly not a scam. After wandering the various departments for an hour, and reading the myriad clippings from local newspapers that line the attraction's inner walls, I couldn't help but get the sense that the store was just an innovative answer to the question of how to survive on a plot of rural land that gold and oil forgot.

Differentiating Wall Drug from the town of Wall itself feels impossible. In 2013, the Census reported 876 permanent residents living in the town; a Harvard Business Review profile of the store estimates that in the summertime high season, as many as 1000 customers will pass through the restaurant in a single hour. This is not to mention travelers who visit but don't eat, or the seasonal employees who come from places as far-flung as China and Slovakia to work. These workers, typically students, pay $30 per week to live in one of the 28 proctor-supervised dormitories owned and operated by the store. I couldn't help but think of the paternalistic Pullman Company-type arrangements that organized rural economies in the early days of the railroad, and indeed Wall is a company town of this type. Property records for Pennington County , South Dakota list Wall Drug Store, Inc. as owning 71 plots of land within the Wall city limits, but even the businesses that aren't owned by the company feel enmeshed in and even integral to its scheme.

Across the street from Wall Drug, you'll find a slew of copycat operations willing to gamble on the existence of a person interested in visiting the second-, third-, or fourth-most popular tourist trap off a certain South Dakota interstate exit. These neighbors (Broken Arrow Trading Company, the Wall Discount Outlet, Dakota Mercantile, etc.) all mimic the faux-frontier façade architecture of Wall Drug, which itself mimics real frontier façade architecture, which itself was invented during the heydey of hastily constructed pioneer towns in hopes of mimicking the refined-looking streetscape of an organically evolved downtown. But the thing is, Wall's downtown did evolve organically, only this evolution came as a result of a business model that hinged on selling tourists their own fantasy of what an inorganically evolved Western tourist trap should include. Did Wall constitute Wall Drug, or did Wall Drug constitute Wall? It's an unanswerable question. A three-hour visit to this wild, wild meme town was more than I could wrap my head around. We reconvened in the store's backyard, in the shadow of a giant fiberglass jackalope, a mythical animal of regional folklore said to have the body of jackrabbit and the horns of an antelope.

Having never seen a jackrabbit, nor an antelope, the idea did not seem so implausibly mythical to us, and for a few minutes we debated whether or not the animal actually exists. After a day at Wall Drug, it did not seem crazy that a thing cobbled together from so much randomness could somehow be real. Topics South Dakota - in between but must-see [Archive] - The Great American RoadTrip Forum Peter Thody 11-22-2005, 04:48 AM I wasn't going to post this as I thought it a bit long, but Moderator Bob reckoned I should, so here goes: For months weï¿½d pored over maps, books and the Internet (i.e. here - thanks Bob) ahead of a month-long, letï¿½s do it now the kids have left home journey across the USA. We needed to start and end in cities big enough to offer flights from and to the UK and we wanted a decent drive in between. We looked at and rejected the Pacific Coast (too busy), Route 66 (too cliched) and the Deep South (too windy).

What we wanted to see was middle America, the American heartland, the America that sits in between the so-called sophistication of the east and west coasts and gets on with real life. So finally we decided. Fly to Chicago, hire a car and head West across the plains, over the Rockies to the Pacific. Allow for a few (admittedly major) diversions and itï¿½s a 4500 mile route that offers everything: the beauty of Yellowstone, Wyoming; the awe-inspiring scenery of Glacier National Park, Montana; the Giant Redwoods of California; the rugged coast of Oregon and Mount St. Helens in Washington. And all that stood between us and this American wonderland was the huge, empty looking state of South Dakota, somewhere about which we knew next to nothing. So we looked it up. Mount Rushmore? Well whoï¿½dï¿½ve thought that was there? The Badlands? Donï¿½t know much but I guess itï¿½s not going to be the most hospitable place. And two places ï¿½ the Black Hills and Deadwood ï¿½ best known as the subject of Doris Day songs.

Beyond that, just a map full of names that to us seemed to fall into three categories: British (Ipswich, Aberdeen, Bath, Oldham, Manchester); International (Stockholm, Lebanon, Lyons, Troy, Volga); and Oh So American (Bison, Buffalo, Prairie City, Wounded Knee, Thunder Hawk, Eagle Butte). This was what we were looking for. Smallville USA. Overnight in Brookings We spent our first night in SD in the small town of Brookings, home of South Dakota State University whose motto, ï¿½You can go anywhere from hereï¿½, suggests a resigned acceptance that this was precisely what most graduates would do. We chose Brookings on the recommendation of the woman at the Laura Ingalls Wilder museum in Walnut Grove MN, who, weï¿½d been delighted to learn, played Nellie Olesonï¿½s mum in the annual Wilder Pageant. And we chose our hotel, the perfectly good but unremarkable $60 a night Hotel Brookings Inn on the outskirts of town, simply because it seemed to be the best available.

A quick shower to wash away the dust weï¿½d collected on the outside, down to the bar to do the same inside and our first South Dakotan welcome courtesy of the hotel barman. Within minutes we knew his name, his college course and his hopes for the future, and he knew where we were from and where we were going. This wasnï¿½t someone just doing his job or spouting the corporate ï¿½How are you guys this evening?ï¿½ (the 21st centuryï¿½s ï¿½Have a nice dayï¿½). This was someone who clearly liked people and was genuinely interested in why we were visiting his town. Then there were the two or three fellow drinkers, all local, all equally welcoming and all warning us about the empty, featureless, never-ending roads we faced in the morning. And finally there was our waitress, whose initial nervousness we put down to shyness or inexperience.

However, on bringing us our main course ï¿½ medium rare rib-eye to share with garlic mash and corn ï¿½ she blurted out her confession: ï¿½You know, I was sooo excited when I got to be your server. Are you from England?.ï¿½ Yes we are. ï¿½Last year I visited a friend at college in Manchester. Do you know it?ï¿½ Yes we do. In fact itï¿½s only 30 or 40 miles from Leeds, where we live. ï¿½Do you like any Manchester bands?ï¿½ Being more than twice her age, a shared interest in the likes of Joy Division, the Fall and the Stone Roses was unexpected to say the least but yes, I said, there are loads I like and listed a few. ï¿½Cool!ï¿½ she said uncertainly, her expression making it clear she hadnï¿½t recognised a single one, ï¿½but what about ï¿½ï¿½ and went on to name half a dozen bands that were equally meaningless to me. Two people divided by a common interest as well as a common language.

Day 2: Brookings to Pierre The next day was going to be a big one. Not particularly challenging in terms of distance, just 180 miles along Highway 14, the The Laura Ingalls Wilder Historic Highway, to the state capital Pierre. But these, weï¿½d been warned, were the plains at their plainest. Almost as soon as weï¿½d started, we arrived in De Smet, ï¿½The Little Town on the Prairieï¿½ and if it was good enough to persuade the Ingalls to stop, it was certainly good enough for us. A guide, dressed in period clothing, showed us around the Surveyorsï¿½ House where the Wilders had spent their first Dakota winter in 1879/80, and then ï¿½the house that Pa builtï¿½ in 1887, where Ma, Pa and Lauraï¿½s blind sister Mary lived for many years after. This was real history, history you could touch and smell as well as read about.

But what brought it home most vividly that these people existed beyond the pages of a book and the flickering screen of a 1970s TV series, was the town cemetery. Set in a stunningly beautiful location of shady pines, this is final resting place of Caroline and Charles (Ma and Pa); three of Lauraï¿½s sisters, Mary, Grace and Carrie; and most touching of all, Laura and Almanzoï¿½s unnamed son who died shortly after his birth in 1889. These were people whoï¿½d lived, raised families and died here. Respects duly paid, itï¿½s out of the cemetery, check for traffic (you never know, thereï¿½d been some earlier), turn left and back onto Highway 14, heading west. And the guys in the bar were right. The roads were empty and the countryside was virtually featureless. Mile upon mile of flat farmland and plains, with only the occasional homestead in the distance to break up the horizon. But to us, visitors from a country where you canï¿½t go 10 miles without bumping into a decent sized town or city, this was mesmerising.

Some landscapes are soporific, sending you into semi-conscious autopilot, but this was entirely different. Brilliant blue skies, endless grassland changing colour over massive landscapes, impossibly long freight trains being hauled along the Dakota, Minnesota & Eastern railroad by bright red and yellow locos. Seriously, even the asphalt looked exciting and different from anything weï¿½d experienced before. It was stimulating, hypnotic and magical; something I remain moved by today. This was America, this was why weï¿½d come. So it was with more of a sense of disappointment at having finished the drive than tired relief that we reached Pierre. ï¿½Can we help you?ï¿½ offered two ladies, quickly identifying us as either vagrants or confused out-of-towners as we entered a characterful-looking building that stated ï¿½Hotelï¿½ on the outside but clearly wasnï¿½t on the inside. Discovering that not only were we out-of-town but out-of-country, the SD charm switched into overdrive. ï¿½Be sure to visit our beautiful State Capitol, wonï¿½t you? Take a walk by the river, youï¿½ll love it. You want to eat?

Go to La Minestra ï¿½ itï¿½s Italian and great food. Say, we could be your guides! You need a hotel? The Days Inn does great waffles for breakfast.ï¿½ Five minutes later, having successfully negotiated the road works that had seen the main road through Pierre transformed into a Third World dirt track, we stood in line at the hotel reception. ï¿½What price for Triple-A members?ï¿½, ï¿½Weï¿½re seniors, whatï¿½s your best rate?ï¿½, ï¿½Three night at fishing party rates please?ï¿½. Being British and therefore finding money-related talk in general and discount requests in particular excruciatingly embarrassing, we simply asked about room availability. And I swear she gave us a better price that the three parties before us. Unpack, shower, renegotiate the hazards of West Sioux Ave ï¿½ this time on foot ï¿½and we find ourselves at the Veterans Bar, directly on the banks of the Missouri, drinking Bud and watching water-skiers.

48 hours before, weï¿½d spent Independence Day at La Crosse, WI, enjoying their annual Riverfest on the banks of the Mississippi; tonight we were watching one of Americaï¿½s other great rivers flow slowly by. Thereï¿½s a point in every trip when the amazement you feel at finding yourself in these far-off places makes way for something more comfortable, a kind of settling in process where everythingï¿½s still beautiful and exciting, but you begin to feel part of it. This was our fitting-in moment and it felt great. Day 3: Pierre to Rapid City The next day is an early start: up at 5.30 with the aim of reaching the Badlands while the lightï¿½s still good. Walk into the hotel breakfast room, pour some waffle mixture into the griddle and find ourselves a table amidst the even-earlier-rising fishing parties. Catch sight of the news and learn that 4 or 5 bombs have gone off in London. Too early to say how many casualties yet but itï¿½s clearly not good news.

Hit the road in a slightly sombre mood but our spirits are raised once more by Highway 14 which continues to make its way through coarse grassland that must have looked exactly the same to the settlers who opened up this country in the 19th century. Stop to take a photo and, not for the first time, a pick-up slows down to check that weï¿½re okay for gas. Weï¿½re not going to make the Badlands much before 10 so weï¿½ll miss the best light, but we get it here instead. Empty roads, changing colours, the occasional bird bouncing off the car to join the deer, raccoons and other unidentified road kill that are visible from hundreds of yards away on the otherwise perfectly flat road ahead. And the Wall Drug signs. Back in 1936, owners Ted and Dorothy Hustead had the bright idea of tempting travellers to stop at their drug store in the small town of Wall through the offer of Free Ice Water; the idea proved so successful that people were already arriving as Ted returned from erecting his first signs. Before this spark of inspiration, Wall Drug was struggling for custom. The next summer they had to employ eight waitresses.

Today they get as many as 20,000 visitors a day and their highway signs are world famous. The store itself is so tacky itï¿½s brilliant. Thereï¿½s a chapel, a pharmacy, what seems like dozens of speciality stores and a large cafï¿½, still offering free ice water and coffee at 5 cents a cup. The most memorable and certainly the most photographed aspect of Wall Drug is its collection of novelty items: a life-size bucking bronco you can sit on, a T-Rex that roars every few minutes, various fibreglass characters sitting on benches, and a whole range of animated groups that can be activated for a quarter. Itï¿½s not subtle, but makes no pretence to be. And after a few hours on the road, the offer of free ice water still works. If Wall Drug is the ultimate plastic attraction, a hugely entertaining but essentially pointless diversion in the middle of nowhere, then the Badlands provide the perfect antidote. Created over the last four million years through a combination of wind, rain and river erosion, the Badlands is a quarter of a million acre National Park of almost indescribable beauty.

At first glance the undulating layers of sandstone look like waves on the sea; walk a few hundred yards further on, look over the edge and the same formations have suddenly become sharp and craggy, like the spines on the back of a lizard. There are soft, smooth, rounded formations, pinnacles that look like long-lost eastern temples, sheer drops, moonscapes, distant rivers and patterns made up of different layers of stone and formations that appear so regular that itï¿½s hard to imagine how they could have been created. Every corner reveals a new scene, even more stunning than the last. Look back at where youï¿½ve just been and you get another view. And when you think youï¿½ve seen it all, look ahead in the distance and thereï¿½s a whole new set of rock formations to explore, walk, climb and wonder at. There are buffalo, mountain goats and prairie dogs.

There are fossil trails that let lazy tourists like us feel like weï¿½re experiencing a bit of off-the-beaten-track wilderness without actually going more than a few hundred yards from our air con hire cars, and there are real trails for those whoï¿½ve come prepared with boots, maps and water. There are viewpoints with railings where youï¿½ll find a handful of other people ooohing and aaahing in whispered amazement and there are endless opportunities to escape the crowds and enjoy the silent, tear-down-your-face wonder of the place. As we overheard an old guy saying to his family as we were returning to our car, you sure canï¿½t beat Mother Nature. And this was Mother Nature at her very best. Later that day, sitting on the bed in our room at the Holiday Inn Express, Rapid City, while the thunder rumbled in the hills and the rain came down in buckets, the map shows us that weï¿½d seen less than half of the park.

Tonightï¿½s entertainment ï¿½ on the recommendation of the reception team at our hotel ï¿½ is provided by the Colonial House Restaurant & Bar which is ï¿½just over the roadï¿½. Looking forward to a little leg stretching we set off but realise that not only is there no pavement but, unsurprisingly therefore, no pedestrian crossing point either. Our options appear to be either to return to the hotel and drive the no more than 400-yard journey which, apart from being crazy, would mean an eveningï¿½s abstinence, or to brave it out and hope for a gap in the multiple lanes of traffic flowing in either direction. To this day I honestly donï¿½t know whether it was incredulity at this middle aged coupleï¿½s stupidity or old fashioned South Dakotan courtesy (I really, really want to believe it was the latter), but to our amazement first one driver then another pulled up to a stand still and smilingly waved us across. This was a feature of our entire journey, particularly noticeable in SD but apparent wherever we went.

For years now we Europeans have joked about what we perceive to be the shallow insincerity of the ï¿½How may I help youï¿½ American culture. Itï¿½s only when you experience it for yourself that you realise that, for the greater part, itï¿½s 100 per cent genuine. Thereï¿½s an endearing warmth and friendliness about the people we encountered, one that we in the UK seem to have lost. Day 4: Rapid City to Deadwood Our first port of call the next day was another great American institution. Like the Empire State Building, 50s motels and Old Faithful, Mount Rushmore is Americana personified, a place so familiar you feel youï¿½ve been there before. Presidents Washington, Jefferson, Roosevelt and Lincoln carved into a southeast facing wall of granite in the Black Hills; each 60 feet high and created over the impressively short period of 14 years (only six and half of which actually were spent carving) by sculptor Gutzon Borglum.

Such is the feeling that this is part of an older America that the scale and modernity of the car parks, book shops, visitor centre, restaurant, Avenue of Flags and Grandview Terrace feels unnecessarily commercial even by US standards, but doesnï¿½t detract from the wow factor of this national treasure. And by following the half mile Presidential Trail ï¿½ a scenic boardwalk that takes you away from the crowds but closer to the rock face, you can imagine that itï¿½s 1959 and look, isnï¿½t that Cary Grant on George Washingtonï¿½s nose? Well, no actually, itï¿½s not. Itï¿½s one of team of German contractors flown in to give the monument its first thorough clean in over 60 years. Heading south now towards Custer State Park, we follow what we later discover to be the Iron Mountain Road, also known, more prosaically, as Highway 16A.

Just 17 miles long, this is a totally unexpected delight, providing long distance views of Mount Rushmore through three strategically positioned tunnels, plus the experience of rising up through the forest on ï¿½pigtailï¿½ bridges, a term which perfectly describes these spiralling wooden structures. Custer State Park began life as a game reserve in 1913 with the aim of rebuilding the wildlife population that had been all but wiped out after an expedition led by George A. Custer discovered gold in the Black Hills in 1874. Today thereï¿½s a herd of some 1500 bison, plus mountain goats, elk, bighorn sheep, coyote and a herd of wild burros, first introduced to haul visitors around the park but now roaming free. To be honest, our trip around the Wildlife Loop Road, taking in a quick lunch at a lodge, meant we saw only a fraction of the place.

We bumped into burros, negotiated bison dozing beside the road and passed a number of busy-looking camp grounds but this really wasnï¿½t a place to be appreciated by people on a road trip with miles to cover, but somewhere to relax, fish, explore, hike, swim, ride and ï¿½ we discovered from the official leaflet we were handed on entering the park ï¿½ build snowmen. An hour or so later, we pulled up in front of our second sculpture project of the day, the Crazy Horse Memorial. While this somehow lacked the immediate impact and sense of dï¿½jï¿½ vu of Mount Rushmore, its story is one of almost unimaginable determination on the part of one man. Persuaded by the words of Lakota Chief Standing Bear: ï¿½My fellow chiefs and I would like the white man to know the red man has great heroes, tooï¿½, sculptor Korszak Ziolkowski set about carving Crazy Horse in 1948.

With just $174 to his name, no federal funding (twice declining offers of $10m) and equipment that consisted of a jackhammer and gas compressor, this was such a mammoth undertaking that even today no-one is prepared to say when it will be finished. When Korszak died in 1982, he left behind not only the foundations of a piece of work which, when completed, will be 641 feet long by 563 feet high, but also a wife and 10 children, most of whom have now taken up their fatherï¿½s jackhammer and are continuing his work. For an idea of just how much remains to be done, Crazy Horseï¿½s face was only completed in 1998, the projectï¿½s 50th anniversary; since then the familyï¿½s efforts have been focused on blocking out the 22 storey high horseï¿½s head. The Crazy Horse Memorial will some day become a modern wonder. Until then, itï¿½s a work in progress that honours the Native American and provides a lasting tribute to the commitment, patience and skill of one man.

Itï¿½s also a project that makes you think: is there anything I believe in so strongly that not only would I have to dedicate the rest of my life to creating it, but also the lives of my children, their children and quite possibly half a dozen generations more? No, probably not. So we head for historic Deadwood and its promise of beer and slot machines. Actually, before arriving we had no idea it was a gamblerï¿½s paradise with 24 hour gaming in every hotel, bar, saloon and restaurant on Main Street. Seriously. Weï¿½d booked ahead at the Bullock Hotel ï¿½ ï¿½Step back in time and walk through the very same corridors, rooms, and hallways that Deadwood's first Sheriff Seth Bullock himself still proudly haunts!ï¿½ ï¿½ and once weï¿½d squeezed ourselves and our cases through the gaming halls and up to our room, it was time to explore. The Main Street itself look just the way you want a Wild West street to look, with plenty of wooden-fronted saloons.

Add in the fact that weï¿½d arrived in the middle of a jazz festival so the street was blocked by a huge stage and the atmosphere was great too. So, time for a beer, realising only after ordering a second that if you keep hold of your glass, refills are about half the price. Moving on for a third ï¿½ itï¿½s been a long day ï¿½ we find ourselves in conversation with Kevin & Brian, two college guys who seem delighted to have the opportunity to find out what lifeï¿½s like in England and, more specifically, what we think of the French Governmentï¿½s position on Iraq and the British Governmentï¿½s position on gun laws. Despite us having pretty much directly opposing views on both points ï¿½ I quite admire the Gallic quality of sheer bloody-mindedness and enjoy living in a country where gun crime remains extremely rare ï¿½ their friendliness, openness and insistence on buying us beer proves overwhelming and in minutes we succumb. An hour later weï¿½ve decided to join forces, invade France and create the United British & American Colony of Gaul.

Weï¿½ve agreed a unilateral disarmament treaty based on the Kevinï¿½s realisation that his familyï¿½s collection of 28 guns probably is excessive; 23 would be a far more sensible number. And next time weï¿½re passing through weï¿½re going out with him to discover the satisfaction of shooting something. Years of experience tell my wife that itï¿½s the next pint thatï¿½s the one thatï¿½ll keep us there all night so itï¿½s time to say farewell to two more new friends from SD. And thatï¿½s it really. A good meal, a quarter in the slots because it seemed rude not to, 20 minutes feeding the machines trying to get rid of the bucket of small change won with our first quarter and then bed. A walk around Mt. Moriah Cemetery in the morning to see the gravestones of Wild Bill and Calamity Jane, into the car, on our way and half an hour or so later we were in Wyoming. Over the next three weeks weï¿½d travel another 3329 miles and visit Montana, Idaho, Oregon, California and Washington.

Weï¿½d meet dozens of other wonderful, friendly people and see countless more unforgettable sites. July 2005 was the adventure weï¿½d always dreamt it would be. What we hadnï¿½t expected was that this empty-looking, virtually unknown to us section on the map would prove so special. Thanks SD! PNW Judy 11-22-2005, 08:17 AM I'm so glad Bob convinced you to write your story. Your writing is excellent. You could write for travel magazines! I'm so glad you had a great time in SD and that you shared it with us. It's always interesting to read about how foreigners see us. I hope you'll do future installments about the rest of your trip. Mark Sedenquist 11-22-2005, 08:56 AM vambo25 Wow, and double wow! I really enjoyed traveling along with you and Carole. I hope you can share more of your trip some time. {News Alert} Peter's field report and several stunning photos are featured here.

( Mark Megan Edwards 11-22-2005, 09:01 AM I laughed, I cried, and best of all, I was with you on your journey. Thanks so much for sharing it, and please take another trip soon, so we can hear more! Robert Schaller 11-22-2005, 09:36 AM South Dakotans are famous for their hospitality -- glad you encountered some of it. The places you wrote about are as familiar to me as home, since SD is a favorite destination of mine -- it was great to "see" it again through fresh eyes. Thanks for writing this report! (And come back for another visit soon). Bob UK 11-23-2005, 06:11 AM A wonderful piece of writing and as a fellow 'Loiner' it describes so well my own emotions when I get out in the sticks of the USA. Thats why I go back every year I can afford to. I presume you'll be going back ? Peter Thody 11-29-2005, 01:36 AM Thanks everyone for the kind words.

I wrote this shortly after we got back, then made the 'mistake' of reading a book called Badland - An American Romance by Jonathan Raban (published, in the UK at least, by Picador in 1996). This is simply the most beautiful, vivid and descriptive piece of travel writing I've ever read and I couldn't recommend it highly enough. A description of the drive by the Government and railroads to populate Montana, and subsequent despair and depopulation as the promised milk and honey failed to materialise, it's an absolute must-read. Unfortunately Mr Raban, it's so good that it's a real demotivator for the rest of us! Midwest Michael 11-29-2005, 04:22 AM I'm glad you had such a great time in South Dakota. I still consider the Rushmore state to be my adopted home, after going to college and spending my first few years as "an adult" there. There really is a genuine niceness about the people there - which may come from having to deal with days like today where half the state is under several feet of snow and whole towns are sleeping in school gyms because of power outages.

I'm also glad you got a chance to celebrate the 4th at Riverfest in LaCrosse. I grew up in that area and spent many summers down there. It's still one of my favorite community celebration, and I still try to make it back there every few years. Again, thanks for sharing, and I hope you can make it back again someday. Pawnee National Grassland‏ Pawnee National Grassland‏ Print This Post Although my SUV broke down on my way back home from the Pawnee National Grassland this week, I’m still a lucky man. I was lucky to break down in Greeley, Colorado, the only sizable city on my route between the grassland and my home in Boulder. My Toyota Highlander stalled at a busy intersection, so I called AAA on my cell phone and told the operator that I smelled gasoline. She considered it an emergency and called the fire department, the police, and a tow truck driver, who quickly arrived in that order. They discovered that I had a hole in my SUV’s fuel tank.

This was result, I guess, of driving almost 1,000 miles in the previous four days on dirt roads that were often muddy and where I may have bottomed out on some rock. The Toyota dealership in Greeley was just a mile from where my SUV stalled. After the tow truck driver took me and my SUV there, the dealership quickly gave me their diagnosis — an estimate of $1,050 and a four-day wait for the parts. After renting a 2010 Corolla from the dealer, I was on my way home just two hours after my SUV stalled. Years ago on a lonely road in Africa I was able to fix a leak in my car’s fuel tank with soap until I could get to a mechanic who repaired it. Nowadays, we replace, not repair. But I was lucky this time too. The experience was expensive, but it was only money. I got through it safely and with very little loss of time. I was also lucky this time as I explored the Pawnee National Grassland looking for photographic beauty. I found what I sought, although my best shots kept me waiting until the last moment. This was my first extended visit to the Colorado’s prairies.

I explored the 30-by-60 mile area where this national grassland protects 193,060 acres of shortgrass prairie. This is the western end of the Great Plains, that broad expanse of North American prairie, steppe, and grassland running about 500 miles from east to west and 2,000 miles from north to south. A View of the Prairie within Pawnee National Grassland Click on the picture above to enlarge A Rainbow During a Rain Storm in the Grassland Click on the picture above to enlarge A talk and book by Dave Showalter brought me there. His talk to the Colorado Nature Camera Club a few months ago first led me to appreciate the beauty that we can find on my adopted state’s high plains. His beautiful book, Prairie Thunder , added to my interest in our prairies. Then, a few days ago I called him on the phone to ask his advice on where and when to go. Dave told me that I should get going right away, before the grass turned from green to yellow. I complied with his advice as soon as I could. Colorado’s prairie comprises more than one-third of the state.

But like most people here, I usually turned toward the Rocky Mountains just to the west of Boulder. The Pawnee National Grassland is just two or three hours east of my home in Boulder. I stayed at the Pioneer Trails Lodge Bed and Breakfast , which is at the far southeast corner of the grassland, three miles east of the settlement of Stoneham and then five miles north at the end of a dirt road. Pioneer Trails Lodge B&B and my Dirty SUV Click on the picture above to enlarge Cheryl and Bill Keelan live at the B&B with two of their three children. The lodge has four guest rooms, but I was the only guest when I stayed there. I was extremely fortunate to discover this place. Not only is it the closest accommodation to the grassland — especially to Pawnee Buttes, the biggest landmark — but their hospitality was superb. I especially appreciated Cheryl’s cooking. She cooks low-carb, following Dana Carpender’s 500 Low-Carb Recipes . Her meals also tastes great. And she served them to me when I wanted them — breakfast before 6 a.m. and dinner at either 6 p.m. or 9 p.m., depending on whether I ate before or after going out on my evening photo rounds.

Actually, I had made a quick trip to the Pawnee National Grassland in September 2008. That time I pitched my tent right next to its greatest attraction, the Pawnee Buttes. But that was a fiasco, because the wind and heavy rain that night prevented any sleep until I struck my tent after midnight and drove back home. The photos that I took of the buttes a couple of years ago didn’t please me. Neither did the first shots that I took when I arrived there on Monday before checking in at the B&B. Rain had fallen all afternoon, and while it has stopped coming down when I reached the buttes just before the theoretical sunset, the sky was heavily overcast. My first photos of the buttes were correspondingly dull. I called Cheryl to tell her that I had just left Pawnee Buttes and was on my way. She said that I was about half an hour from the lodge and could get dinner whenever I arrived. But I wasn’t close, because I noticed that the sun was peaking out from behind the clouds, promising a real sunset. So I turned around and went back.

Just then, for no more than five minutes and less than a quarter of an hour before the sun set, it shone on the buttes, giving me the shot that I sought. I was in luck. Pawnee Buttes at Sunset Click on the picture above to enlarge Later, I captured this image of the wider area. A Panorama of the Pawnee Buttes and Nearby Cliffs Click on the picture above to enlarge On Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday until I returned home, I drove around the grassland at first light and just before sunset as I looked for birds and wildlife. Every day Cheryl woke me before 5 a.m. by knocking on my door as I had requested. I also explored the surrounding area, especially on heavily overcast mornings. I visited Jackson Lake State Park , North Sterling State Park , and went to lunch in the nearby cities of Fort Morgan and Sterling, which with a population of about 12,000 is the biggest city on the prairie west of the Front Range. On Wednesday I also drove about 70 miles to Cabela’s headquarters in Sidney, Nebraska, where my host Bill Keelan happens to work. Like the town of Wall in South Dakota, Sidney is famous for just one store.

But Wall Drug is a heavily advertised tourist trap, while I had to use my iPad to find Cabela’s, one of the country’s major outdoor outfitters, where I found something that I wanted. I knew that they carry shirts in my hard-to-find size, medium tall, and did find three of them, one of which I am happily wearing as write. Back on the grassland, it is a birder’s paradise with more than 250 species. I saw a lot more of them than I could identify as well as wildlife. On Tuesday morning I had hiked the Bird Walk Trail at the Crow Valley Recreation Area , the only campground within the grassland. Nobody else was there except the birds and the wildlife. One of Many Rabbits I Saw at Crow Valley Click on the picture above to enlarge The predominant wildlife on the prairies now that the buffalo are mostly gone is the pronghorn, which people often incorrectly call an antelope. Pronghorns do fill a similar ecological niche.

A Male Pronghorn Just Before Sunset on Wednesday Click on the picture above to enlarge Two Female Pronghorns at Sunrise on Thursday Click on the picture above to enlarge But what I most hoped to see on my visit to the grassland was birds. I found them not only as I hiked the Bird Walk Trail but also on the grassland’s other marked trail, the three-mile roundtrip hike to the Pawnee Buttes, and by driving around miles and miles of the grassland’s mostly dirt roads. Actually, the dirt road to the B&B where I stayed had some of the greatest profusion of birdlife. I saw thousands of birds there on power and fence lines. Maybe one out of a thousand would stay put when I stopped and shut off the motor. The two-track road, actually more of a trail than a road, to the East Stoneham Reservoir a couple of miles from the B&B was especially productive of pictures.

A Dragonfly at the Reservoir Click on the picture above to enlarge A Butterfly on a Sunflower at the Reservoir Click on the picture above to enlarge A Mourning Dove Click on the picture above to enlarge A Rock Wren That I Spotted Along the Pawnee Butte Trail Click on the picture above to enlarge A Savannah Sparrow Click on the picture above to enlarge This Small Bird Has Big Wings A Western Meadowlark Along the Pawnee Butte Trail Click on the picture above to enlarge A Western Kingbird Click on the picture above to enlarge The birds that I most wanted to see were raptors, the birds of prey. The obvious place to look for them was the cliffs along the Pawnee Buttes trail, because the U.S. Forest Service closes that trail from March 1 to June 30 every year to protect nesting hawks and falcons. But although I went there twice just three weeks later, I saw no raptors. Not there, but I saw them on fence posts and power lines a dozen times. I got a couple of shots as they flew away from me in my first three days there.

A Hawk and a Smaller Bird Fly Click on the picture above to enlarge A Red-Tailed Hawk Flies Away Click on the picture above to enlarge I couldn’t get close enough to a hawk before it flew off, and the skies were overcast. I thought that my luck might have run out. But then on Thursday morning less than a quarter of an hour before I left the Pawnee National Grassland, the sun was shining brightly on this hawk resting on a fence post and looking for prey. Then, I was able to capture an image of the hawk as it took off. A Red-Tailed Hawk Looks for Prey Click on the picture above to enlarge Then, the Hawk Takes Off Click on the picture above to enlarge What a successful trip! I loved driving through the grasslands on dirt roads unencumbered by excess signs and often free of fences. I do love the prairies like I love the desert and the ocean. In all of those environments I can see for miles. This is Plainsong country, the beautiful novel that Kent Haruf wrote, based on the years he lived in Yuma, Colorado, an hour south of Sterling.

This can be a harsh land, but even now early in the summer the temperatures were not nearly as hot as I expected and the grassland was much greener. My good luck holds. Never Miss An Update Subscribe to my free newsletter “Diabetes Update” I send out my newsletter on first of every month. It covers new articles and columns that I have written and important developments in diabetes generally that you may have missed. I also include new photo essays from this blog in my newsletter. Your Email Address

Question: What South Dakota drug store is advertised on road signs for hundreds of miles in either direction?
Answer: Wall Drug