More from Custer

 The drive to Custer on Friday was for

 1) geocaching 

2) burgers 

3) pie

and in that order. After visiting the Gordon Stockade we drove along Main Street looking for the burger place where we ate several years ago. Guess what? It is now a pizza joint. So we walked until we found the Buglin' Bull for Hubby's burger and my Rueben. Yummy food, but way too much.

these two cats watched me eat

the first jail in Custer

Wilbur Todd the builder of the jail was its first occupant, having gotten drunk and disorderly on the money paid to him by the city for completing the job.

window was too small and barred too well to see inside

there was a Fort Custer, but nothing remains 

just a sign noting its location and purpose

a drive by look at the progress on the Crazy Horse Monument

geocaching virtual reward

The city of Custer has bison statues on street corners. I had not seen this one before. 

this one is my favorite

Our very best geocache find today was this one. Well hidden. Found by Hubby.

Custer once was home to the Flintstone Village

also the location of that very sneaky geocache hide

Sometime this afternoon I reached 30,800 geocache finds!

then it was pie time

resident mascot

Strawberry-Rhubarb pie

our reward for the day of geocaching

Mount Rushmore drive by on the way to Hart Ranch

we're not in St. Louis!

entrance to the closed Sitting Bull Crystal Cave

North of East Glacier

 We saw all we wanted to see from the east side of Glacier National Park and since there weren't many places to explore, we headed north towards the Canadian border to find some geocaches.

I am not certain if we are heading north or south when I took this photo. The mountains are of Glacier National Park. The smokey haze is still evident.

We had not planned to cross into Alberta once Hubby read the requirements. We had our passports along, but did not plan to get a 72 hour covid test prior to crossing. This closed border crossing is at Chief Mountain.

This is Chief Mountain. It reminded us of Devils Tower in WY.  

This designation was near the border crossing at Chief Mountain. It was the first time I had seen a sign referencing the park as Waterton-Glacier. The maps given to visitors labels the national park as Waterton-Glacier.

This is the third Blackfeet Nation sign we have encountered near Glacier National Park. This sign was near the Piegan Border Crossing.

We stopped to look for a geocache similar to the one we found near East Glacier Village on similar metal art.

Hub caps are used for the eyes on all of the horses. I recognized other car parts on the native riders.

The tails of the horses are of rusted barbed wire.

While we were looking for the geocache that appears to be missing, a car drove into the parking area and asked if we could help with an online form to enter Canada. Further discussion led to helping a native mother of my age and her daughter, the age of our daughter, with completing an online form so they could visit relatives in Carway, across the border. The sad piece is, these two women had all their information in paper form, but the border guard would not accept the originals. We spent at least an hour trying to help them. The mother needed her email address for the form. She didn't remember it. The daughter had a temperamental cell phone that turned off and on when it wanted. Finally, patience won and the forms were completed, photos of paperwork uploaded, and the two of them headed back to the border. We have no idea if they were able to cross as we headed back to our campground in St. Mary.

The conversation we had with the two women was so interesting. The mother and Hubby visited while I was helping the daughter. Both mother and daughter had attended school in Flandreau SD. The mother shared the information about the 3 Blackfeet Nation metal art; one at each entrance to the land of the Blackfeet. I hope they were able to visit their family whom they had not seen in 2 years.

These bison are one of three Double T herds on land of the Blackfeet Nation. Each herd is about 300 animals and owned by billionaire businessman Joe Ricketts. Ricketts is a longtime proponent of the health benefits of bison meat, including lower fat and cholesterol. His family is the majority owner of the Chicago Cubs, which serves many bison products at Wrigley Field.

This is a photo of Lower Saint Mary Lake. It is on the north side of the road to the east entrance of Glacier National Park. (The lake in Glacier National Park is Saint Mary Lake.) The lake nor the land around it are commercialized and no houses line its shore.

We were ready to move to West Glacier and explore new-to-us territory.

Traveling Through Colorado

The original plan was to spend 6 nights in Colorado, but the possibility of snow storms brought about Plan B. (2 nights at Lamar, 2 nights at Alamosa, and 2 nights at Montrose) We skipped the 2 nights at Montrose and boogied to Utah, in what we hoped would be ahead of the freezing rain, snow and below freezing temps.

So this post is a summary of some of what we saw in southern Colorado while driving to out of the way places to find a geocache in a new county.

this is the CO county map prior to our trip

These photos are most likely not in order of our traveling days, but they will give an idea of the variety in flora and fauna, as well as our geocache finds.

interesting cemetery family plot

including a mural painted brick wall

not a bad view for a final resting place

again, one of those places we found not knowing its significance

June 24, 1895 – May 31, 1983

Jack Dempsey

"William Harrison "Jack" Dempsey, nicknamed Kid Blackie, and The Manassa Mauler, was an American professional boxer who competed from 1914 to 1927, and reigned as the world heavyweight champion from 1919 to 1926.~ Wikipedia"

our view one morning at we headed north into the mountains

gray skies, but beautiful fall colors

mountain peaks above the low lying clouds (fog)

a bison 

A sign several miles down the road advertised meat for sale: beef, elk, rabbit, bison, deer, etc. Buses and RVs welcome. Oh, and jerky for sale. We passed.

a marker honoring The Old Spanish Trail

and the first settlement in western San Luis Valley 

a water tank along the train tracks for filling 

the ol' steam locomotives (South Fork CO)

a passenger train car, also in South Fork

windshield view on the way up to Wolf Pass

no photos on the way down

Chimney Rock on our way to the UT border

a small herd of 5 deer on the sidewalk of one of the 

communities we drove through

they even posed for the photo

We had hoped to get those nine counties in the southwest area, but alas, the weather...I guess we will just have to come back another time...Thirteen new counties on this trip. Not bad for 5 days and about 1000 miles.

We are now in Utah. Winter has come to the area, but it will be a passing through in a day. We can deal with cold. We left SD so we would not have to deal with snow!

Next Stop ~ Purple Pie Place

After completing the check list in Hot Springs, we headed north to the next requested stop - Custer. Our first stop was...

...Purple Pie Place

We were still very content after the Red Shed Smokehouse lunch, but we also know, the choices of pie become slimmer as the day gets shorter.

So we stopped as we drove into town, and ordered our selections to go.

Hubby and I chose Strawberry Rhubarb, and OFD chose the last slice of Banana Cream. In fact, it was the last of their cream pies. We enjoyed the pie later in the evening, and it was just as delicious as lunch. Well worth the stop.

We needed to walk off the pork lunch, so OFD and I checked out the shops and painted buffalo (bison) on the corners of Main Street.

The idea for the painted buffalo came about in 2005 when then Gov. Rounds threw out the 2010 Initiative which challenged communities to come up with ways to broaden economic development in their communities. Concerned Custer citizens realized the need to develop some event that would bring visitors into town for a longer period of time. 

Custer citizens wanted something that would complement the buffalo roundup in Custer State Park held the last Saturday in September. The roundup brings roughly 10,000 people to the area each fall. Bringing people into Custer would be a boost to the town's economy. 

According to my google research, the display of painted bison has done just that as they are mentioned in many travel blogs of Black Hills visitors. We did our part to add to the town's economy!

The sculptures are made of fiberglass with a polyurethane shell. Each sculpture is nearly 8 feet long, 2-1/2 feet wide, and slightly more than 5 feet tall at the hump.

It started as a bison art show, showcasing the talents of 20 artists from SD, MT, WY, ND, NM and NE using a variety of mediums and art forms.

Now there is a herd of sixteen painted bison, half of which migrate from Colleen Hennessy's yard in Custer around Memorial Day weekend to the corners of Main Street. The herd is rounded up and brought back to her yard after the Custer State Park's Buffalo Round-Up.

Hennessy owns many of the herd of statues. Each statue is unique in it's design. Most depict some Black Hills history, story or significance.

my favorite

I liked the mask wearing horses I saw on our way out of town. As an aside, we wore our masks when we were out and about, as did many other people; not all of them, of course, but many of them. Some stores had signs asking everyone to wear a mask. The gift shop at Mt. Rushmore handed them out as you entered the shop, along with a squirt of sanitizer. If we ate out, it usually was outdoors or at a time that wasn't typically a meal time. Some places had a lot of visitors and other places, not so much. Overall, we felt it was a good "second choice" vacation location.

On our way back to the campground, we stopped to see the Crazy Horse Monument.

OFD commented Crazy Horse did not have a nose when she last saw him, so I guess there are changes to the monument. We just don't notice those changes as we see it almost every year.

The end of another day playing tourists in the Black Hills. This was the sunset we enjoyed while enjoying our Purple Pie choices.