Girls Weekend 2019, South Dakota, October 4

Kathi and Lori with Bridal Veil Falls in the background

Friday, October 4 (Lori writing)

It's Girls Weekend, that blissful time of year when Kathi and I meet somewhere in the country to enjoy one another's company as well as explore whatever there is to be discovered at our destination.  This year we are in Rapid City, South Dakota and, once again, we have been blessed by stunning weather.

Upon awaking this morning, we lazed around for a bit on our couch, then I made a pot of coffee, chatted for a bit then ate some yogurt and fruit along with some toast and lingonberry jam for breakfast.  Kathi is co-authoring a research paper and one of her co-authors contacted her to say that she needed to do a "hard read" today and make any edits or suggestions before days' end.  So Kathi read the paper aloud to me to help her process as well as seek any advice or suggestions that I might have.  This really is not as boring a process as it might sound to some.  Kathi and I are both what I would consider life-long learners and find ourselves interested in a wide variety of things.  This paper is about how and why African Americans choose whether or not to participate in medical research projects and what kinds of methods might work best to get more of that population to participate in more projects.  This is important because it has been proven that many disease states affect African Americans quite differently than the average white person and these research projects are attempting to determine why this is and how treatments need to be adjusted for those differences.

Other topics of discussion for the morning included race, ethnicity and corporate/organizational diversity and how far we have come and how far we have yet to go for true equality and diversity to truly exist.  We also started a list of suggestions for our Air BNB host that we feel could improve this location going forward.  Things like a stock of paper towels and toilet paper, hand soap for the bathroom, dish cloths and towels (there were NONE that we could find.....what the heck??) and a welcome/information note that tells one where these things could be found and any other information one might need.  Kathi wanted to include a note that the sheets should be ironed before being put on the beds, but I put the kabosh on that!  What?  Who the heck irons their sheets???  Kathi, that's who.  (as I type this, she sends me 2 photos of her wrinkled sheets........)

After solving many of the problems in the world, we showered and got ready for our day, which we decided would be a drive on the Spearfish Canyon Scenic Byway and a visit to Deadwood.  Our decision to start with these locations was driven by the weather forecast which showed beautiful and warm weather there, while Rapid City was a little cooler and MUCH windier. 

It was noon before we left our cozy little house and it took us about an hour to get to the beginning of the Spearfish Canyon.

This truly is a beautiful and scenic drive that we would recommend to anyone visiting this area.  There are a few waterfalls along the way along with rock faces and lots of trees.  There was some color, but I don't think fall peak has yet been achieved.  

We realized that we were quite hungry and decided that we would eat at the restaurant that was located next to the lodge near Roughlock Falls, Latchstring Restaurant.  Upon entering we noticed that there was no waitstaff anywhere but there was a sign that said "please wait to be seated" and that there were several uncleared tables.  We decided to take a chance anyway and were finally seated on an outside deck with a lovely view, but after sitting for 10-15 minutes with no one appearing, we realized that they must be very short staffed and that we would move on to Deadwood and find lunch there.

Main Street, Deadwood South Dakota

Roughlock Falls

 So, on to Deadwood.  What an interesting and unique little town.  To me it is sort of like a Western version of New Orleans with a little bit of Las Vegas tossed in.  The main street is comprised of MANY saloons, all of which are not only bars but also small gambling establishments with slot machines and digital Black Jack (as in the dealer is a woman on a digital screen and no real cards are dealt, instead they appear on a digital screen in front of you.......weird)  We parked and went to Mustang Sally's for our late lunch/early dinner.  Their chalkboard menu said they were serving homemade tomato soup with a grilled cheese sandwich as a fall special.  This sounded good to me, so this is what I ordered while Kathi ordered up a hamburger.  I was a bit disappointed in the meal and a bit surprised by the fact that the soup was served in a plastic/throwaway picnic bowl and the sandwich on the same kind of plate with a plastic spoon.  I would probably NOT recommend this place for a meal to anyone finding themselves in Deadwood and there are PLENTY of other choices.  We then walked up and down the main street and wandered in an out many of the shops.  There were two really nice clothing stores that we liked a lot and both of them had bars in them!!!  Like, full service bars with people sitting on bar stools and everything!!  The first one we went into, I didn't really notice the bar at first, but did note that it was VERY LOUD in the store and that I was hearing many mens' voices in a women's clothing store, which was odd. THEN I noticed the bar and the several loud, drunk people that were enjoying themselves immensely.

While walking we also found these barstools near the sidewalk that provided a photo opportunity that we could not pass up.

So after making asses of ourselves, we continued our walk up and down Main Street, then decided that it was time to head back to our home away from home.  Did I mention that there were drunk people EVERYWHERE???  It was Octoberfest in Deadwood and it was ok to walk around town with open containers until 10pm and people were taking full advantage of that. (Very New Orleans like).

 

Kathi is a big fan of caves and when we are in an area where there are caves we always make an effort to include a cave tour during our trip.  Well, I had read about TWO really great caves in this area and in doing a little research while in the car to determine which one we should go to, I discovered that BOTH of them are currently closed. Jewel Cave is closed due to some structural repairs and Wind Cave is closed because the elevator to the cave is currently non-functional.  Since we had planned to do a cave on Saturday, we had to come up with a new plan.  I had read about and paleontological site near Rapid City that is an active excavation site where the bones of many woolly mammoths have been discovered.  Since we like to do things/see places that are unique to where we are, we decided that this is tomorrow's destination.  Where else can one go to see woolly mammoth bones??  Once this decision was made and episode two of "Evil" was watched, it was off to bed in our wrinkly sheets for a good night's sleep.

Until tomorrow.......