Mt. Rushmore, The Badlands, & Mitchell, SD

Hurrah! Have a connection, so will try to get caught up!
I think it was day before yesterday when we left the Mt. Rushmore area and drove toward the Badlands. (Have been on the road a month and still enjoying sunny weather.) As we left I-90 and headed down Rte. 44 the landscape began to change and we were into the Grasslands-lots of cattle-and horses. And gradually the landscape began to change to some pretty foreign (to our eyes) land and rock formations. Eventually we passed through the official entrance to Badlands Nat'l Park (once again thanks for our Senior Pass) and the landscape really got bizarre. We stopped to explore the strange looking scenery. ( Hope I will be able to attach photos! ) We walked across the pathway of packed limestone-was hard as pavement, then climbed up onto some of the protrusions and the view through a break in the rocks was beyond description. I don't have the words to describe it. Hank says it sort of looks like a giant had been building sand castles! A bit farther on we stopped again to walk on a wooden boardwalk out into the formations a bit. It was a bit disconcerting to see a sign along that boardwalk that read " Beware of Snakes" showing a curled up rattler...Fortunately for both me and the snakes they didn't show themselves and any self-respecting snake would have been far away from all the spectators that day! Knowing we still had some mileage to put on we headed for Mitchell, SD where we'd spend the night in a gravel parking lot with an electric and water hook-up which euphemistically called itself a campground.
Have not been successful with photos, sorry!