Farewell Black Hills

8/2/24 - We enjoyed time at our RV site, including another campfire in the evening.

8/3/24 - Although I had seen them advertised several times during our trip, it hadn't worked out until this day to visit a "hot spring". In my mind, they should be a hole in the ground bubbling hot water from below, but they always seem to be a pool-type experience! I found one in the nearby town of Hot Springs that had a good rating so I talked Pat into going.

Moccasin Springs ended up being beautiful with 6 different pools ranging from 80F to 105F. We didn't figure out where the hot water was coming from...probably a hot water tank!!

We both really enjoyed moving from the different temperatures and found the experience relaxing. We had a delicious lunch in the attached restaurant afterwards.

Our next stop was the Mammoth Site, in the same town. We weren't sure what to expect, but it ended up being real fossils, mostly left where they were found in the 1970s. A building was constructed around but it is still an active dig site. We were fascinated!

So far they have found remains of 61 Columbian mammoths, in addition to other animals that went into a sink hole and couldn't get out ~190,000 years ago.

We didn't even know there was a different mammoth, let alone one bigger than a woolly

It is unusual to find a skeleton where the bones haven't been moved around over time

After dinner at a lodge inside Custer State Park, we drove around the Wildlife Loop and saw lots of buffalo, prairie dogs, pronghorn, white-tailed deer, and a bunny 😊.

We had to drive THROUGH the herd of buffalo (slowly of course)

In our bumper-cam

Pronghorn

8/4/24 - Our last full day at one of our favorite campgrounds so in addition to some grocery shopping, cleaning, and on-line euchre with friends, we sat outside and roasted marshmallows over another campfire.

We really enjoyed our 11 days in the Black Hills area of South Dakota. We start heading east and will transition into a "Friends and Family Tour", visiting loved ones in S. Dakota, Minnesota, Wisconsin, Iowa, Nebraska, and Colorado, before doing some more adventuring in Utah and Arizona.