Vote Custer State Park the best in the Country!!!

America!  Appreciate it.  thanks.

 Good morning!
 We just found out that Custer State Park is in the running for USA Today's 10Best Best State Park! There are 27 days left to vote, which you can do here: http://www.10best.com/awards/travel/best-state-park/?csp=Newsletter-Readers-Choice.
 Let’s tell the rest of the country what we already know: We DO have the BEST state park in America! Vote every 8 hours!!!!

6th Year at Custer State Park, Custer, SD Voume II

Just have time to post a few pictures.  Had a hale storm and lost our screen room for the 3rd time!!! Also the awning on our RV.  Some other minor damage to the RV, but otherwise we are fine!

As the pictures will show, we are doing quite a bit of hiking and driving around.  Yesterday a friend that works for the Resort took us on a jeep ride way in the back country - we were right in the middle of the herd and they are in big time RUT! Very exciting.

Time is getting short - next week is the Sturgis Motorcycle Rally, thousands of motorcycles in the park each day.  As soon as that is over we start preparing for the Round-Up and as soon as that is over, we head home.  Can't believe the summer has gone by so quckly we have had a GREAT time.

Hope everyone is well and you enjoy the pictures.

Please be sure to click on the CSP link to the right as well as follow the park
on Facebook.

This cow had the most interesting horns. I wonder how she feels about them?

This lamb was running to its mother and stopped short when
he saw me standing in the middle of the path!

These three pictures is why Doug likes the job he has! Sunrise at CSP

He gets to ride the whole park everyday -

and since he is such an early riser sees it at it's best!

Doug with TT - his "toy truck" with
Washington watching!!!

Doug also got to see this mom and baby Mountain Goats - a real treat,
don't see them often.

Mt. Rushmore framed in one of the
narrow tunnels on Iron Mtn. Rd.

This little guy was about 24 hours old!!!

These guys always cause a traffic jam!

This big boy was scratching his belly on a rock right next to the car.

6th Year at Custer State Park, Custer, SD

Welcome to Custer State Park, have been here for over a month and just getting around to blogging.  Weather has been cold with snow, rain, wind and a few very nice days.  Today is drizzly and about 50 degrees!  Regardless of the weather, we are still loving this place.  Many of you have been following us for the past five years and this will be repetitive, but hope you still enjoy this. 

We were only here a few days when we went on our first hike.  We were rather high up so there was still a lot of snow.  Never got to the ghost town we were heading for as the road was not plowed and we couldn't get in.

Still had a great time with our friends and catching up.

Our good friends Ray and Donna.

Our next trip had to be a trip around the Wildlife Loop to see the new babies, I can never get enough pictures of them.

The following was rather interesting, the young female was a bit agitated and started to charge our car. Doug just started rolling back.  She followed a bit and then got bored.  Then we saw two cows actually butting heads - have seen the bulls do this, but never have seen the cows do this before!! 

This was our next hike to an ice cave.  What an experience.  We were quite warm by the time we hiked up here so the ice was even more amazing!

Our favorite people to hike with-
Bob, Ray and Donna 

Panoramic view on Needles Hwy.

Our granddaughter graduated from high school in May so we made a VERY quick trip home for the graduation.  Spent many hours in airports. While waiting at Rapid City we were able to see a tornado form, touch down, and the disappear.  Heard later it did some damage in Silver City, about 50 mi away.

I guess this is unusual for the hills. A friend told me it was the first tornado that she has experienced here in the Black Hills and she has been here for quite a few years.

Our granddaughter Ana - on the track
to who knows where - sure to make
a great mark on our world!!!

Our grandchildren - Nicholas & Ana - I know
the world is a better place
because they are in it! Love you guys!

Hope everyone is well will try and get on sooner next time.

Mid Summer in Custer State Park, SD

Well folks, it's been a while since we have been on the web.  Our lives are rather routine, but I just don't take the time to go to the lodge to get on the internet.

It has not been all together boring!! We finally got all the problems in the RV fixed!  There were MANY!!  When that was finally over, we had a huge hail storm and it took out our screen room!!

The noise hitting the RV was tremendous and caused the girls to run in the closet.  We watched as these white missals zoomed at tremendous speeds smashing into everything! Almost everyone in the park had some kind of damage.  Beside the screen room, our AC cover sustained several small cracks.  We feel fortunate that we did not have more damage.

We have since gotten a new screen room and are now enjoying our yard again.  

Just a few pictures of the wildlife we are enjoying  -

 These guys got a bit close. Notice the cat's ears at the bottom of the picture.  She watched them closely. The stained glass Buff in the window was made for us by a friend here.

 This is our returning Western Tanager. We have bird watchers come to see him.  The other day we watched him feed one of his young.

Doug was having a running battle with this squirrel - he kept eating the bird seed!

We have taken several day trips.  One was south into Nebraska where we visited the Fur Traders Museum.  Doug really enjoyed that. They had the largest canoe we have ever seen. 

It was used to ship furs down the Missouri River, holding approximately 6,000 pounds.  It measured about 65 ft. and 6 feet at the widest point. 

The next ride we went to Wyoming and took the old Cheyenne to Deadwood Stagecoach road starting in New Castle.  What a wonderful day, the weather was magnificent and the scenery beautiful. 

On the way home we watched some incredible cloud formations as another storm brewed around us! 

As we entered the park I finally got to see my very first mountain lion in the wild!!  For five years I have waited for this experience.  It happened so fast I never got a chance to take a picture, but I really don't need one to remember it.  What beautiful animals they are.

Last Sunday we were late for church as we were held up by an buffalo jam!  They were in no hurry to get out of our way!!

About 12 days ago I started to get a summer cold and it has gone into my chest, as a result it is a bit difficult to sleep.  It developed into pneumonia.  Finally got some antibiotics and I am seeing some results today.  Yesterday I needed to get some sun so we went to watch the buffalo, always pick me up!  The rut has started and it is so much fun to watch the males act like teenage boys.

We had quite a conversation with this guy.  He acted like he knew just what we were talking about.









Can never resist a baby!

The Lewis and Clark Trail and the Wonderful Clydesdale Horses

Our mini tour of Missouri has come to an end and we will head straight to Custer State Park on Tues., May 28th as we start our volunteer position June 5th.

Missouri gave us lots of fun and relaxation.  We visited the Arch as mentioned earlier. Doug particularly enjoyed the museum depicting the construction of the Arch.  We then followed a bit of the Lewis and Clark trail and the point where L&C departed into the wilderness.  What a great stop.  The museum abounds with information of the exploration including a 55 foot keelboat with the 30 ft. sail in full flight.

The backside of the boat is a cut-a-way so you can see living quarters and how equipment and supplies were stored.

43 men prepared and trained for five months before their departure.

Driving the trail a little further we came across a tower of 150 ft. that overlooks the confluence of the Missouri and Mississippi rivers.  What a sight.

On the grounds there is a garden containing many spicies of plants discovered by these brave adventurous men.

We then drove the L&C trail for about 100 miles - what beautiful farm lands and rolling hills.  Visited several State Parks and fell in love with a very old town - Arrow Rock, MO.  Barb said 'Let's move here!'  It 'aint' going to happen, too old to move again.

May 27, 2013

The day started with torrential rain, at noon it looked like 10PM.  Our tour of the Clydesdale Ranch was scheduled for 2pm.  The drive to the ranch was awful, fog and rain, it was really hard to see.  Got to the rance and to our relief a lot of it was going to be inside.

The first thing they did was bring out Evan, one of the draft horses.  It was just awsome the way he just stood there and let everyone pet him. There size is incredible.

They took us to the shower room where they where giving Evan a bath.  Unfortunately those pics did not turn out.

Then we got to see a baby that was just born on the 20th, it is just 7 days old - how cute it that!!!

Out side they have the big stallion that has fathered most of these babies.  They breed about 40 babies each year.  

Also outside, there were three pregnant mares, one of them is due any moment, we were really hoping she would have her baby while we were there!  No such luck.

TWhat a wonderful day.  I recommend the tour to anyone that has a chance to go. Fortunately for us the rain stopped toward the end of the tour so we got some pics outside.  To say goodbye we  were treated to a free beer!  What else would Busch give out?!?!

Today we are headed for Custer. Stopping at one of our favorite campgrounds Basswoods Resort just northwest of Kansas City, MO. Only about 200 miles today, winds are picking up again.

Will be back when we have something to say.