Summer and Winter in South Dakota

...and we were only there for two days!

The Presidents, from Iron Mountain Road

With my anniversary date coming up at work and unused vacation time still left, Dan and I took the week off. We spent the first half of the week in Keystone, SD. 

We enjoyed clear skies and balmy temperatures all the way from home to our destination. After getting settled into our lovely cabin and eating dinner, we set out to explore. Because the famous faces are toward the East, we knew we wouldn't have good light for pictures. Therefore, we picked another direction. We ended up on Iron Mountain Road. Narrow and twisting... talk about a Pony road! Dan was having way too much fun driving my car around those hairpin curves! We came to a meadow just as the full moon was coming up. GORGEOUS!! Eventually, though, we turned around and retraced our track. 

Tuesday morning dawned damp and dreary. I felt like Rip Van Winkle - I must have slept through fall and woke up in winter! We had brought the golf clubs, so play we must. And play we did. Well, sort of... It was only a light mist, but after 18 holes, we were pretty much drenched. We retreated to our cabin for the rest of the day.  

When we awakened on Wednesday, the skies weren't much brighter, but we made up our minds to take the scenic route home anyway. Back to Iron Mountain Road, but this time I was driving. YEE-HAH!! As we approached the very first "piggy-tail" in the road, I realized that there was a tour bus on the road above us. I pulled over as much as possible and stopped to let it by, only to discover to my horror that it was going OUR way!! So much for fun driving - I was stuck averaging 15 mph (and nearly stopping in the curves) for mile after mile. FINALLY, after forming a long-enough train, the bus pulled over and we were free. We dropped down through Custer State Park and turned back north and west by way of the Needles Highway. (Another awesome road!) Then it was back to interstate driving. We met Dan's brother in Sheridan for dinner and drove the rest of the way home in the rain. 

Needles Highway... appropriately named

Check back soon to find out what we did with the second half of the week.