dakota road trip, day 4

after all the climbing and hiking and sunshine and outside-ness of the badlands, it was time to get to rapid city. the kids finished up the junior ranger workbooks, took an oath, got some badges, and said good bye to those good badlands.


(on our way out of the park, we found a giant prairie dog statue, and assumed it must be the world's biggest prairie dog, so we took a picture with it. we were wrong. it's not the world's largest prairie dog).


we spent the next day in the metropolitan rapid city. it's a little big city at the base of the black hills,  just a short drive from the badlands. it's a cool little city full of street art and presidential statues and restaurants and stuff. it also happens to have a big dinosaur park at the top of a hill.

after our hilltop dinosaur riding session, we checked out the presidential walk in rapid city.

(how americana american is this george washington statue on the corner in front of a starbucks, eh?)

and then it was break time. hotel. water park. pizza. break.