Go West! Part 2

If you thought we "squoze" a lot into Day 1, just wait til you see what we did Day 2!

We were rather overambitious with our Day 2 itinerary. Before we could even leave The Badlands, we took time for an early hike up one of the nearby rock formations:

I think the photos speak for themselves. It was a great start to the day, and got us a bit of exercise. From here, we drove the scenic route, which I highly recommend, over to Mount Rushmore!

Yep. Those are the guys!

State flags line the walkway to the scenic overlook.

The best selfie we managed. Don't know who the guy is behind Andy, but we hope he had fun. :)

Is that him again? Hmmm....

Photobomber replaced by my water bottle. :)

Andy and I had just visited Mount Rushmore the year before, but it was fun travelling with Jeff and Kathy and the two cute campers!

Our attempt at a photo op with the campers and the faces:

Well, we tried anyway...

No time to waste. It's off to Devil's Tower! (Cue Close Encounters soundtrack music...)

Scenic overlook before Devil's Tower. Both campers, Devil's Tower, and...Andy?...all in one pic.

Though the trip was getting long, we at least had lots of sights to look forward to seeing. We stopped briefly for a photo op and break here before continuing to the park. 

The line to get in was slow-moving, but that's ok. Like any good tourist, I took the opportunity to hop out of the car and get a pic of both the Scamp and B@R T@B heading in to the park entrance! Love the sign and the tower with the two tiny campers. :)

Parking was surprisingly easy. We were told the RV parking area was full, and to go to a drop off point to leave the two campers, unhitch one vehicle, and drive it with all four of us, up to the visitor parking. Yeah... no.

As we drove up, we noticed several (like, a dozen or more) large RVs leaving. We reasoned they left perfectly good parking spots at the top. We were correct!

It was probably easy for us as we both had tiny rigs, but here we are, parked in the RV area, with an awesome view of the tower!

We filled our water bottles, emptied our bladders, and began the easy walk around the tower.

Jeff walked part way with us, then due to stupid painful plantar fasciitis, decided to wait while the other three of us did about a 15 minute walk, only partway around the tower, before turning back. Once again, worth it! Got some great pics and even learned some stuff!

Kathy, on the rocks.

Me, in front of the rocks, still on the path, because rules. :)

Andy and Kathy "climbing."

Only the best pic ever taken by anyone, anywhere! 💖

My teaching skills these days. Take a pic of the explanation, tell readers to zoom in to read. :)

After a brief stop at the visitors' center and gift shop, we took off for Sibley Lake Campground in Wyoming.

This was what I'd call an "uphill drive." Kathy and I had selected and reserved this campground months ago, as geographically, it put us 1/2 way between Devil's Tower and our campground outside of Yellowstone, Henry's Lake. What we didn't realize at the time of booking, Sibley Lake is located at the top of a mountain! All was well, except for one little oxygen sensor that went out on our Escape. It just meant a lot of stopping so we didn't overheat as we pulled the suddenly somewhat heavier T@b up the mountain side.

Yeah...we started aaaaaaalll the way down there!

The more we climbed, the cooler it got! We watched as the outside temp continued to DROP!

The campground itself was rustic. We had an electric hookup, but no running water. Andy filled our freshwater tank with water from a spigot, and we used it for showers and cooking. As far as the bathroom goes, we were actually pretty close to what might have been the cleanest vault toilets I'd ever seen! The campground hosts told us they clean them about 3x a day. Their efforts were much appreciated.

I loved the campsite we had. Unfortunately, we weren't close to Jeff and Kathy, but we made the best of it. The sites were spectacular! Lots of mature trees and personal space!

I took these pics before it got too late in the evening to have any light, then went in the camper to change to something warmer while Kathy and Jeff set up their site, and Andy chatted with the campground hosts. When I came out of the camper to get a fire going, my neighbor reported to me that I had just missed the elk walking through the back of my campsite. BUMMER!

Since we arrived so late, we did a quick meal and had a couple of drinks around the campfire before bed. We all wished we could have spent more time here, because we didn't know ahead of time what a treasure this place was. We decided to wake up early the next morning and do a little exploring before heading to Yellowstone.

Not a bad view to wake up to, huh?

Kathy and I decided to take a walk down to the actual lake we hadn't had time to see yet. The hosts gave us good directions, and in about four minutes, we made it to the lake. The walk there was downhill, tree lined, and so pretty.

Such an easy trip!

Once I had phone service again (as it didn't work anywhere around the campground), I posted this pic to my Facebook page. My brother commented that he swears he could see a bear watching us, so I looked a little closer and found this:

OMG! A BEAR!

Heh. Now that we found this friendly fella, he would be appearing in more of our trip photos... 

Anyway, the lake was clear, calm, and wonderful! Take a look:

We were the only people there, which was a welcome surprise. We found out later that often the elk are there bathing in the morning hours, and we were bummed they weren't there with us.

Still, we walked along the boardwalk and enjoyed the scenery and solitude.

Lakeside selfie!

This is my second favorite pic from this trip. Serene.

I snuck in a little of Day 3 here, because I wanted to share the whole experience at Sibley Lake before tackling the next post...Jellystone! I mean...Yellowstone! Part 3 gets us to Yellowstone National Park, and our campsite at Henry's Lake, ID.

Happy Camping!

Peggy