we woke up bright and early to the sound of groaning bison, made a pancake breakfast on the nifty camping stove, then sat around reading until 10 am.
we went for a hike through peach gray canyons. it was hot, the trail was challenging (log ladder up a rock wall, narrow pathways, dry and crumbling ground), and we were euphoric by the end of it.
the badlands is an incredible and unearthly place, yet the landscape is true earth, earth stripped absolutely bare.
there are these rather big yellow grasshoppers all over sage creek (the place where we pitched our tent) and they will eat anything, including their dead.
this morning i found them piled on top of each other trying to get at my toothpaste spit from last night. despite their tendency towards invasion and scavenging, they look like pretty little intricately painted bug figurines.
the winds picked up around noon and by the time we returned to our campsite (about twenty miles from the trail) our tent had collapsed on itself and a pole had splintered. we decided to pack up immediately and try to fix the tent elsewhere, since the sky was darkening, the wind was not subsiding, and rain seemed near.
to backtrack, we've had a particularly rich reserve of energy lately. i mean, we arrived in the badlands after eight hours of driving through the early morning.
we left omaha at 1:30 am after hanging out in someone's basement at a punk/hardcore show.
i guess it wasn't easy to leave - we ended up really getting along with the people who housed us and found the city interesting in an indescribable way.
courtney drove from 1:30 until 6:30 and saw the sun rise in south dakota while i was passed out, and she slept while i drove from 6:30 until 9:30.
rural south dakota in the early morning is enough to bring on a spiritual experience.
we set up the tent around 10:30 and napped from 11 until 5.
dinner was black beans with nutritional yeast and wild rice.
the sky made its way from indigo to the palest lavender to dark cobalt and we were asleep again by 10.
so since we've been in the swing of spontaneous departures, we decided three in the afternoon would be a good a time as any to travel from the badlands to the black hills. unfortunately, the map we have handy doesn't designate campgrounds; all the motel rates are ridiculous because of the sturgis motorcycle rally.
luckily, we found an affordable room at the rocket motel.
a real sink and shower and flushing toilet. and a bed. and a portrait of mt. rushmore above it.
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