There’s been a lot going on in this Western South Dakota / Eastern Wyoming area if you’re an RVer. The biggest rally was the FMCA, but then after a week break, comes the Escapade. What to do with the week in between? How about another rally! We used to own a Safari RV, so we were invited to attend the Safari 25th anniversary rally in Rapid City. That’s right where we were before coming to Gillette! We have now driven those 140 miles between Rapid City and Gillette 3 times now in the last few weeks. Actually, it’s a beautiful stretch of highway. I loved it.
Because we waited till the ground dried out a bit at the end of the FMCA rally, we ended up driving as it turned dark. The moon may not have been exactly full, but since this was a super moon, it was quite impressive as it peeked up over the hills.
The Safari rally didn’t start till the next day, so we just pulled into a Rest area to sleep for the night. And, what a nice rest area it was. In the morning, Jim went inside the building as I walked around and took pictures. I thought for sure he’d be back in the coach by the time I finished, but he wasn’t there. I had just started to wonder what he could be doing, when he showed up with a smile on his face talking about his new girlfriends! Apparently the South Dakota Welcome center was staffed by a couple of very friendly women who loved hearing Jim tell his tales!
What a nice place to wake up in!
Coffee service with a smile!
Then it was on to the Safari rally. Here is just a sampling of the murals painted on these classic motorhomes. See more info on these paintings in our 2008 blog post about the Safari rally.
We taught a Picasa seminar at this rally, and the collage above was done in class, then uploaded to a Web Album to demonstrate sharing pictures.
But, mostly, we had fun at the Safari rally. We had a party on board the bus that took us to see Mount Rushmore at night. Here’s our friends Al and Sue Wilson who we’ve known from way back in Datastorm rally days. Everybody’s making sure their cameras are in working order for taking pictures of the giants on the mountain.
We remembered to take the big lens with us so we could get some closeups!
There’s a really nice trail you can walk and get different angles on the mountain. It’s called the Presidents trail. We didn’t walk this last time we were here. I even wonder if it’s been built since then.
We were there to see the lights come on. You sit in an open air amphitheatre and listen to a presentation by a park ranger, watch a movie about the 4 presidents carved on the mountain, George Washington for being the father of our country, Thomas Jefferson for expanding our country thru the west, Teddy Roosevelt for protecting the wild and beautiful national parks, and of course, Abraham Lincoln for preserving the nation. Then we watched the lights come on and shine on those four faces.
What a beautiful night!
Now we’re back in Gillette and ready to teach our hands-on class called Camp Reboot. People bring their laptops and spend two days with us teaching the things we think they would have learned in High School, IF there had been computers when they went to High School!