Adventures

What. A week. It's been!

This has been the first week of National Parks!

Wind Cave National Park in South Dakota was incredible. The extremely nice and educated Forest Ranger, Abbey, hooked me up with the best hike and drives to take. Stunning views, lots of wildlife, and I made a new friend at the Gift Shop, Pam.

Pam is living her best life working at the Gift Shop at Wind Cave. She meets people from all over the world and celebrates their adventures with them. She has granddaughters my age and one of them is adventurous like I am ;) Pam put a lot of things in perspective for me. She not only set me on the right path for my National Park Passport book and stickers, but I was telling her about my trip and why and how I'm taking it and she looked at me and said "wow. You're so brave."

She's not the first person who has used that adjective to describe me in the last couple of months. Really, in the last 8 years... but for some reason, when she said it, I heard it. I really heard it for the first time. And I FELT it. I AM brave! I am driving in a car that isn't mine, across a country to places I've never been and don't know, ALONE. With no time frame, no end date. Sleeping in my car most nights... with just a list of things I want to experience. Because I can! I have been given the gift of time and the gift of virtual work and the gift of supportive parents who embrace my big dreams. I'm embracing that word this week.

On I went to Custer State Park. If you ever get the chance to go and drive the Needles Eye Tunnel - DO IT! It's really awesome. The drive and views from the top alone are worth it, but there is something about driving through a literal mountain in a hole that barely fits your car that is thrilling!

The next morning on the way out of the park, I passed a Bison walking down the road.

And on I went to Crazy Horse Memorial. I could have spent a whole day there. The work they are doing at this Memorial is mindblowing. It is more than just a sculpture in a mountain. It is a Native American Museum. A University. An Arts and Cultural Center. And it's never taken a penny of government funding. The story of the artist, their family, and the tribe members that recruited them and that are all still involved today is incredible. And the REASON they are building it is so important. Chief Henry Standing Bear said in his 1919 invitation to Korczak to carve the memorial "My fellow chiefs and I would like the white man to know the red man has great heroes, too." A. Men.

I followed that with Mt. Rushmore. Which... after Crazy Horse... was underwhelming. Don't get me wrong. The ART of carving the mountain is AMAZING. But the reason. The presentation. Even the size. Doesn't compare. And especially now. I do believe these four men had mostly good intentions with the work they were doing, but they still set up a system that is deeply flawed and broken. We have a LOT of work to do...

Meditating on all of that, I drove to Badlands National Park. I got there in time to find a place to sleep for the night and camped on the edge of the grounds in a campground where I took my first ever paid, camp shower :) It was also the first night the wind was SO strong the car was shaking to the point where I glanced out more than once to see if anyone else was concerned. It didn't seem anyone was... so I went back to sleep. It was also the first drops of rain on the entire trip!

Some of you saw the incredible hike I took that next morning - Notch Trail. That. Ladder. But the ladder, while intimidating, was honestly not the hardest part! There is a section in the middle where you are literally climbing over chunks of mountain - there isn't a real "trail" just markers that you are heading towards and it's more of a chose your own adventure type of hike. It was challenging to say the least. When I got back to the bottom of that ladder - that's right, you have to come back DOWN the thing! - I had a real moment with myself. THAT was brave. THAT was something I can't imagine past-life Melanie doing. THAT I was proud of.

From there it felt like nothing could get me down! I drove in to North Dakota and went through Theodore Roosevelt National Park. Took a couple of short hikes there and drove through the beautiful mountains and then headed to Montana.

Montana has given me some real adventure. As you might have read yesterday on the Social Media, yesterday was a DAY. I wasn't more than 3o minutes on the road when I killed a bird. A Chucker Partridge it turns out. Broke the plastic grill and stuck right on in the internal grill until some nice ex-Sheriff pulled it out with his bare hands. And then I attempted to get to Upper Missouri River Breaks National Monument. I lost service after a few minutes on the first gravel road. An hour later I hit a locked gate that said "Private Property" so I searched for a new way. After running in to mostly private drives, I ran in to some fellow adventurers and they pointed me the way out - which consisted of going down a road that is "impassable when wet" and getting to the ferry. It had been raining all day. They promised me I wouldn't get back up - I don't NEED to get back up! I just need to get OUT! So off we went. They went ahead of me which helped - I could see their tracks. But I slid. A lot. I definitely got sideways. More than once. And at one point, as I was going through worst case scenarios, I took a deep breath and reminded myself to take it one baby step at a time. Can I just get the car straight? OK! Can I keep it straight for more than a second? OK! Can I get to the bottom of this hill? OK! And then I got to cross the Missouri river on a single car raft. It is NOT the ferry you all see in your head. It is a raft. Manned by an amazing man named Jack who lives in a house by the river and helps people FOR FREE cross to the other side.

The other adventurers had made it there and even turned around to come back and look for me! As we passed I thanked them hugely for guiding me the right way and for worrying. Jack and I didn't see them again. I hope they made it back up!

Jack told me the way out once I got to the other side and told me the town to head to. I made it to Lewistown and treated myself to a motel. I had survived. Yes, I was a murderer now, but I didn't slide off a mountain. That's a WIN!

I woke up with a few inches of snow covering the ground and my car. It snowed all day as I drove from Lewistown to Glacier National Park. I'll explore the park today and then head south to Polson. And on to Week 3!