{"id":1311,"date":"2012-09-27T20:48:47","date_gmt":"2012-09-28T03:48:47","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/pjgardner.com\/travel\/?p=1311"},"modified":"2016-08-28T09:20:02","modified_gmt":"2016-08-28T16:20:02","slug":"september-27-fall-colors-in-south-dakota","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/pjgardner.com\/travel1\/2012\/09\/27\/september-27-fall-colors-in-south-dakota\/","title":{"rendered":"September 27: Fall Colors in South Dakota"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Spearfish<\/a>
Fall Foliage in Spearfish Canyon<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Mile 10,677 – Wall, South Dakota.<\/strong> New Englanders tend to turn up their noses at fall colors elsewhere.\u00a0 This morning, we drove through Spearfish Canyon, in\u00a0the Black Hills of South Dakota.\u00a0 Colors were at peak, and it was absolutely gorgeous.\u00a0 We did not expect this, but it was one of the highlights of the day.\u00a0 The other one was driving through Badlands National Park.<\/p>\n

We are running out of time on our trip and\u00a0we crammed in a lot the last day, so we\u00a0arrived in the Badlands in the late afternoon and stayed until sunset.\u00a0 The Badlands are stark and peaceful.\u00a0 It was kind of poignant: the last major attraction of our trip in the setting sun.\u00a0<\/p>\n

Earlier we\u00a0drove down the Needles Highway, in Custer State Park.\u00a0 P.J.’s Aunt Esther left a\u00a0pile of postcards of that 11-mile drive, and it was difficult to match them all in the time we had.\u00a0 But the highway is definitely unique and worth a visit:\u00a0two-billion-year-old, hard volcanic rocks (many “needle-like”) that were exposed after the surrounding soil eroded away over the eons.<\/p>\n

After the Needles Highway, we went to Mount Rushmore— we had to because P.J had never been there and Aunt Esther left post cards.\u00a0 When I was last there, I remember loudspeakers blaring with either patriotic music or propaganda, completely ruining any sort of experience for me.\u00a0 Now the memorial has been renovated (1998).\u00a0 The loudspeakers are gone, definitely an improvement.\u00a0\u00a0 But instead,\u00a0there is\u00a0an airport-style parking system that charges $11. National Park passes are not honored because it is a private concession.\u00a0 Our Mount Rushmore parking pass we bought today is valid until the end of the year!\u00a0 I’ll just have to fly back a couple of times to get my money’s worth (actually P.J. paid for it).\u00a0 From what I’ve read about George Washington, he might have disapproved of all that “royal treatment” in his honor.<\/p>\n

\"Needles<\/a>
Needles Highway, Custer State Park<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"Four<\/a>
Four Presidents at Mount Rushmore<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"Badlands<\/a>
Badlands in Afternoon Glow<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"Arjan<\/a>
Arjan in the Badlands<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"Badlands<\/a>
Bighorn Ram in the Badlands<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"Flowers<\/a>
Flowers in the Badlands<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n
\"Badlands<\/a>
Badlands Sunset<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Vintage Postcard Project:<\/strong> September 27: Mount Rushmore, South Dakota<\/a><\/p>\n

[Photographs © 2012 P.J. Gardner. All Rights Reserved.]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Mile 10,677 – Wall, South Dakota. New Englanders tend to turn up their noses at fall colors elsewhere.\u00a0 This morning, we drove through Spearfish Canyon, in\u00a0the Black Hills of South Dakota.\u00a0 Colors were at peak, and it was absolutely gorgeous.\u00a0 We did not expect this, but it was one of the highlights of the day.\u00a0 … Continue reading “September 27: Fall Colors in South Dakota”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3,4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1311","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-arjan","category-pj"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/pjgardner.com\/travel1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1311","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/pjgardner.com\/travel1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/pjgardner.com\/travel1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pjgardner.com\/travel1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pjgardner.com\/travel1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1311"}],"version-history":[{"count":21,"href":"https:\/\/pjgardner.com\/travel1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1311\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":2024,"href":"https:\/\/pjgardner.com\/travel1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1311\/revisions\/2024"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/pjgardner.com\/travel1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1311"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pjgardner.com\/travel1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1311"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pjgardner.com\/travel1\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1311"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}