Take me back to the Black Hills . . .

Call me a geek, but I love the movie Calamity Jane with Doris Day and whenever I go to the Black Hills of South Dakota I must sing "Take me back to the Black Hills, the Black Hills of Dakota.  To the beautiful Indian country that I love . . ."

And I do love the Black Hills.  I have so many happy memories of that place and I am very glad that I finally got to share this place with my family.  A few weekends ago we ended up in the Black Hills for a mini vacation.  Hammy has always wanted to see "the Faces" and of course visit Reptile Gardens.  We were also able to throw in some go-carts, bumper boats, miniature golf and Homecoming dress shopping.  And for good measure we threw in a flat tire.  I am not sure what my favorite part of the trip was, but I loved spending the long weekend with our family, even though it had to have been the hottest weekend of the summer. I also forgot, the kids were able to kayak and paddle-boat at the camp we stayed at.  We packed a whole lot into three days and had a ball.

We started out with a tour of the Badlands of South Dakota, which were amazing, but I am still partial to the Badlands of North Dakota for whatever reason.

If you know me, you know what this sign did to my heart-rate.  I am not sure if I saw much of the view after I saw this sign, my eyes were on the ground determined to not have another run in with a rattler!

This is Tank, the Tortoise.  He was the 'young' one at Reptile Gardens at the youthful age of 70.

The reason we went.  Gators, Crocs, & Snakes! Oh, my!!!!

I know they are hard to view, but I think if you click on it you should be able to see better.  We finished our trip with a stop in Deadwood, which by the way, is not so much history and mostly casino, casino, casino.  They did have a place with go-karts and that was all the kids needed.  We also visited Mt. Rushmore and had a great trek on their walking path.  I learned quite a bit, that I did not know about this historic site.  Great memories were had by all, if you haven't visited the Black Hills before, you should.

Oh, and if you can't see it very well, take a closer look at the purple flowers . . . that is a hummingbird moth.  What an amazing creature, I had never seen one before.  Amazing!!! God is so creative!