MN --> SD --> WY

We've had a busy couple of days.  We left Alexandria on Sunday morning to head towards South Dakota.  This was a long day of driving...nearly 9 hours including our stops.  Our main stop was the Corn Palace which was covered in artwork made out of corn.  The theme this year was remembering the past.  The girls got to do some shopping and even picked up a chocolate and peanut butter popcorn ball for a snack.  Our destination was the Cedar Pass campground in the badlands, and we all agreed that we had never camped anywhere quite as unique as this place.  We got our camp set up just before dark and didn't have much time to explore, so that is what we did most of Monday morning.

Monday we hiked a number of paths through the badlands.  Attie and Scott even hiked the steep Summit Pass trail to look from the top of a peak.  We left around lunch time and our next actual touristy stop was Wall Drug where the girls did some souvenir shopping.  Attie ended up with a stuffed fox (we saw one cross the road the night before) and Audra picked out a necklace made out of some local rock.  We then made our way towards Mt. Rushmore and decided to tour Wind Cave on the way.  We took scenic route 16a which had lots of twists and tunnels and bridges.  There were lots of surprise views of Mt. Rushmore in the distance framed by the tunnels.  The girls did their first official cave tour which took us down several stories underground in the longest set of underground caves anywhere in the world.   We got to see Mt. Rushmore so many times during the scenic drive to the cave that we decided to put some miles on instead of actually going to the monument.  We ended up in Gilette Wyoming last night at about 10:00 and had trouble finding a hotel so we set up camp at a local campground.  Scott loved this.  Ang and the girls were really looking forward to a real bed and shower.

Today [Tuesday] we made our way from Gillette to Cody Wy.  The drive here was beautiful and we stopped several times to just view our surroundings.  We are planning on a traditional Rodeo tonight, and the girls are swimming in the hotel pool as I type this.  I will have them each add their favorite thing before I post this.
My favorite part was climbing on the Badlands because I love seeing rocks. -- Audra
My favorite part was climbing [in the Badlands] --Attie
So I guess it is unanimous...hiking in the badlands was definitely one of the highlights of our trip so far.

Tomorrow, it is off to Yellowstone...
[We'll update this with photos later]