South Dakota's Lesser Known Tourist Stops

We went to the church service at the local church near our campground in Rapid City, South Dakota, and then were on the road by 11:00. We didn't pull off at the normal tourist stops on this route--Badlands National Park, Walls Drug, and the Missile Site National Historic Site. We made those three stops on a trip two years ago. But we did stop at two of the state's lesser known tourist stops. The first one was at a South Dakota rest area to see the "Dignity of Earth and Sky" statue.

This stainless steel statue was gifted to the state, and her clothing is patterned after the traditional garments of the Native American women of the 1850s. Three Lakota women were used as models for the face of Dignity. Not exactly a size 6, she is 50 feet tall, and 32 feet wide. Her quilt is made of 128 diamonds that are four feet across, and painted in the colors of the South Dakota water and sky. LED lights highlight the diamonds after dark, and we bet she's a beauty at night.

To stretch our legs, we took a hike down the walking path that starts at the rest area.

We took a picture from the viewpoint overlooking the Missouri River.

We hustled back to the visitor center, only to find that it closed just minutes before. But Denisa took a picture of the museum's replica of the boat used by Lewis and Clark as they made their way up the Missouri River on their great adventure. The Lewis and Clark expedition spent a night here in 1904.

We were making the long drive across South Dakota through fields of corn, wheat, and maize, and a surprising number of fields of sunflowers as we drove along I-90 all day. 

We drove through rain much of the day with an unusual weather advisory warning of "Reduced visibility ahead."

The other stop of the day was at the Sodak natural Foods truck. We learned that "Sodak" is short for South Dakota, and all the beef, pork, chicken, and lamb comes from a ranch 13 miles down the gravel road. They positioned the food truck here along I-90, and plan to build a restaurant on this same land in the near future. For now, we can say that we were one of their first customers, and our beef platter was very good.

We had reservations at our next Boondockers Welcome site just outside Mitchell, South Dakota. We parked in the field behind a local's house, and we had our first mosquito swarm of the summer. We were lucky that this was our first time to be bothered by bugs for this long trip. We had planned to eat at our host's Bistro, but they were closed for Labor Day. So instead, we took a walk down Mitchell's Main Street. This town is best known for its corn.

Mitchell is famous for its Corn Palace, and we got there when it opened at 9:00. The entire outside of the palace is covered with local grain products. In the United States in the late 1800's, there were 34 different corn prairie palaces. All the rest have come and gone, and this is the world's only Corn Palace now.

The indoor lobby has many signboards, describing the history of the Corn Palace and the celebrities that have visited Mitchell, South Dakota, for the annual Corn Festival. They also have displays explaining the process of cutting the cobs in half and attaching them to the walls. Corn is grown in many different colors to make the shading possible for the murals that adorn the inside and outside walls of the palace.

Corn murals line the arena walls in the interior of the palace.

The indoor murals have been up for many years, and are based on South Dakota history. We were surprised at the large number of people visiting the Corn Palace this morning. Then we discovered that they were hosting the state children's pedal tractor pull. 

We would have stayed to watch the competition, as they add an increasing amount of weight to the trailer as the children pedal the tractor. But things didn't start until 11:00, and we had plenty of miles to travel this day. Later this year, the Corn Palace will host the national pedal pull competition, where the state winners will all vie for the national title.

We thought the columns in the foyer were nicely tiled to look like huge multi-colored corn cobs.

The many-colored real cobs were also on display.

While the inside murals stay for years, the outside murals are replaced every year. The theme for the 2025 murals were "Wonders of the World." At one time the plans were painstakingly colored and plotted by hand. Now the images are computer-generated into a giant paint-by-number grid that will use local seeds and cobs instead of paint.

The murals were still a work in progress in August. Looking at the side of the Corn Palace, we could see that most of the work was done on the murals.

But the decorative finishes around the murals were not completed. You can see Denisa standing at the base of the wall to give some degree of the size of the palace.

We took a closer picture of the finished mural of Australia's Opera House.

Besides using corn cobs, they also make use of native grasses and seeds. This section had the grasses outlining the stars, and the golden straw stars. The star of the show in Mitchell, South Dakota is definitely the Corn Palace. Even though we drove right by some of South Dakota's biggest tourist sites, we'll give a big thumbs up to some of the state's lesser known stops.