Western South Dakota

Last night we had so many interruptions I don’t know how we got any sleep at all. First, there’s an alarm in our bedroom that began chirping in the middle of the night. It had chirped the night before but somehow Paddy got it to stop. It says it is a carbon monoxide detector, but our owner’s manual only mentions a smoke detector, so who knows. Anyway, I think the detector (whatever kind it is) was telling us that the battery was going down, but why does it only chirp in the night??? Today we bought new batteries for the infernal noisemaker, so let’s hope it will stay quiet tonight.

But, back to the interruptions last night. Shaddy refused to go out at bedtime, so of course he wanted to go out about 3:00 am for the job. Then at 4:00 he needed to go out again. And at about 5:00 am he jumped off the bed and threw up his entire supper. At least he didn’t do it on the bed. Needless to say, we’re hoping for a better night tonight.

Ah, but we had a great day today. We only drove about an hour or so from Sundance to Sturgis and set up camp at Mt. Rodney RV Park. It’s a nice place on a hill with a nice view. We have Wi-Fi, but no cable TV. We are able to catch a few channels using the antenna and were able to watch President Obama’s speech on health care. Isn’t he great? If you don’t agree, that’s okay – I think he is.

Anyway, after setting up Uncle Joe in the Mt. Rodney RV Park, we took off for a side trip to Deadwood and Lead (pronounced Leed). They are both old gold mining towns from the mid 1800’s when gold was found in the Black Hills and the Indians were displaced from the land they had been given by the U.S. government (which led to their anger at Little Big Horn). The towns have a number of old historical buildings from the gold rush days and lots of casinos. Since we don’t have an interest in gambling, the charm of the casinos is all lost on us, but we enjoyed seeing the old buildings.

Tomorrow we will visit the area between Spearfish and Cheyenne Crossing, and then if there’s time we’ll go to the Petrified Forest of the Black Hills. We’re really enjoying the trip, and traveling in Uncle Joe is many steps above our old Quicksilver tent trailer (don’t tell Paddy I said so, he doesn’t really appreciate the difference yet).