South Dakota Trip - Episode III - Revenge of the Presidents

(I debated between "Revenge of the Presidents" and "Revenge of the Amtrak" but I thought presidents seemed more Sith-like :)


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Thursday we woke up to pouring rain. We sorta knew this was coming, but that didn't make it any better. Fortunately another good, big breakfast at dad's made it easier to get up. Today was designated for Hill City/Keystone/Mount Rushmore things. Even with rain, we decided to go ahead, although as we got toward Hill City we decided doing the 1880 Train was out - just wouldn't be a fun trip in the rain (and we'd have enough train on this trip as it is!) We did take the "scenic route" from Hill City to Keystone - I think this was the original highway before they built the more direct one that cut through some hills. This one was very windy and hilly, so I was kinda thinking maybe we wouldn't do it again on the way back :)

We arrived in Keystone and headed to the Big Thunder Gold Mine - an actual real mine back in the day, that is now a tour/gift shop/restaurant. We put on hard hats, followed the tour guide, and headed into the mine. It was very interesting to learn about how they used to mine, what the gold rush was like, and how much gold they actually found. In this mine, they ended up only "officially" getting 8 oz of gold out in the many years they mined, although speculation is they didn't report most of it because of the legalities of how this mine was set up. Still, even if they got 10 times that, it isn't much for that many years of work. The tour guide also took us into where they sort of sorted and refined the gold ore. Although the last mine in the Black Hills closed in 2001, there is one that they think has a lot of gold that will probably re-open given the current $900+/oz price of gold.

SIDE COMMENTARY - ok, this tour made me wonder, as I've wondered before, WHY is gold so valuable? Especially back then? Even now I don't quite understand why it's so valuable now - yes it's pretty, and it does have practical uses like in circuit boards (but copper is actually used more often now than gold). I mean, I know it's probably more rare than other elements, but STILL...who told us at some point that gold was so valuable, and why did people abandon their lives and rush out to try to find it? I may write a whole blog entry about that...but I digress...

After our fill of gold mining, we went to find some lunch - Erin and I went to Eno's Pizza to see if the local pizza was any good, and the rest went to Dairy Queen, which was really easier for the kids. By then it was POURING rain, so good to get inside and eat. After lunch was done, we were mulling over indoor activities to do in Keystone. I REALLY wanted to go to the National Presidential Wax Museum after reading about it, dad and Chris didn't seem to hot on it, and I didn't know if the kids would last through the whole thing, but with limited options, all of us except Dad and Chris went (they went to another Keystone museum though). WOW, I didn't expect it to be so nice - the wax statues looked eerily life-like in many cases. I think they had one of every president (might have missed one or two) plus some more "situational" ones. You also got an electronic wand that you could listen to a description/history lesson of each president you were looking at. NEAT! I knew some of the history stuff but did learn quite a bit. I think it took almost 2 hours to get through the whole thing. The kids didn't quite last through the whole thing, but it was a nice clean warm building, out of the train, and had a big gift shop.


By 3:30 we were all needing some rest, so headed home via the Mount Rushmore road. Unfortunately, it was so rainy and foggy we couldn't see anything. We had all seen Rushmore before, and it doesn't really change, but still would have been nice to see it. Dad and Chris headed out to see if they could fit in some fishing, even in the rain, and the rest of us decided it was a good night for Erin to make some dinner and for all of us to watch some DVDs, so I went into town and picked a couple up. Enchanted was an instant favorite of Erin's and mine when we accidentally saw it in the theater one time (long story) and was good for kids - Keagann liked it a lot. After we were done with that one and dinner, the kids went to bed, and the rest of us watched National Treasure 2, a local favorite because it features Mount Rushmore and the Black Hills. The movie stars Nicholas Cage, so I set my expectations lower (honestly, he's a fine actor, he just seems to be in a lot of "B" movies) but the movie was actually pretty good. After that it was definitely time for bed!

Friday was more of the same pouring rain. Chris and dad were determined to fish, and Keagann really wanted to go with them, so they left, and the rest of us headed back to Keystone to Black Hills Bagels because they had such high reviews in the things I had read. It was pretty good - they had breakfast and lunch sandwiches available, and Laynie was in a good mood and making funny faces :) We headed back on the route that goes past Sylvan Lake , which is a special place for sister Erin because she worked there one summer while in college. Unfortunately, it again was SO foggy that we couldn't see anything - we couldn't see much further than the road.



We got back and waited for the fishers got back and had some light lunch, as we were planning on going out to eat that night. Since it was still raining, we mostly hung out, played with the kids, read (I got to read almost 2 whole books on this trip) and I helped dad fix his ancient Apple IIGS computer (he does have a regular PC too, but still uses the old Apple to do a few things). I was amazed at how much I remembered about Appleworks, even after about 15 years :)

At about 6:00 we all piled into the van and headed down to the Bank House Steak & Rib's Restaurant (yes, the Bank House is coffee shop by day, restaurant by night). It is a small restaurant and I don't think they were prepared for 7 of us with a baby - but we finally got a table together in the back room. I also think our waiter was fairly new (and found out later he was) and wasn't especially thorough on getting the orders right...but we mostly got eventually what we wanted and had a nice meal. It was probably good we were in the back room as Keagann could run around a little bit more. It was back to sprinkling again when we got outside, but we decided it was a good night for Dairy Queen (what night isn't?) so we walked down the street and dad drove the van down to meet us there. There are buffalo statues all over Custer, the one in the picture being by the Dairy Queen.

As we all were planning on getting up early and leaving (target was 7:00am, which meant if we left by 7:30am we were doing well) we went to bed early. We all did get up pretty early, got showers, and got our stuff packed into the van, and away we went - Dad drove his car as we would be returning the van in Williston and we took turns riding with him. Starting out, it actually got sunny and nice out - we stopped at Annie Lode Coffee Cabin on the way, which was recommended by our friend Gina (and was right on the highway) and all got our triple lattes and mochas, and headed to Deadwood for some breakfast. We arrived in Deadwood around 8:30, at the First Gold Casino. We had to wait about 10 minutes to get a table big enough for all of us, so in the meantime, we walked around the casino. I had to hold Keagann as she wanted to play all the slot machines, which is of course not allowed (I wasn't even sure if kids were supposed to be in there, but it is attached to a hotel so it seemed ok). Dad played one of the machines, and then our table was ready and the rest of us sat down. About 5 minutes later, dad came to the table and told us he had just won $220 on a quarter machine. WOW - sometimes I think he's the luckiest person I know. He gave me a $20 and I played a machine but of course lost it pretty quickly as I always do.

We ordered breakfast, and, as advertised, the "Hungry Miner's Breakfast" special - two eggs, hash browns, and toast - was $.79. Yes, that isn't a typo. I know casinos are famous for cheap food, but still...that is pretty cheap. And it was good too - we all got that, and a few of us got coffee or milk or OJ, but even then it was only about $11 total for the 6 of us. Crazy.

We left Deadwood, hit I-90 for a few miles, and then headed north on Hwy 85 for the LONG journey to Williston. We tried to budget in some stops so that Keagann and Laynie (especially Laynie) could get out of the car for awhile. Heading north it started raining again, and basically didn't stop raining most of the trip. but we did stop in Buffalo, Bellfield, and Watford City, where we ate lunch at the Dakotan Restaurant (good food!). As it turned out, we got to the Williston Amtrak station about 5:00 (with the time zone change) so it was a good thing we left as early as we did. The train was on time (7:05pm) so we had a couple hours to wait, and we walked around outside with Keagann to pass the time.

We finally boarded the train at 7:05pm - I was worried about getting seats together as last time the train was totally full - but it was no problem, the car we got onto only had 4 people already on it, so we got our pick of whatever we wanted for seats. Keagann was pretty hyper for awhile, but around 11 everyone eventually got off to sleep. The projected arrival time in St. Paul was 7:05am, and it was pretty much right on time this time. Mom was picking up Chris, sister Erin, and the kids to take them home, and cousin Brent was picking up Erin and I since they live closeby. It took about 20 minutes to get our checked luggage (surprising since there is only one train, but not so surprising knowing they are always understaffed there) and we dropped Brent off and headed toward Rochester. We stopped at the Caribou Coffee on Larpenteur Ave for latte and tea before hopping on I-35E and then 52.

We arrived home around 9:00am, really probably needing to sleep, but it's hard to start a nap at 9:00am on any day. So we unpacked and started the mountain of laundary, caught up on mail, e-mail, etc. At 1:00, the gang called and Shelley's friend "The Weave" was in town visiting, and we all headed to Whistle Binkies for lunch. I was glad to finally meat "The Weave" as I've heard a lot about her for many years, and she didn't disappoint :) Later, I went to see the "Indiana Jones and the Legend of the Crystal Skull" with my friend Bill at the new Wehrenberg theaters - showing on the digital big screen - good movie, wondering if they'll now make some more in the series as they set this one up to do that. As Erin had some things to do that night, I stopped back at Ryan & Shelley's to see "The Weave" again, have some drinks, and head home, where the past two days were finally catching up to me.

Monday was Memorial Day, and I was looking forward to just a day to catch up and get ready for the mountain of work that was waiting for me on Tuesday. I had coffee with my friend Bill at Dunn Brothers, and then headed home and spent the day catching up, going outside and enjoying the nice weather, and taking a walk. As the day went on, I was messing with one of my TiVo machines (it had sort of stopped working before we left) and after several hours, finally determined the hardware had actually died, and as I really didn't need 4 receivers anymore, decided to deactivate this one and give some of the "extra" parts to my friend Ryan for his TiVo. Cousin Andy showed up later in the afternoon, as he started work the next day, and we were trying to figure out how to get his PS3 to access my UPnP media server, without much success - which led me to start messing with my server and eventually upgrade (but I'll save that for another blog).

I'm going to put the complete set of pictures up at some point, but the ones in the blog were probably the best. I had a really fun trip, it was great to spend time with dad and the family!