As we drive songs keep popping into my head. Today it was Calamity Jane’s ‘Oh, the Deadwood stage is rollin’ over the plains’. 🎶. She’s is buried here in Deadwood. Next to Wild Bill Hickok.

Calamity Jane, along with A.W. Merrick, Sol Star, and Al Swearengen all shaped Deadwood from a rough mining town to an iconic western town. Prospectors scoured the area for the smallest flecks of gold in the 1800s. Gold mining was huge.

Deadwood is not a great name for a town.

It was a pretty driving afternoon after leaving Badlands and heading towards Mt Rushmore.

We left Badlands and had a few stops along the way to explore.

First stop was the amazing store in Wall called Wall Drug. It’s a huge place with restaurants and lots if stalls full of …… stuff.

The it was Keystone. Another town with American Indian influence .

We stopped in Keystone ( these names have me chuckling and singing) before moving onto Mt Rushmore.

The story of how Mt Rushmore came about is so interesting and it’s really quite awesome to see.

Of course it’s well laid out. 6 layers of parking a big open mall walking up through the state flags. A good movie and museum gave us the story of the sculptures.

We walked the trail and chatted to a few people along the way.

Arriving into Deadwood surprised us. I didn’t realise it is a big gambling town. Lots of cute shops in Main St. But they all turned out to be full of poker machines & poker tables. And a big lack of restaurants.

The gambling places offered burgers. That’s it. So I found a place that did take away nachos and we went back to our very big comfortable room and Steve watched football.

Tomorrow we head to Cody. Cody is a town in northwest Wyoming famous for Buffalo Bill Center. We’ll be seeing Devil’s Tower and Big Horn National Park.