We did a hike at Norfolk Lake, spent a weekend hiking and looking at art in Fayetteville and Bentonville (Crystal Bridges), spent a weekend w/ my sister and bro-in-law in Memphis and received the blue pine we ordered for the walls and ceiling in the shed.

Some more hikes, one just down to Bull Shoals. We completed the Indian Rock House Trail that has a huge cave that Native Americans used as a gathering place, then later miners used before leaving defunct mines. We also went back to Mountain View, where a friendly, neighborhood dog went on a 2 mile hike with us that ended at a small, family, graveyard. We went back to STL to see Chayse and Heather for Christmas, and Britt and her roomie won the door decorating contest in their dorms.

Time flies – Jim finished tiling and building the bathroom in the shed – we got to see Chayse, who helped us move/donate even more stuff and close out the storage unit. We found some old pics of the kids and had our second ever Thanksgiving with just the two of us (no kids). We had a forestry mulcher come out, who did an incredible amount of work taking down small trees/brush in 4 days. The land around the shed is more open, with space between the trees, it’s really cool. We have seen quite a few deer, including a couple brothers, who wrestled for quite a while. Jim found an old squirrel gun and an armadillo shell on the property. We also went down to Mountain View to see Tim, and did a bit of hiking. Tim took us to his hangout, the Rainbow Cafe, where Jim got the world’s smallest chicken fried steak dinner. We also were able to see part of Arkansas’ only wild elk herd. For about 3 weeks it smelled like we were living in a hamster cage due to the amount of shredded cedars 🙂 We had our first snow, M learned to play air guitar, and B enjoys some down time, and gets out to see Idaho.

It’s hard to believe we’ve been back a month. Jim has been working full time on the shed. He built the bathroom, which is functional now, just needs some grout touch up and a door, he got the water softener and hot water heater in place, tiled the laundry room, and is almost finished tiling the whole shed. We put up some spotlights and got to see our Workamping buddy Tim in Branson. Britt graduated from Air Force Tech school (we were able to watch via face time), was promoted to Airman First Class, and was assigned a base in Mountain Home, Idaho. I’ve been cutting down old metal fencing and pulling junk out of the woods into piles so that we can clean up the land.

Well. That was the fastest summer of our lives. We had adventures, saw new things and places, learned to love to hike, and met some awesome people. We’re heading back to the property to get some work done and have a doctor look at Jim’s knee before deciding what to do next. We took our time on the way back, we slept in a Home Depot parking lot in Hays, Ks, and then a KOA in Springfield, Mo. In Springfield, we found a dude in a gold bug with the Halloween spirit.

We went back to Custer State Park to drive the Needles Highway and Wildlife Loop on our last day in South Dakota. The Bison were still rounded up together, but we found them near the stables and were able to watch over 1000 bison roaming around together. We were able to find the boroughs again and I have a great video of Jim explaining that he does not have any food to one of them. I would love to come back to the Custer are to do some hiking and more exploring. We discovered Prairie Berry, a new favorite (local) winery of mine, looks like they do some Workamping, we’ll have to see how it goes 🙂 We finished the evening at the Buglin’ Bull where I had an elk burger and Jim had the Bison tips. (both tasted like beef)

Sturgis was not what we expected, but the Motorcycle hall of fame was really cool. We were here in the off season, so we got to walk around the town with vey little traffic or congestion. Deadwood is mostly small casinos, but the history is everywhere and the town had a really cool feel. We had lunch outside and then walked the town. We were incredibly lucky with the weather – we could not have asked for better, fall colors with blue skies and high 60s/low 70s. The drive back to camp through Spearfish Canyon were stunning, but pics were hard to get due to bug splattage 🙂

Wall Drug was interesting – I’m amazed at the marketing genius that seems to have built a town around a drug store. It was an eclectic collection of Old West and seemingly anything that someone found interesting, jackalopes, weird carvings, and Jurassic Park, as examples. We headed to the Badlands, which was really interesting because on the north side of the road is flat prairie with the South side dropping sharply to the Badlands geological formations that make up the National Park. The colors within the rock were yellows and reds and not like anything we’d seen before.

We headed out and spent some time at the Crazy Horse Visitor Center before taking the bus up to the base of the monument. From what the guide was saying, due to advances in technology and some pretty significant donations, they expect to be able to make substantial progress over the next decade. The carving continues to be a family affair, with Korczak’s grand children now working on the sculpture. We had lunch in Keystone, where we were relieved to FINALLY find gluten free taffy (eyeroll), then headed to Mt. Rushmore. We finished the day with another walk around Custer State Park’s Cylvan Lake.

We changed campgrounds (Custer’s Gulch closed for the season) so we moved, then went on a short hike while we waited for Pat, Glen, and Boyd to arrive. It was a 3 mile loop with cool rock formations and gorgeous fall colors.