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Gering (Scotts Bluff), NE

Gering (Scotts Bluff), NE

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Scotts Bluff and Gering are two towns in south western Nebraska with the main draw for tourists here being the Oregon and California emigration trails along with the Pony Express going through the area as our nation grew westward in the mid-1800’s. The bluff that sits here, Scotts Bluff (as opposed to the town of Scotts Bluff) was a major landmark in the area used by emigrants while navigating the trails through Mitchell Pass. Scotts Bluff was named for Hiram Scott, an employee of the Rocky Mountain Fur Company, who died in the vicinity of the bluff in 1826 after being abandoned by his companions after becoming ill.

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Hill City, SD

Hill City, SD

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We spent a week near Hill City primarily to see Mount Rushmore and to visit a few of the nearby towns. As you will soon find out, we didn’t even know about Custer State Park when we did our original planning but we’re sure glad we were tipped off to it when someone found out we were going to be in the area. We were sure glad we didn’t miss it as we took more pictures there than anywhere else. The featured image at the top of this post is of Sylvan Lake within the park and is one of my favorite pictures of all time. The beauty in this part of South Dakota is just unbelievable!

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West Yellowstone, MT

West Yellowstone, MT

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We spent 18 days in West Yellowstone taking in the local attractions and seeing as much of Yellowstone National Park as we could. Even though there are museums and other things to do in the town of West Yellowstone (like shopping for the ladies :-)) the big attraction here is of course Yellowstone National Park. While I’ll talk about that more later, let’s just say that Yellowstone absolutely must be on your bucket list if you have never been before!

West Yellowstone is an ideal place to stay (unless you are inside the park somewhere) because from there you can easily get to anywhere in the park without too much of a drive. Of course, too much is relative. The park is very large so you will be doing a lot of driving but from the west side you’re sort of in the middle of the action and you are also closest to the most popular sites within the park such as Old Faithful.

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Devils Tower, WY

Devils Tower, WY

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Bear Lodge is one of many Indian names given to the tower. Other American Indian names include Bear’s Tipi, Home of the Bear, Tree Rock and Great Gray Horn. Many Indians believed a bear scratched the side of the “mountain” with its claws and then lived inside the structure. Col. Richard Dodge translated the name to Devils Tower in 1875 and the name stuck. Some contend that Col. Dodge simply got a bad translation of the indigenous name; others say it was an intentional renaming. Dodge led a military expedition in the area to confirm reports of gold in the Black Hills and to survey the area. Scientists at that time thought the tower was the core of an ancient volcano. Recent data suggests it is actually an igneous intrusion. About 50 million years ago molten magma was forced into sedimentary rock above and then it cooled underground. As it cooled it contracted and fractured into columns. Over millions of years, erosion of the sedimentary rock exposed the tower.

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Hardin, MT

Hardin, MT

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Hardin is a small town of about 3500 people in south eastern Montana. It was incorporated in 1911 and Thomas D. Campbell operated the nation’s largest wheat farm on 95,000 acres near there while pioneering the use of industrial machinery in farming. The Holly Sugar Company also established a sugar beet–processing plant in Hardin in 1937. Interestingly, with Hardin being in the middle of nowhere, Bitcoin miner Marathon apparently has a large mining operation in Hardin today because of low cost coal fired power generation nearby. With efforts to close down the coal fired plant, solar is being built to replace the coal. So what was the draw here for us? The Little Bighorn Battlefield is about 15 miles south of Hardin.

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