Badlands | Custer State Park | A&M Indian Taco

Friday - 25 June 2004 - Custer, South Dakota: You know you are going to have a Great Day when you wake up and Jimmy Buffett is singing, live, on The Today Show! Dang, does he sound terrible that early in the morning... but I must admit - he sure looks good. Well, he is handsome if you are into middle-aged, balding men... and I am. Jimmy has totally sold-out to his new audience: country-western fans. He is promoting his new CD, "License to Chill". Most of the songs on the CD are duets with different popular country-western stars. Goodness. Doesn't he have enough money already? Watching him this morning made me smile, and hum, and sing all the way to The Badlands!

And what a ride it is, along this stretch of I-90. Jimmy Buffett has nothing on the shameful commerce occurring along this section of the Interstate! Tacky billboards galore! In 60 miles we passed countless signs for 1800 Town, Badlands Petrified Gardens, Badlands Trading Post (and BP station), Prairie Dog Ranch Store (See Prairie Dogs for Free!), Bear Country USA, Prairie Homestead Historical Site, Reptile Gardens, Wonderland Cave, Flintstones Theme Park & Campground, and many, many, many billboards for Wall Drug (Free Ice Water, Coffee 5 cents, Free Museum, All Roads Lead to Wall Drug).

We exited at Milepost 131 to drive through Badlands National Park and continue on the scenic byway to Custer. We had warm, though cloudy, weather all day - NO RAIN! Here are a few shots of the Badlands:

Badlands National Park


Prickly Pear Cactus in bloom

The route we followed to Custer/Rapid City passes through the Pine Ridge Indian Reservation. It was on this reservation where the Massacre at Wounded Knee occurred. We stopped at the A&M Badlands Cafe (in Interior, South Dakota) where they serve up tasty Indian Tacos. Instead of a usual corn taco shell, the filling is served on a piece of fried dough - usually called Indian Fry Bread or Sopaipilla. Our friendly waitress, an Oglala Sioux girl, gave me their secret (it is Xeroxed by the hundreds, I am sure) recipe for the A&M's famous Indian Fry Bread, which is the base of their taco. DT had a Buffalo Burger. He commented it wasn't like the Cheeseburger in Paradise Jimmy sang about this morning on The Today Show, as it was more like a Buffalo Burger in The Badlands.

A&M's Indian Taco

After lunch, we continued on Highway 44 through rangeland, with cattle ON the roads and thousands and thousands (more than thousands, hundreds even) of Prairie Dogs. There were so many flowers blooming in the Buffalo Gap National Grasslands - we saw Black-eyed Susan, Plains Prickly Pear, Lupines, Yellow Sweet Clover and Milkweed. Beautiful!

We finally arrived in Custer. But, as we pulled into town, we witnessed a deer being hit by a car directly in front of Our Intrigue! It really put us in a funk. The poor deer darted out into a 4-lane road, IN town! There is no way the driver could have avoided hitting the animal. The deer was killed, the driver was shaken, and their car was damaged. It was an awful thing to witness - something we have luckily been able to avoid all these years. We checked-into a campground and were out the door to explore, when the camp host asked us if we could move to another site. He said he was very sorry, but he had put us in the wrong site. We are too nice to say no, so we put everything back in its place and moved from #19 to #22. Turns out, #22 was much nicer and our neighbors are the friendliest family (with three adorable children) from Atlanta. So, after a little delay, we headed out to explore - with a quick stop at the post office to send postcards! Everyone needs a postcard! We headed out to explore Custer State Park.

Obviously, we drove the Honda today through Custer State Park


Much of the park is grasslands

DT is just crazy about Custer State Park. The last time we were here, we saw so many animals. He wanted to return to see if it was a fluke, or if the place was a virtual drive-through wild-animal preserve/zoo. We drove along a road called the Wildlife Loop (or something like that), but we didn't see a thing! Well, we did see a lot of white tail deer. Then we came around a corner and found the resident mule herd. The mules are left-over from a team that used to pull tourists in carts up to a mountain top for the views.

Then, it was like somebody let the animals out of their cages! We saw so many deer and Pronghorn Sheep (American Antelope), we stopped counting! We found bunnies, turkey's (with babies), Prairie Dogs (hundreds of them) and a Red Tail Hawk. On a whim, we left the main road and took a gravel road back into a large grassland and we found a herd of over 250 buffalo (American Bison) - mostly females with calves. We watched them for about one hour. There were two huge bulls and they were snorting at each other and chasing each other. Two young females were hanging around them too, and it is not mating season. The males were digging in the red earth and rolling around in the dust, snorting loudly, while making big clouds of dust. It was fascinating to watch the huge beasts!

Sweet bunny


Female pronghorn


American Bison with their calves


Big Boys

We arrived back to Our Intrigue just at sunset. We enjoyed a quiet Shabbat together and were invited to join our New Best Friends from Georgia at their campfire. I made a huge bowl of (real) popcorn, and we shared campfire stories. They are headed off to Cody and Yellowstone, so the guys discussed elevation gains while they toured our motorcoach. Such a pleasure to meet nice people! And that Georgia accent is so sweet. As I type this journal, late night, I am being serenaded by coyotes!

RV Park: American Presidents Cabins & Camp