While We Were Gone...

 This is an update on the garden plants and flower bed.

the tomato plants grew!

every plant has blossoms

two of the four plants have tomatoes

The tomato plants have never looked so good and healthy. I watched several videos this year about planting tomatoes and the two tips I used seem to have made a difference. I am impressed...so far. The plants got another shot of fertilizer and hopefully some more rain this weekend.

the cucumbers have also grown

I got them 'tied' so they will climb the trellis. There are lots of blossoms and numerous itty bitty cucumbers. A huge improvement over last summer when the blossoms did not produce a single cucumber!

 

I don't know if the marigolds helped or if I just got lucky with the starter plants I bought. Whatever the reason, the first cucumber will go to the neighbor for watering while we were playing in the Black Hills. He will get it before July 4th! It was about 2 inches long on Friday when I took the photo.

the mint and basil 

This is how everything looked on the June 2nd post: The Garden, the Flowers & the Perennial Flower Bed

I have tried for many years to grow poppies. I planted two last year and one survived the winter (and lack of snow cover). I was trilled to see a bud when I checked it on Tuesday.

The wild roses between my flower bed and the neighbors potato patch are doing very well. Even if I did not get photos while in the Black Hills, there's wild roses here at home.

bugs were busy on this flower

The daisies did not reemerge in the perennial bed, but this lovely bunch is growing in the ditch behind our townhouses. It wasn't there last year.

The poppy bud one day later. It should open this weekend! Yippee!

the poppy on Friday afternoon

the tag from this perennial is long gone

but it came back

pretty flowers

I threw of box of bird and butterfly flower seeds along the edge of the perennial bed. Some of those flowers and numerous milk weed plants are growing. That bed needs some serious attention as the grass and thistles are also growing, but high 80ºs and 90º is just too warm to be pulling weeds. I will get it cleaned up as it appears the city mowers are leaving the area alone. Woo Hoo!

Date Night

 I had a date night with my grandson on Wednesday this week. We attended a production of Stomp at the Washington Pavilion. We started the evening with dinner at the restaurant of his choice. 

Stomp is a percussion group, originating in Brighton, England, that uses the body and ordinary objects to create a physical theatre performance using rhythms, acrobatics and pantomime. ~ Wikipedia

In the performance we saw, the 8 musician used brooms, suitcases, shopping carts, plastic pails, newspapers, floating tubes, hub caps, metal garbage cans and other items I can't remember. Photos during the performance were not allowed.

McBe, almost 12 years old,  is a percussionist and I thought he would enjoy seeing a percussion performance. We enjoyed the 1 hour 45 minute show and especially enjoyed the comedic performer. We ended the evening with a stop for ice cream. He was home by 10:00 PM.

Wild Flowers in the Black Hills

 As we come to the end of this stay in the Black Hills, I am posting photos of the wild flowers I noticed as we geocached in the area. I don't know the name of most of them. Enjoy the colors.

a delicate violet looking flower

pine cone used as reference to its size

white with protruding yellow stamen

wild iris

lilacs in Custer

more yellow flowers

single blue flower on a single delicate stem

the glove in reference to size of ground flower

up close

more of the yellow flowers

wild phlox (I think)

we called them purple rockets 

delicate petals

I also saw some flowering wild roses, but did not get to them. Maybe next trip...

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

The Gordon Stockade

 We spent some time in Custer on this camping trip and because of geocaching we stopped at the Gordon Stockade. On my first visit to the stockade on the east side of Custer, I thought it was a fort, like an army fort. Even today as I walked into the stockade center area, I was thinking fort. It wasn't until I read the info I finally understood - stockade:civilians.

the gold mining feature is a new addition to the stockade display

after all, it IS the reason for the stockade

There are also informational signs along the walk way from the parking area to the stockade, sharing information about the history of the area and the problems that evolved when gold was discovered in the Black Hills.

cabins to the left of the entrance

In the summer of 1874, an expedition led by Lt. Col. George A. Custer discovered gold in the Black Hills. Under the 1868 Treaty of Fort Laramie this region belonged to the Plains Indians and white settlement was prohibited.

Each of the six smaller settler's cabins contained a massive stone fireplace, in tact. The cabin was only twice the size of the area seen in the photo; room for a bed and little else.

Word of the discovery spread quickly and a group of gold seekers from Sioux City, Iowa moved into the Black Hills the following winter. Upon their arrival, the Gordon Party built a log fortress on the bank of the French Creek to protect themselves from possible Lakota attacks.

original tree/log stumps next to the current rebuilt cabin wall

three settler cabins to the right of the entrance

These three cabins were in serious need of repair. This one had lost its roof. The other two had either gapping holes in the roof or the roof beams were beginning to rot.

The party's stay was short lived and not profitable. Within five months the US Cavalry removed the Gordon Party from the Black Hills. 

Go to the SDPS website listed at the end to find out what happened to the Gordon Party of 28.

gun holes in the walls of the stockade

I LOVE where geocaching takes us...sometimes. I enjoy knowing the history and the reasons why. We also found a nearby geocache that shared this info: the discovery of gold in the Black Hills on July 27, 1874 by Horatio Ross and William McKay. They were miners with General George Custer's expedition.

This South Dakota Public Broadcasting site: The Gordon Stockade has great photos of how the original stockade looked and more information of how it came to be what it is today.