Second stop: a bit harrowing - Day 862 (Yr 3, Day 129)

Beresford, SD

Timing went pretty well: we were able to leave around the time we had hoped (8am) and arrived at 1:00.  It would have been closer to noon if not for the little delay....

The first order of harrow was that despite my instinct and confidence that we needed to make a right turn out of the campground, the GPS was telling us to go left and Mitch insisted I do so (I took the first leg of driving).  That led us about a mile down a dirt road with nothing but nothing as far as the eye could see, except for a small driveway which looked like it had something at the end of it.  Turns out it was some kind of parking lot leading to an airport runway, so we were able to turn around without having to go into reverse.  That was about a 15 minute delay.

For the most part, the scenery on the 3 1/2 hour drive was nothing but farmlands (mostly wheat) and pastures with a few cows dotting the land.  So much wide open space this country has!  Boring to drive through, but grateful that it was uneventful and mostly flat land.

The second part of harrow was when we got off the exit.  We are staying in a state park (first time -- Union Grove State Park).  We didn't realize that there was a detour to the park (actually, there was a sign before the exit, but I had read online that there was construction during the summer.  I kind of thought they meant it was only during the summer and they just didn't update the website.  WRONG!).  We got as far as about 500 feet from the entrance, where the road was closed, and needed to turn around and go back to the highway and get off at a different exit.  But was there an easy place to turn around??  Fortunately, we caught a small break in the road where we were able to just very barely turn around without having to do a K turn.  Mind you, this isn't like turning a car -- think of a huge semi truck!  Heading back to the highway, we missed our turn (these are single lane roads with nothing on either side except farmland) and landed up going about 10 miles out of the way to pick up the highway again.  We took the detour exit and hoped there would be signs leading us to the park, since the GPS kept telling us to go back to the original exit.  Thankfully, there were signs and we landed up on the other side of the road block.

Third harrow: the roads in the park.  This is the first time we've ever stayed in a state park.  They are known to be quite beautiful, but not being private campgrounds, are often somewhat primitive and not designed for big rigs.  I chose this place because they had a pull through site (no way on earth we'd ever be able to back in here!) with electric.  The roads were very narrow and very loopy.  Mitch navigated it like a real pro!  We had a map of the campground and it appeared that the campsites should have been very close to the entrance.  After riding all around, we determined we were probably lost.  Suddenly, two guys on a golf cart came riding by (probably sanitation workers?) and we asked them to show us where we were on the map and how to get to the camping area.  They had no clue and pointed to a place on the map far away (but said the whole place loops around so eventually we'd get there if we just followed the road).  So we continued and discovered that about 500 feet away was the campground!!!  We must have gone full circle without realizing it (and clearly, neither did they).

If we thought yesterday's place was quiet and serene, this place is wildly remote - true wilderness in the woods.  Here are some photos: first 2 are from my front door; the other is from the other side of the trailer:

    

It's too bad that we're not hikers; there are many good trails around here.  In fact, one trail starts right outside our campsite, so maybe we can take a short walk down the trail later.  For now, I need to work, and Mitch has started on one of his many projects (today it's rewiring cables in the truck so he can plug in his chargers).