South Dakota

My family and I went to South Dakota a few times in my life. Although it doesn't seem to be the most exciting place to be in the world, it can be pretty fun. We went when I was about 4 or 5 years old. Again when i was 13, and once more when I was 14 years old. The most exciting place seems to be Mt. Rushmore, but there's a lot better places than that. We went to a place called the Bad Lands. Its a very dry and hilly area in South Dakota named after the Indians. It's pretty amazing because you can look out over them, and see miles and miles of hills with no civilization. Another cool monument besides Mt. Rushmore that's in South Dakota is Crazy Horse. It's still in the process of being finished. Crazy Horse is named after a famous Indian Chief who was murdered under a peace flag. The monument is of Crazy Horse riding a horse. It's supposed to be Man-Kinds biggest art project and it's been worked on for over 60 years and not even close to being finished.

When you think of South Dakota, a lot of people just think of flat, boring ground with nothing to do, but when you get out to the western part of South Dakota, it's very hilly and has lots of mountains. Rapid City is the city where Mt. Rushmore was built and also is the most Mountainous region of South Dakota. The car ride out there was not very fun. My family of five had to squish into a tiny Mercury Sable. And I was stuck in between my 2 older sisters for over 10 hours. It was hell. The animal life is different from here. You'll be driving down a road and all of a sudden there will be a giant buffalo in the middle of the road. There's also fields of prairie dogs popping their heads in and out of their burrows. Mountain goats climb all over the hills in the western part of the state. It's a totally different atmosphere. We also went to the hotel that was featured in the old movie North by Northwest. One day, our whole family went on a hike and my mom almost passed out because of the high altitude. Another interesting place to go to in South Dakota is Wall Drug. It's the biggest drug store in the U.S., at least when we went there. There's signs promoting Wall Drug at least 400 miles before you get there. They say things like "Free ice water at Wall Drug", or "5 cent coffee at Wall Drug." My mom and dad even saw one when they went to Europe.

Although South Dakota doesn't seem like a very exciting place, you'll be very surprised.