Home and Heart

First things first. Chris says she has never seen me so relaxed and open-hearted. I would say much the same about her. No doubts or misgivings about our plans and plots. Fun, fun, fun.

There is land, lots of land, out here. We left Sioux Falls this morning with the plan to drive to Mitchell, SD to see the “World’s Only Corn Palace”. https://cornpalace.com/ https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Corn_Palace This is corn palace # 6, I believe, in this part of the state since early 20th century. It is basically a sports and concert venue about 75 miles from Sioux Falls. But about half way there we were distracted by a road sign that took us off the interstate to the prairie home of Laura Ingalls Wilder. In keeping with our plans to be spontaneous we headed north from route 90 and went to De Smet, SD (pop 1056) to see the place. Unfortunately the visitor center was closed but we were able to wander around the buildings and see the prairie around the area and imagine what it must have been like to eke out a living there 100 years ago. Even today it is very remote and windswept. We had lunch at the Oxbow restaurant in De Smet. Talked to the owner and learned that De Smet High School has 200 students. Even smaller than Voorheesville..

On the road then to Mitchell to see the corn palace. The cool thing about it is that the outside walls are completely covered in mosaic art made entirely of corn cobs and other parts of the corn plant.

Finished at the Corn Palace and headed back to Sioux Falls. BUT, made another detour – this time to Howard, SD!

I poked my nose into the local hardare store hoping to buy a postcard to mail to myself postmarked from Howard, SD but alas, the post office closes from 12:30 to 1:15 and we couldn’t do that.

Back on the road to Sioux Falls.

By the way – they drive FAST here. The speed limit on the interstate is 80mph and i’m sure many of the folks passing us were doing more than that.

When we got back to Sioux Falls, we went to The Falls – from whence the town takes its name.

The stone is an interesting red color – according to google it is “Sioux Quartizite”

Tomorrow – on to Rapid City in the western end of SD – Crazy Horse monument, Deadwood, Mount Rushmore, Badlands, Spearfish Canyon, etc.