We left Minnesota in June and headed West...first stop was Watertown, South Dakota. We camped there a couple days at Stokes-Thomas Lake City Park...a nice park right on Lake Kampeska. Watertown has an impressive Terry Redlin art museum/gallery on the east edge of town near the junction of I-29 and highway 212.
Next destination was near Gettysburg, South Dakota. We chose a campsite at South Whitlock Recreation Area, a huge area along the Missouri River with access to Lake Oahe. Formed by a dam near Pierre, SD Lake Oahe is a very active fishing lake. In the fall the area supports pheasant and deer hunting.
A road trip one day lead us to Hoven, South Dakota, a little town of about 500 persons. What puts this little town on the map is its Cathedral of the Prairie (St. Anthony of Padua Catholic Church). Completed in 1921, and now registered as a historic place, the massive church seats over 1000; twin spires reach 140 feet toward the heavens; the interior walls are covered with intricate, ornate stenciling. It is believed to have been patterned after a church in Bavaria. A walk through the cemetery revealed a gravestone containing a familiar family name! Some of our relatives had been here...
From Gettysburg we drove south through Pierre then toward Rapid City. While driving along highway 14 we learned we were following the "Old Deadwood Trail"....signs along the way marked sites where stage coach stops had once been and where wagon wheel ruts were still visible in nearby fields.
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