learning life is about reservations

    Today, I headed for Wall Drug, the Badlands, and settled on the Minuteman Missile National Historic Site. Upon arriving at Wall Drug, I found it over crowded with people and difficult to find a parking location. So, I gave up and returned towards Rapid City. As I travelled back that way, I remembered a failed attempt at visiting the minuteman missile national historic sites with my mom and husband last October. With that plugged into good old Google Maps, I headed for a different adventure. 

   Before visiting the Visitor Center for the Minuteman Missile NHS, I stopped for gas just south of the highway. It was a big tourist travel plaza and gift shop with a prairie dog town in the field next to it. I wandered through the gift shop finding nothing I needed or wanted. Then, I wandered out to look at the prairie dog field, and to watch the tourists. I was flabbergasted by the people wandering around in the field and allowing the critters to climb on them and such. All I could think about were all the colonies of prairies dogs in the Denver area that were exterminated due to having fleas carrying the black plague. You can't tell me the South Dakota prairie dogs do NOT have those fleas? 

    After totally grossing myself out with watching the antics of the tourists and these prairie dogs, I ventured to the visitor center and toured the museum information. It was scary how some of the stuff could be prevalent to school shootings today; e.g., Duck and Cover. It was also interesting to learn about them putting nuclear missile silos in the land given to the Lakota Sioux Tribe many years ago and the testing done in the area, which caused some health issues for many of the prairie folk during that time. Once I had learned all I could from the visitor center, I picked up a few tidbits from the gift shop, and headed out to see the inactive silo on a self guided tour, and to learn that the other one is by reservation only, and there were no more slots available for the day. 

    The inactive silo location with the self guided tour was pretty neat, and not very busy. It told of the history and the regulations with Russia and the U.S. I enjoyed wandering around looking out over the expanse of land and imagining what it was like during the height of its use. While at the silo location, I slowly wandered back to my car as I was being dive bombed by red wing blackbirds. I think the natives were trying to tell me something.

    Upon leaving the Minuteman NHS area, I decided to try and find one of the roadside america items just up the road. On the first pass, I missed the exit. So, I took the next exit, where I found myself on Big Foot Road. For my birthday, my friends gave me a bigfoot call whistle/kazoo, and so I of course was ecstatic to stumble upon the road. A necessary photo was taken and sent to them. 

    That was basically the morning. I headed back in to Rapid City area to hit another roadside america curiosity and oddity, the largest bronze Big Mac before heading on to other curiosities and oddities and a tour of the Black hills. Traveling alone, I have found that I get up early, visit places I want to see quickly, and move on to the next item. I'm always amazed how much I can cram into a day, when I'm willing to sit in the car for awhile. 

    Because I had previously done The Mystery Spot in St Ignace, MI and Mystery Spot (no The) in California, I knew I HAD to do Cosmos Mystery Area. The one in Michigan was one that I had grown up seeing signs for and went one other time with my mom and sister. So, when I stumbled upon the California one in April, I simply had to stop. That one was rather run down and was a self guided place. This time, I had been through the black hills a few times with people that I am certain would not have enjoyed stopping at Cosmos. So, alone and with nothing better to do, I stopped. 

    Online, it said I should have a reservation, but I decided to wing it and pray I could get in. Admission was no problem. I was the first one there for my tour time, and then it filled up with large families from there. The tour guide was great and quirky, which I enjoyed. She gave plenty of time for the kids of all ages to explore and try the different items before moving us on to the next part of the tour/story. At the end, she offered to take photos of people standing on the cabin steps, but this came with a sneak photo she took of herself, while I got situated on the steps. Pretty sneaky she was, but that made the experience all the better. 

    From Cosmos, I headed out to see the other roadside america curiosities and oddities I had come up with, and had never really paid much attention to before. I don't know how many times I have passed by the Largest Smokey the Bear, but this time I stopped and took photos. Next door to that was the teddy bear museum, which I think I had peeked in the windows of before with my in-laws, but actually took time to walk around this time. This was on the way to check out the winery and brewery along the way.

    In October, when my mom was with us, she noticed the winery made Red Ass Rhubarb wine, and wanted to acquire some; however, the liquor store in Deadwood did not open until much later. So, she did not get a chance to buy herself a bottle. Thus, I went to the Prairie Berry Winery with the intent to buy my mom a bottle of the Red Ass Rhubarb wine. Once inside the winery, I noticed they also had a Rosy Ass Rhubarb, and that is when I decided I needed to sample. I'm glad I did because I found I liked the Rosy better than the Red, but I bought a bottle of each for my mom to try. 

    From the winery, I wandered down to the neighboring Miner Brewing Company to sample some of their beers, as most of my visits found the brewery closed along with the winery. The service was so so until I started talking to a regular customer. Eventually, I broke away from that conversation and headed down the road a little bit to the Firehouse Brewing Company's Smoke Jumper Station for lunch and a beer. With my nephew's graduation from Fire Academy occurring upon our return from this trip, I decided to purchase a couple wines and a cool 32oz growler for the occasion. After lunch, it was a visit to Sick & Twisted Brewery for a beer before grabbing dinner at Mt Rushmore Brewing Company.

    Sufficiently/Safely lubricated and fed, I headed back to my hotel for the night. The day taught me that somethings needed reservations like Glacier NP or the Minuteman Delta-01 location, but Cosmos suggested a reservation and didn't really need one. After a few beers, I began to have fewer reservations talking to people and learning about them, the area, and some other places to visit while I was in the area. Back at the hotel, I looked at brochures, and made a plan for the next day before falling asleep with the TV on.