Sunday, August 8th through the morning of Thursday, August 12th
The move from Rafter J Campground to Custer Gulch Campground was only about 10 miles. We would have stayed the whole time at Rafter J, except that, due to the Sturgis Bike week, the campground was completely booked. We were lucky to find an opening 10 miles down the road. Since we do have Internet here at Custer Gulch, it has turned out to be a good move. Besides Internet, we also have a network of hiking trails in the small mountains right behind our RV, great scenery, and a charming new town to investigate.
On our first day, we hiked for a while on our own personal mountain and then went into town and watched all the bikers. It was amazing to see how many bikes were in town since Custer is about 50 miles from Sturgis. At night, we grilled catfish and sat around under our awning during a gentle rain. On Monday, we were going to go to Crazy Horse to see what the workers had accomplished during the two years since we were there last. But, when we saw Crazy Horse from the road, it looked very little different. So, we decided not to stop this time around. We went up the road a few yards to check out an antique shop. The only picture we have to show for that stop is the donkey “mowing” the lawn.
After the antique shop stop, we went to the National Woodcarving Museum in Custer. Both the carvings and the animation of many of the carvings were amazing.
The next day, we took a drive into Custer State Park and saw some Pronghorn deer right away. Then, we came around a corner and saw three buffalo. We stopped for pictures and then saw more buffalo coming around a bend. As we watched, about 300 buffalo spilled out. They were on both sides of our car, but seemed to totally not even notice us. Due to all the “buffalo are dangerous” signs, we were very careful to never get so that we couldn’t quickly jump into the car for protection. The herd included many buffalo calves.
We also went to Wind Cave followed by ice cream and rhubarb pie at the Purple Pie Place.
On our last full day in Custer, we went to Shankster’s Alley for lunch. The restaurant is actually in an alley with no inside part at all. We also went to Jewel Cave. Both Wind Cave and Jewel Cave are mostly dry caves. Wind Cave is at about 53 degrees and Jewel Cave is at about 49 degrees.
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