Deadwood, South Dakota to the Black Hills: Devils Tower, Mount Rushmore, and Wall, South Dakota.
Deadwood, South Dakota is a small town, with a population of about 1,300, although it seems larger than that. It’s located in the heart of the Black Hills National Forest, which sits in both western South Dakota and northeastern Wyoming. It’s another gigantic forest, with over 1 million acres of forested hills and mountains, and about 110 miles long and 70 miles wide.
Deadwood is a well known Western mining town, and home to Wild Bill Hickok, shot to death here in 1876, and Calamity Jane, who died near here in 1903. Wild Bill was supposedly playing 5-card stud poker at the time he was shot in the head from behind, and holding a pair of of black aces and a pair of black eights, known today as Dead Man’s Hand. That’s the hand that’s shown in the Deadwood sign in the photo (above). He was also known for always sitting with his back to the wall – but not that day!
The stagecoach in the welcome sign (below) reminds me of the Doris Day song from the movie Calamity Jane. “Oh, the Deadwood stage is a-rollin’ on over the plains, with the curtains flappin’ and the driver slappin’ the reins, beautiful sky, a wonderful day. Whip crack-away!, Whip crack-away!, Whip crack-away!”
It was pretty cool in the morning, even by 10:30, with temps in the high 40’s, but it started to slowly warm up by noon, although never got beyond the low 60’s, and was in the 50’s most of the day. Tonight, it dips to 31 degrees. Yikes. Nevertheless, starting out crisp, once the day warmed up a little the weather was pretty nice, but still a little too cool for me to be motivated to hike. Maybe tomorrow. Besides, today I drove a lot to several spots I wanted to see, and enjoyed a great day of scenic driving, leaving little time to actually take a hike (even if I wanted to).
First though, I drove into Deadwood and walked around the town for an hour or so.
Deadwood is a nice town, tucked into the hills, with many old, original, and restored buildings, and a clear sense of of its own history, like many of these old western towns I’ve visited. The downtown area is pretty uncluttered and nice looking, with some nice looking buildings.
Main Street is filled with restored or rebuilt Victorian and brick buildings, and tries hard to capture and retain the feel of Main Street as it was at the end of the 19th century and the early 20th century.
There are some lovely homes and buildings on Main Street, but as you get more downtown the street is basically gift shops, casinos, and saloons/bars, or all three in one. It’s still a mighty nice street to walk.
It’s too bad for me that tourist season is over, so no more street events and activities, like gunfights, etc, in which “authentic re-enactments of Deadwood’s rough and tumble past come to life. In addition to the shootouts, the shooting of Wild Bill is held inside Saloon No. 10.” They call this “Deadwood Alive,” but it sended a couple of weeks back. Oh well.
Then it was on the road, heading into the Black Hills, and thinking I might stay around tomorrow as well, as I won’t be able to fit everything I’d like to see and do into one day. The Black Hills contrasts with the flat and sort of drab prairie lands that surround it, and filled with beautiful and vast forested roads and mountainsides, both green and yellow/gold at this time of year, with pine forests that rise thousands of feet. The name is drawn from the Lakota Indian name for the area, “hills that are black.”
I started out by heading west again, toward Spearfish Canyon Scenic Byway, about 16 miles from Deadwood and near the town of Spearfish, named for the creek that runs through it. What a wonderful road, which I drove south for about 30 miles to Cheyenne Crossing, and colored yellow and gold with autumn foliage. Wow!
After leaving Spearfish Canyon, I continued west, another 60 miles but still in the Black Hills, to the Devil’s Tower National Monument in Wyoming. This is the mountain that was the centerpiece in Close Encounters of the Third Kind.
On another day, and perhaps in different weather, I would have spent some more time, and hiked at least part of the mountain, but today I just visited, and then turned back east, back toward Deadwood and southeast from there, driving about 125 miles through the gorgeous Black Hills to visit Mount Rushmore, still in the Black Hills.
On the way, still in the Black Hills on scenic route 385 south, I passed Pactola Reservoir and Dam, which is the largest and deepest reservoir in the Black Hills, with 14 miles of shoreline.
Just a little further south, still on route 385, I passed another, much smaller but still lovely deep blue lake, Sheridan Lake, a few miles outside of Rapid City, South Dakota. Boy, this area is just lovely.
I reached Mount Rushmore late in the afternoon. I planned to enter the park, but by now it was getting late in the day, and dusk starts falling around 6, and I still had another 80 miles to go before reaching Wall, South Dakota, where I’m spending the night (and maybe tomorrow night, as well; I haven’t yet decided).
Actually, I did enter the park, but as Kaye told me, quite accurately, you can see the mountain and its famous sculpture from outside of the park, which I could, and as it was getting late I left the park and instead just looked, without touching, sort of as I had done at Devil’s Tower.
There is more in this area I’d like to see, which I’d hoped (against all hope) to see today, such as Custer National Park and Wounded Knee, but that was not to be. I’ll have to figure out how to do that tomorrow. Instead, I took the Peter Norbeck Scenic Byway which runs near Mount Rushmore, another great road, and headed south about 20 miles before turning my attention to getting to Wall, South Dakota, where I’m staying tonight.
So, finally, it was time to drive the 80 miles to Wall, first heading back north and then east along interstate 90, reaching Wall around 7 pm. Wall is the home of the famous Wall Drugs, which is famous only because it advertises for miles and miles and miles in both directions along route 90. I’m looking forward to visiting it tomorrow, but have a feeling I might have visited many, many, many years ago.
Just a few words here about Bev. Although Bev is less on my mind than just a few weeks ago, she is nevertheless on my mind a great deal, and throughout the day. I think about what I could of and should have done differently, and wishing I could just have one more chance to take care of Bev again, and do it better, and to be more of what Bev needed more of the time. One more chance, which can never be. I thought today of what an incredible person Bev was, non-judgmental when it counted, living by the golden rule, allowing others to be who they are, and gentle, caring, and loving.
I also thought, as I often do, of how much Bev had to endure, and how much she lost, piece by piece, and wonder how much Bev was aware of her situation toward the end. In those final months and weeks. I hoped Bev was not aware of that, but I’m not so sure. It would be just like Bev to simply accept it and live her life the best she could. I wish I had been more sensitive to that. I wish I had talked to Bev more about that, although I always avoided talking about that as I was always afraid it would upset Bev, but I don’t really know. I still can’t believe, not just that Bev is gone, but the permanency of it. Bev is gone. It’s a long road ahead of me without Bev.
It’s late now. Tomorrow, I’ll figure out what I’ll be doing and where I’ll be staying.