Custer State Park

We drove across Wyoming the first day of our return journey and stopped in Custer, South Dakota, which is in the south-west corner of the state. We spent the night and were off bright and early the next morning to explore the area around Mount Rushmore. The awesome desk clerk at our hotel highly recommended spending some time at Custer State Park and we heeded her advice. I am so glad we did!

 I had never heard of Custer State Park, but I would love to go back again now. It reminded me of Yellowstone in some ways, but it was a lot smaller. There are lots of trails to hike on, a couple of campgrounds, a nice visitors' center and several other things to do, but we were so limited on time that we chose to just drive around the "wildlife loop." It was great--we could have easily spent the whole day!

 There is an area inside the park called Bluebell that features a lodge, trail rides, cabins you can camp in, and lots of other things. It looked like lots of fun.

 A lot of Custer State Park was improved by the CCC. I loved this bridge that they built.

 This picture doesn't do it justice at all, but there was the coolest prairie dog town along one stretch of the road. There must have been about 15 burrow holes, all with at least 3 prairie dogs poking their heads out. They ran around and whistled and were just generally hilarious while we watched. Hank thought they were the coolest things ever.

 I have always thought of "the badlands" of South Dakota as rocky and barren and empty, and they proved to be completely the opposite. Such a beautiful place!

 One of the highlights of CSP was, of course, the buffalo. This year is the 100th anniversary of buffalo being in the park and they have lots of celebratory events planned later in the year. We had so much fun driving slowly through the buffalo.

 The calves were especially cute and fuzzy. I totally wanted to reach out and snuggle one, but I didn't think their mamas would take too kindly to that.

 This was the Wildlife Visitors Center, which was unfortunately closed as we drove by. I love the rock!

 More buffalo lounging on the side of the road. Aren't those calves just too cute?

Goodbye, Custer State Park! I really, really wished we would have had a lot more time to spend in this area. The town of Custer itself was cute and full of incredibly nice people--I had to run to the dollar store for some ginger ale and saltines since Jed wasn't feeling too well when we arrived, and everyone was SO helpful and kind and inquisitive about our journey--and well maintained. The area had so much to do; I felt we barely scratched the surface at all. It would be so much fun to go back!