A Rapid Day Exploring Rapid City

When we drove by Rapid City, South Dakota, in the motor home in the rain a week ago, we didn't stop. But since then, we have learned of several points of interest in the city. So we decided it was worth the 26-mile drive from our camping spot at Sheridan Lake to make a rapid tour of Rapid City. Besides, it was our only option for a Sunday morning church service. So we went to church in Rapid City, and then rapidly started checking off some tourist stops. We actually walked from our church parking spot to downtown Rapid where the presidents reside.

Perhaps inspired by Mount Rushmore, the city has bronze presidential statues on the downtown street corners. We found a few of our favorite leaders of the free world for pictures.

Downtown also has a very nice park that hosts a splash pad in the summer and an ice rink in the winter. Denisa is hanging out with President James Madison at the entry of the park.

In our rapid driving tour of Rapid City, we also found Monument Park. We had thought about biking the trail beside the river, but it was a little warm this afternoon. But we did enjoy the display in the park that featured a piece of the Berlin Wall. Mark is standing by one section of the wall that separated East Berlin from West Berlin for 49 years. The signboards explained that the rounded top made it almost impossible to get a grip on the top so that East Berliners couldn't crawl over the 13.5-feet-tall wall. The metal pieces displayed in front of the wall section are tank traps that made it impossible for a vehicle to smash through the wall. This Berlin Wall section made its way to Rapid City, South Dakota, in honor of the Air Force personnel at Ellsworth Air Force Base just outside of town.

We had a good history lesson that told the stories of the sad years when German friends and families where separated by a wall, as well as the triumphant times when the wall came down in 1990. A map explained exactly where this Berlin wall section came from along the 96-mile wall. It was east of the famous "Checkpoint Charlie" gate in Berlin, Germany.

Next stop on our rapid tour was Dinosaur Park. We drove a steep and winding road to the top of the hill that gives a 360-degree view of the area surrounding Rapid City.

But the real reason to climb that hill is to see the dinosaurs. The park is undergoing some upgrades, so it was a little tricky to get to these big guys that we just thought were extinct. Denisa was standing by her apatosaurus . . .

but of course Mark had to climb up on his triceratop. Climbing on the dinosaurs seems to be encouraged, as we saw other children climbing the triceratop as well. Of course, none of the other climbers were quite as old as Mark. Afterwards, we checked out the little souvenir shop and concession stand at the base of Dinosaur Park. After hearing another customer rave about the bison dog, we had to try one for ourselves. It was a yummy afternoon snack.

Our next rapid tour stop was the Chapel in the Hills. We actually visited here 13 years ago to see the little church fashioned after one in Norway.

This little church was built to house the Lutheran Vespers radio program in 1969. The inside was open, and we were sad to see that the evening vesper service wasn't until much later this Sunday. We don't have time to wait around for that on this rapid day of exploring Rapid City.

A recording explains a little about the architecture and the inside of the chapel. If you look to the right of the altar, you can see a little trap door that opens to the outside. That was where communion could be passed to a leper, standing outside and away from the other parishioners to avoid infecting others.

We took a picture by the Norwegian hosts, Ole and Lena, just like we did 13 years ago. At the time, we were friends with a dear elderly couple of Scandinavian descent. We knew that our Ollie would like that picture.

It was later than we planned to be back to the motor home, but we found lots of fun things to do in Rapid City. This was our last evening at Lake Sheridan, and we still hadn't taken the Spring Creek and Flume Trail Loop hike that we had planned when we first arrived. So even though it was later than prudent at 6:30 p.m., we started on this 6-mile trail. It helped that we could start the hike right from our camp site. We had to keep up our rapid pace to get this done before it got dark. The trail went first around the forested edge of the lake.

Then it took us up a steep section so we could see the rocks around us, and the lake below us. Mark had to move a sapling so that we could see the view more clearly.

Denisa also enjoyed the flowers along the way, in all shades of purple and blue.

This was the flume section of the loop hike, because much of this trail was outfitted with a wooden trestle that carried water 17 miles to the nearby town of Rockerville. Part of the flume went through a tunnel, so our trail did as well. That certainly seemed like a pretty short tunnel entrance.

Mark went first into that dark tunnel, and soon found out that the wooden boards on the floor would dip into the water with the weight of a hiker on them. Denisa saw that it was a wet walk through the tunnel.

She was just starting into the tunnel when Mark let out a bone-chilling yell. A series of scenarios raced through Denisa's mind, but she snapped a picture just in case we needed some medical proof of injury. Was he attacked by bats, or a bear, or criminals hiding in the tunnel?!? When she finally found out that he had bonked his head on the too-short ceiling because he was concentrating on the too-wet floor, she was relieved. It was the best of all the scenarios that flashed through her mind when she heard that yell.

The flume headed downhill, and eventually brought us to the water. As we approached the section along Spring Creek, we noticed that the hikers heading our way were certainly friendly. They were all waving wildly as they approached.

That's when we found out that this section of the trail was infested with mosquitoes. While no one stopped to talk to us, we had a fleeting conversation with a family making a quick departure. They said that the mosquitoes just showed up about 30 minutes before. They had enjoyed a nice swimming and fishing day in the water until then. So our pictures in this section were taken very quickly.

Since this is a loop trail, we had no choice but fight on through the mosquitoes unless we wanted to re-hike the five miles we had just finished. So we pushed on rapidly, and found that a record-setting pace kept the mosquitoes from landing on us. It was another part of our rapid day. We finally made it to the bridge section, that we had seen from our kayak when we first arrived at Lake Sheridan.

We hiked high above the lake, and the pesky mosquitoes were less of a nuisance. That gave us a lovely view of Lake Sheridan. Even on a rapid day of exploring, we were blessed to wander into more of God's wonders!

The sun was setting over the lake as we finished our 6-mile loop and returned to the motor home. Wow! We have had a rapid day of exploring Rapid City and back home for a rapid hike around Sheridan Lake.