It has been a good week here in South Dakota. The weather has cooperated most days with beautiful cool mornings and then warming up by mid-afternoon to the 90's. Most afternoons have clouded up and we think we're going to get a storm, however, only one afternoon produced any rain and that wasn't much at all.
Monday we went to Mt. Rushmore, one of our favorite National Parks, and even though we had just been there two years ago, we wanted to go again. Admission to the park is still free, however, they get you with an $11
parking fee. We still enjoyed taking the walking tour and watching the film of Mr. Borglum and his crew building the memorial.
We are hearing that the Sturgis bike rally isn't going to bring in the crowds of people like years past. As I said in last week's blog, the RV park here was planning/hoping for a nice influx of people to occupy the field across from us but they have revised their thinking, based on other campgrounds not sold out either, so we think it might be quieter here than we first anticipated. Only time will tell......
Dick was an avid bicycle rider a couple of years ago and even though we have a bike rack and carry his bike around, he hadn't ridden for quite a while. He decided this was the week as Rapid has a wonderful bike path through the downtown area. I had been thinking about getting a bike as well for exercise purposes so this week we found a very nice little local bike shop called 'Cranky Jeff's' and we ended up with two new bikes. Dick traded his in for a more 'gravel friendly' bike and I bought a new one called a 'Townie'. It's not one of those with a real skinny seat or too many speeds so I think it'll be perfect for me. We actually took our first ride together this morning and so far I'm not too sore. Dick managed to make the two hills on our route out here by the RV park but I just only got about half way up the first one and had to turn around. I'll make it to the top before we leave though......that's my goal! Next week we'll load the bikes up and taken them downtown to the bike path which goes for miles according to the map Cranky Jeff gave us. We sure like doing business with a local guy who appreciates your business instead of one of the big boys. Cranky Jeff's is right downtown, next to an alley, and on our first visit to his store, I took a Townie out for a ride down the alley next to his store. This picture is what the alley looks like and all of this graffiti is 'ok' with the city. Several years ago the city paved the alley and encouraged amateur artists to display their talent. It is now known as Art Alley and is quite interesting to see, as well as a little weird. As in many 'downtowns' across the country, the cities are trying to preserve the history and the same is true here with Thursday nights during the summer bringing out music, arts and crafts booths, etc. We may have to take in one of those Thursday nights while we're here.
We also found a doggie daycare for Murphy and so he's been a happy camper too. He came home last night after a long day of playing and barely moved a muscle last night and most of today.
We were at the local WalMart one day this week and this 'RV' was in the parking lot. I couldn't resist a picture. Wonder where they're headed??? It appeared to be a group of 'young' people as I got relatively close to take this picture.
It has been another good week and we look forward to what is in store for next week.
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