Our Soggy, Foggy, Adventurous Trip

Our trip was good, but it was nothing like any of us had expected. Not even close.

The drive out to SD was good. We had easy travel conditions and all were in good spirits. We arrived in Deadwood around dinnertime, found our campsite and set up the tent. Unfortunately, however, in that particular part of Black Hills National Forest, no open fires are allowed. Thus, we were stuck camping in an RV park without picnic table or firepit. This made my dinner plans fairly impossible. Plus, it was threatening rain. So, we packed ourselves up, jumped on the cute, western-style trolley and headed into town to find some food. Unfortunately, my stomach was hurting and all we could find were gambling halls serving pub grub and buffets.

Eventually we found a place, ate and headed back to our tent. Before we arrived I got very sick. After a lot of discussion regarding finding a hotel room, we finally made our way into the tent for the night.

Eleanor didn't seem to understand "nigh-nigh" without her crib... She wasn't bad, but she wouldn't sleep. So, Seth and I huddled under our sleeping bags, let her cruise the tent and eventually she lay down with her blanket between us. At that point I was able to transfer her to her own sleeping bag. She slept amazingly for the rest of the night (despite noisy wind and rain whipping around our tent).

Saturday dawned foggy. We made our way out of town, back to a coffee shop we'd noticed on our way in where we enjoyed a leisurely meal in warmth. Then we headed off to Keystone and Mount Rushmore. Here's what we saw:

Isn't it beautiful? Amazing, huh? Well, we didn't have anything else planned for the day, so we decided to hike up closer. We encountered a Lakota, Nakota, Dakota Indian Village.

We also climbed lots and lots of steps. This was Eleanor's favorite! We made it all the way out to the lookout and waited, straining to see faces emerge from the fog...

Did you see him? That was George Washington's face! The fog did lift slightly a couple of times while we were out there. It was actually kind of spooky to see the outline of huge faces come in and out of focus above us. We were disappointed that we didn't get a good view, but the fog itself was beautiful there in the forest and like I said, Ellie loved the stairs. :)

Then we hit up the Artist's Studio:




Eventually we gave up on the fog lifting and headed into Keystone to walk around, wait to see if the sky would clear and find some lunch. We walked, checked out the touristy shops, ate, watched the rain and saw this very cool train:

The fog didn't lift. So, we headed into Rapid City. There we hit the mall and Cabella's since they were warm and dry. After dinner we headed back to our campsite.

Eleanor had trouble getting to sleep again... and mom probably wasn't so much help because I was tired, still didn't feel great and really wanted to get all my stuff together for my run. Anyway, she finally went to bed when Seth and I again closed ourselves in our sleeping bags.

Sunday I rose crazy early in the morning, got ready to run, tried to ignore the cold, rain and fog and jumped on a bus that took us (1400 runners in the half marathon) up into the mountains to the trail where the race took place. There we all milled around, trying to keep from freezing while we waited and hour and forty five mintutes for the start of the race. I overheard runners talking about the snow last year... it helped give me good perspective.

I ran the half. It was good and bad. I ran amazingly for the first 6 miles, then my stomach sickness came back and I had to really pull back the pace. The trail was beautiful and running with so many people was fun. Luckily, the first half of the race was good enough to allow me to PR even though I had a lousy second half, but I was disappointed that I missed my time goal by quite a bit. (It makes me really want to find another half to run here in a couple of weeks!) Anyway, I finished - and that's what really matters. :)

Since we were unfamiliar with the area and trail, Seth and Ellie were unable to see me at any point in the race. In fact, because they were trying, they even missed me at the end.

After the run, we headed back to the campsite to get cleaned up and packed for the trip home. We were hoping for a nicer day so we could head back down to Mount Rushmore, and although it was less foggy than the day before, it didn't look promising. So, we just headed home. Before we left SD completely, though, we found a wonderfully ecclectic coffee shop deli for lunch. It was really nice to sit and talk, eat and let Eleanor wander about in a relaxing and fun environment.

We arrived safely home yesterday afternoon and today we've attempted to get things cleaned and unpacked. Today is sunny, and Ellie and I decided to take full advantage of that fact. We went for a long walk and then met some friends in the park. It is nice to be home.