Off and running!

Our epic journey has begun! On Tuesday around 8:30 AM, Bobby and I started out trek out West from my house in Evanston. We made it to Minneapolis by night fall and were able to stay with the Copeland family. They treated us very well and were more than generous with food. We thank them very much and hope they have a great rest of a summer. The next part of our trip took us through Minnesota and South Dakota. Minnesota was not totally what I expected. It was mostly farm land and didn't see as many lakes as I thought I would. South Dakota was quite the same until we passed over the Missouri River and were delighted to see some rolling hills. The rest of our drive to the Badlands was much more scenic than the first few hours after Minneapolis.
After driving all across South Dakota we found ourselves at the Badlands. We got out of the car at the first scenic over look and it is hard to describe how beautiful it was. The Badlands are essential prairie and these clay/dirt formations with all differenent colors. We saw formations with yellows, reds, and greens. After an hour or so of driving through the park we decided to take a detour to Wall, SD. In Wall there is the famous Wall Drug which we saw about 1,000 advertisements for on our way through South Dakota. It was essential a place of souveniors and tons of worthless crap. Although they did have free ice water, but Bobby and I passed on that. We headed to the grocery store and got some provisions for the night.
Entering back into the Badlands we drove to our remote camp site. As we drove along the dirt road we were able to see some bison roaming around. When we got to the actual camp site we were pleasantly greeted by a live bison about 10 feet from my car. We both took some pictures, but hastily got out of their when it looked like he no longer wanted to be our model. The camp site was on the other side of the park and didn't have to many other people there, but it did have three bison roaming around it about 50 feet from our tents. We set up camp and cooked a great dinner of scrambled eggs. Before it got to dark out we decided to take a mini hike up to the nearest hill and watch as the sun went down. Before going to bed we decided to meet some fellow campers who were from Minnesota and Columbia. They had met each other in Japan as high school exchange students and were essentially doing the same route as us over the next month.
We were pretty much undisturbed during the night and luckily were not trampled by any bison roaming through the camp site. Apparently we will be early risers during the trip as we woke up at 5:45 and were ready to go. We had some more scrambled egss and got ready for an off trail hike through the Badlands. The hike can be summed up as very muddy. It had rained recently and the clay/mud stuck to our boots like gum. At times we were walking on about 5 inches of mud on our boots. The hike was very nice and we saw a couple of bison and their babies, and were able to avoid the prairie rattle snakes.
I am writing you all now from Rapid City, SD in a bagel shop we found with free Wi-Fi. We will be headed to Mt. Rushmore and Crazy Horse in about half an hour and then headed out West again. We both feel Badlands was a great start and the rest of the trip has a lot to live up to. If you can make it out here some time I strongly recommend it. Hope you all are having a great summer and talk to you soon!

-Jordan