Before the Park
The alarm goes off at 7:00am. I swear, it does not matter how enchanting of an alarm sound you choose, it becomes an irritant quickly. Maybe I should invest in one of those watches that wakes you up when you're in a decent part of your sleep cycle to be woken up in, because I swear my body chooses to be in its deepest slumber at the time my alarm is set to go off.
It's our last day staying in The Rushmore Hotel + Suites, so we hop in the shower, get dressed, pack our things, and check out of our room. We walk down to the car, load our luggage into the back, and hop into the front seats. I'm driving, and Jeremy is in the passenger seat.
"What should we do for breakfast?" I ask.
"I was thinking of this place I found last night when I was Googling places for us to go," Jeremy replies.
"Okay," I say. Normally I would ask more questions, but I am starving, and I trust him. "How do I get there?"
Jeremy directs me to a charming café called Harriet + Oak. We go inside and get a two-person little table next to the window so that we can keep an eye on our vehicle since it has our possessions in it. Jeremy orders an iced pumpkin spice latte with a breakfast sandwich. I order a hot maple nut latte with a peanut butter chocolate waffle. I would not normally order a waffle, as my experiences with waffles have included frozen L'eggo waffles and hotel continental breakfast waffles, but my goodness - someone else had one at their table and it looked thick like a fluffy pancake and delicious.
The waffle at Harriet + Oak has forever changed my mind on waffles. I now love them, and by "them" I mean the thick fluffy waffles. I still am not fond of the thinner, frozen ones.
Entering Wind Cave National Park
We finish eating, hop back into the car, and say goodbye to Rapid City. Next destination: Wind Cave National Park. The Park itself is only about an hour away from Rapid City and the drive goes relatively quickly. Jeremy is giving me directions as I drive, and we have music playing. We have a tour scheduled for this morning to see the actual cave the park is named after, but we have plenty of time to make it.
We decide to drive straight to the Visitor's Center regardless, just for peace of mind, and so that we can look around the Center. We plan to drive around the Park after the cave tour. Upon entering the park, there is no admission booth where you have to pay a fee. You just have to pay for the tours of the cave, which is fine. I ruin the plan to go straight to the Visitor's Center when there is a bison grazing on the side of the road. I stop the car to get a photograph of him, and then we continue our journey to the original destination.
Visitor's Center
We park the car and walk into the Visitor's Center. There are three Park Rangers at the front desk who greet us. We ensure that our names are on the list for the morning Garden of Eden Tour, and then we go and explore the exhibits. The Visitor's Center is very well put together. There are interesting interactive displays showing caves around the United States, and information regarding the sacred meaning the Wind Cave has for First Nations peoples.
I also really like the building. It has those windows I like, the ones with the lines going through them like quaint cottage? I decide to take a photograph through one of those windows showing the walking path and land outside.
Garden of Eden Tour
The Park Rangers let us know to all meet on the lower floor of the building, so we head down. Ranger Peelee comes down and announces that they will be our tour guide. They let us know that we will be walking outside for a bit to get to another building, and from there we will take an elevator down into the cave. They forewarn us that there will be steps within the cave, and basically gives us a last "out" before we take off.
We all gather as a group and walk down the sidewalk I had taken a picture of from the window upstairs, and enter another building further down the path. We have to go down the elevator in smaller groups. Jeremy and I are one of the first people to go down, and then we find ourselves in a dimly lit semi-round room. The tour guide stands guard in front of the door that opens into the cave, and we wait for the other people to come down the elevator. A younger person is standing against the wall staring at their camera and asks their mom how they will take photos of the cave without using flash. I meander over to them and offer a crash course in manual settings. I get them set up with what my camera is set to and let them know they may have to adjust depending on the amount of light in the cave.
The rest of the people on the tour join us in the semi-circular room, and then we all walk single file into the cave. Ranger Peelee leads us into this open space, and uses their flashlight to light up the ceiling of the cave. They tell us that we are looking at boxwork. Wind Cave National Park has a large concentration of this rare cave formation. They then break into a small performance where they sing to us a song about how boxwork is formed. As minerals build up in the cracks of limestone, the limestone itself starts eroding, but the mineral build up erodes at a slower pace creating this lace-like boxwork formation.
About halfway into the tour, Ranger Peelee turns off the lights to show us what it was like exploring the caves in the dark. I can now assure you that I would absolutely have not been a spelunker back in the day.
On the way out of the cave, we stop to see a rock called The Heart of the Cave. It literally looks like an anatomically-mostly-correct heart, and it's honestly a bit magical.
The path leads up to the elevator room room, and we go up in groups. The tour is now officially over, so we are free to roam the park.
Wind Cave's Natural Entrance
Jeremy and I walk along the path, beyond the Visitor's Center, to the other side of it where the only Natural Entrance to Wind Cave can be found.
Ranger Peelee had told us about the significance that the Natural Entrance has to the Oceti Sakowin peoples. Wind Cave is the place where the birth of their people took place. As souls become ready to join this world they emerge from the Wind Cave to take on the human form. However, if a soul left too soon, it would take on the form of the bison. The First Nations will come to the Wind Cave Natural Entrance and leave prayer cloths, which can look like strips of cloth tied to branches. Out of respect, it is asked that you do not photograph the prayer cloths when you are there.
They call the Natural Entrance Maka Oniye which means "breathing Earth", which is beautiful. Differences in air pressure between the surface and underground inside the cave causes air to either blow into the cave or out of the cave. Today the wind is blowing gently out of the cave.
The Trail Back to the Car
We walk around the trail that goes around the Visitor's Center. It is a beautifully maintained trail surrounded by nature. I love that they even made the steps in the trail out of stone that matches the landscape. We then walk back inside the building. We look around the gift shop but nothing really catches our eye, so we grab a map of the park and head out to further explore the park.
Exploring the Park
We make it back to the car and get inside. Jeremy is driving so that I can take pictures. We don't make it very far before we see a small herd of bull bison. They are just grazing and being lazy, and I get some pictures of them. One is rolling around on the ground, but it's further away. As quickly as I can, with Jeremy helping me, I switch out my standard zoom for my prime telephoto lens. It's a bit too late however, as the bison is now standing up and shaking the dust off of his fur.
We also come across a few pronghorn just walking along, enjoying their day. I'm enjoying my day too! I love it when I am given the gift of being able to spend time with the wild animals (from a safe distance, of course).
We end up on some dirt road that goes around what feels like perimeter of the park. It's on this road where we cross a little wooden bridge over Beaver Creek where we stop for more photographs. The road does eventually lead us out of the park, and then we go to the town nearby for lunch.
