Epic Summer Road Trip 2019 (Day 44 & 45): North Point State Rec Area & The Badlands, South Dakota

We said goodbye to the Hommels right before they took off for church and hit the road in the direction of a gas station heading west-bound in central Iowa.  What I’m basically saying is that we were heading to the middle of nowhere.  Fortunately we found one which actually had gas, fresh doughnuts, ice, and coffee!  Git-r-dun.  The number of moths that we smacked into was crazy along with the headwind which dropped our gas mileage by a few miles/gallon, though I don’t think the moths had anything to do with that.  It was a long, straight, boring five and ½ hour drive to southeast South Dakota with the temperature rising steadily to hover around 94 degrees by the time we got to our destination of North Point Rec Area off of Lake Andes, SD.  Lake Andes is actually a reservoir and it was particularly high so there were a few campsites next to the lake that were actually underwater along with some lake front trees.  I told the kids that I would set up the camper so they could head down to the beach and jump in the water.  Oddly enough, they thought that was a good idea!

I set up camp and made the mistake of checking the news on my phone which had very limited cell service.  I read about the mass shootings happening around the country and started to get depressed, as I always do, when I read about these instances of mass destruction on innocent Americans (or innocent people, for that matter).  Being tired from the drive and not wanting to move, I forced myself to get up and join the kids in the water.  I’m not trying to stick my head in the sand, but at that moment the most important thing for me to do was to spend time playing with my kids.  I’m glad that I did!  The water was beautiful with two different temperatures (warm the first couple feet and cool underneath) along with a sandy bottom. 

Drew and I headed back to the campsite after a while so that I could start dinner and Olivia, of course, played in the water for another fifteen minutes or so.  Marinated chicken kabobs with vegetables for dinner and the kids had fun attempting to cook the perfect marshmallow.  For those of you who don’t know what the perfect marshmallow looks like, you need to cook it rotisserie-style over hot coals making sure that the outside is browned evenly and ever-so-slightly crispy so it almost crunches.  You can’t do that until the inside is completely “ooohey-gooey” as Olivia puts it.  When you bite into it, the outside should crunch just a little as you break through into the soft, pillowy, warm inside.  It’s an art which should not be taken for granted.

The next morning I woke up to the clothes on the clothesline banging against the camper due to the wind picking up quite a bit.  The sky looked a bit ominous and the lake had transformed from a beautiful sheet of glass the night before to large whitecaps crashing into the beach.  We ate breakfast and headed out for a relatively easy 3 hour drive to our next destination of The Badlands, SD.  Another hour gained as we passed into the Mountain time zone so we arrived at our KOA just after lunchtime.  Olivia and I ate lunch in the camper while Drew took off to play minigolf after paying $2.50 at the office for a ball and putter.  That kid cracks me up.

The southeast entrance to the National Park was only about 6 miles away so we took the truck over to the park and got in free-of-charge since Drew is technically still in 4^th grade.  All kids in 4^th grade get into National Parks for free along with three passengers!  Yes, this is a national program!  We checked out the visitor’s center and then headed out for a 1.5 mile hike called the Notch trail.  Drew said that the formations reminded him of the landscape in the movie, Cowboys vs. Aliens.  I thought it reminded me of the movie, GalaxyQuest.  The hike was hot, but it provided a good workout along with some spectacular views! 

We headed back to the campground and the kids played in the swimming pool while I attempted to battle the poor wi-fi trying to upload pictures to my post about Iowa.  I’m pretty sure we won’t have much cell service or internet access for the next couple of days!  Hamburgers over the fire and then a late night walk outside to enjoy a beautiful summer starlight night which included a first-time viewing of shooting stars for the kids.  We don’t get much chance to see stars like this in dreary, city-lit Seattle. 

Olivia cutting up sweet Iowa corn