South Dakota Trip: Needles Hike and Devil's Tower

For our last day in South Dakota, we woke up early for one last hike in Custer State Park. We hiked to the Needles rock formation, and it was glorious!

Of course little Mr. Fearless found some good places to scramble up rocks. He looks so high up in this picture, but I promise we didn't let him get that far up. 

After our hike, we packed up and hit the road for Devil's Tower. On the way, Michael insisted we stop in Sturgis. 

Outside of the motorcycle rally once a year, it's a tiny little town. We found a fun little local diner and stopped for lunch. Michael not so sneakily told them we were celebrating my birthday, so they sang to me (much to my chagrin). 

After lunch Michael had to take the kids to look at bikes. Conrad left OBSESSED and asking for a motorcycle for Christmas. 

By this point in the trip, kids were TIRED. They enjoyed a much needed nap on the rest of the drive to Devil's Tower. 

I heard Devils' Tower was a must see, and I'm so glad we went. It's incredible! So much taller than I expected especially since all the surrounding land is just gentle rolling prairie. 

We hiked around the base of the tower and enjoyed some amazing views. 

We were able to get a campsite right in the park with this amazing view! We were all a bit worried though because we were back in Wyoming and rain was in the forecast again... 

It rained steadily again all night, but with a better set up we stayed dry! However, I kept hearing this odd sound in the night. It was clearly an animal crying out, but it didn't sound very big and I couldn't place the sound at all. At dawn I peeked out of the tent and spotted a poor baby raccoon! It must have gotten separated from his mom in the storm and kept crying out to her.  

He cried all night until he was hoarse - poor little thing! When we woke up and started cooking breakfast, he didn't want to leave the tree near our tent. After he tried climbing up and fell from exhaustion, I wrapped him up in a towel and moved him across the road. He fell asleep all curled up in the towel. The kids LOVED him and were so worried about what would happen to him. We let the rangers know and they were coming to check on him as we left. Hopefully they helped the little guy. 

After an amazing week,  it was time to head home. One last funny story... we stopped at a rest stop near Echo, UT and discovered hundreds of ground squirrels living around the bathrooms. Lenora, who's a bit obsessed with squirrels, started making her crazy squirrel face at one. It charged at her and chased her inside! We almost died laughing. These guys seem like a tough bunch. On the way out, we spotted a cannibal squirrel nibbling at a dead comrade in the parking lot. My kids will forever remember that rest stop for the "demon cannibal squirrels!"

We loved this trip and everything about South Dakota! We will definately be planning another fun road trip next year!