Roughlock Falls
When in Western South Dakota, one should make sure that Spearfish is on the “must see” list. Spearfish is a town on the north edge of the Black Hills, about 100 miles and 90 minutes north of us. The area is known for its beauty, clear creeks, waterfalls, and hiking. We intended to start out with a 3-mile hike. When we got into the area, we met a park official who talked us out of the hike. I’m not sure we made the best decision when we decided to skip that hike.
Spearfish Falls
We decided to move on to the waterfalls. There are three in the area. The most impressive are Roughlock Falls and Spearfish Falls. The entire area is stunningly beautiful. The creeks are perfectly clear. It was common to see people fly fishing, hiking, and of course taking pictures. It is easy to tell this is one of the most beautiful areas of the state, because there are many extremely upscale vacation homes in the area.
Studebaker Surrey
Our next stop was a museum in town. We saw many items that made us wonder why anybody would want to see them, such as various horse saddles. We saw a stagecoach that was used on the Spearfish – Deadwood line, one of the last stage coaches in regular use. We saw a surrey with a fringe on top, made by Studebaker. But the surprise find of the day was an Edison cylinder player, which I found way cool (and Danita ignored).
Edison Cylinder Player
The most interesting place we visited was the Termesphere Gallery. The artist is Dick Termes. His education was entirely in fine arts. But what he does is highly mathematical. He paints what one would see if standing in the middle of the room and slowly turning in a full circle. But he paints it on the outside of a sphere. He starts by precisely marking 6 points on the sphere: North, East, South, West, Up, and Down. Then he paints so each scene uses the correct vanishing points. It’s a precise mathematical transformation, done without formal math. One views the work by suspending it from the ceiling and using a motor to slowly rotate it. It’s very strange to view. Several of them are mind-blowing. Rather than try to take a picture, I’ll visit the website from time to time.
Since we didn’t do our hike, we had some extra time and decided to watch the movie “Dunkirk”. It was quite a strange experience. After watching 20 or 25 minutes of the movie, the picture went black. After a minute of sound but no picture, I went out to the lobby, saw the manager, and told her what happened. She acted like she knew what she had to do, so I went back to the theater. After another couple of minutes, the theater lights went on, the manager came in, and announced she would give us refunds. It was ideal for us. After seeing the first 1/3 of the movie, we decided we didn’t want to see the rest of it.
Bear Butte
Bear Butte
When we went to our hotel, we found a severe case of road construction in the middle of the town’s major interchange with the Interstate. There was no traffic control. The SD drivers were taking turns, one at a time, through 4 intersections within about 1/4 mile, and being very cautious about what they were doing. It was astonishing to see. Anywhere on the East Coast, the result would have been gridlock as every driver tried to force their way through. It took over 20 minutes to get through the mess. Danita had a nice swim, and the desk clerk told us how to bypass the traffic. We weren’t able to eat at the restaurant we wanted. Most days of the week, they are open for lunch and dinner. But on Mondays, they are open only for lunch. That’s pretty much the way things are done around here. There’s no predictability, rhyme, or reason. And information on the Internet isn’t updated to what they’re doing this month. It’s all part of the adventure!
Bear Bute
This morning we took a drive over to Bear Butte. This is a stunningly beautiful area. We intended to walk to the top of the butte, but weather was iffy. You can see the clouds in the pictures. We experienced occasional light rain. One never knows when light rain might turn into a major thunderstorm in the Black Hills. The first 1/2 of the walk went up a saddle peak almost as high as the main peak. We decided to enjoy this view and return to the car.
I hope this finds everybody doing well.