Monday Aug 15, to Rapid City

After leaving Pine Island Sunday morning we head west toward our first stop in Fargo, N.D.  We cross the Mississippi one last time, in the countryside outside of Grand Rapids.

One last crossing...

...of the Mighty River.

It’s quite beautiful, although it doesn’t look as “mighty” here as it did when we stopped to admire it in Hannibal, MO.

It turns out the motel where we’re spending the night is in Moorehead, just across the Red River from Fargo, so we haven’t actually yet left Minnesota.  But the next morning we cross the river into North Dakota and head south and west toward Rapid City.

Our route takes us through Mitchell, SD, the home of the “World’s Only Corn Palace”.  I’d been advised by friends to make sure to see it if we were in the neighborhood, so we stop to visit.  The building has every outside surface newly decorated each year with illustrations made of corn.

Corn Palace main entrance...every side looks like this!

Very corny.

It’s actually pretty impressive.  It has a large theater and a gift shop where, naturally, you can buy just about everything in the shape of corn, or made out of corn kernels, corn cobs, corn husks, corn stalks…well, you get the picture (pun intended).

We make one more stop in the town of Wall, about fifty miles outside Rapid City, to visit the famous Wall Drug Store.  Jan knew exactly what it was, I’d never heard of it.  But it’s kind of hard to miss once you’re in the neighborhood, there are signs along the highway for a hundred miles in both directions reminding you of everything they offer – as you get close they’re only a few hundred yards apart.

Can't miss Wall Drug.

The place began as a struggling pharmacy in the middle of nowhere at the start of the Depression, and the couple who owned it were discouraged at seeing all the automobile traffic drive by without stopping.  One hot summer day when they were close to giving up on the shop, the wife had the brilliant idea of putting up a sign on the road reading, “Free Ice Water”.  Cars began stopping, and the rest, as they say, is history.  The enterprise now covers an entire acre, has a courtyard with live entertainment, a mechanical bull and a Jurassic Park T. rex, lovely art work all over the place,  and it sells just about everything.

One of Wall Drug's many, many entrances.

They’ve also expanded quite a bit on their original highway advertising campaign, as you saw above.

I’ve miscalculated the distance and our drive is longer than we expected, and further delayed by our two stops we arrive at the Western Thrifty Inn in Rapid City not much before dark.  It turns out the motel is not quite the two-star facility that Orbitz had advertised, it’s a residence motel with groups of kids playing on the stairs and in the walkways, parents with limited access to dental care, and someone’s dinner cooking on a barbecue in the parking lot.  But the room looks OK, and we figure we can handle it for a couple of nights.  The place quiets down after dark, and we get a good night’s rest for an early start tomorrow morning to tour the Badlands.