Finally posted up in Michigan and getting settled into the new job, which features a house big enough for me to have a home office, which means that my RCT comment count is about to start going UP again. I have missed getting to kick it with all of you on the reg, even if it appears that I have returned only in time to catch tumbleweeds XD

I thought I would go ahead and make a fanpost with some photos from the trip. It is nothing exhaustive, as we booked it through most states and really only spent extended time in the Badlands in SD on the way. Still, we saw some gorgeous country on the drive, particularly from the salt flats of Utah through the Black Hills of SD. Wyoming is wildly beautiful and also desolate in a way that I've never felt driving across any other state - part of that is probably because we were not on the interstate for a lot of that drive. I will never call Utah empty again.

One of the highlights was definitely getting to check out the Crazy Horse monument in SD, which I am pleased to note is way more impressive than Mt. Rushmore even if it is nowhere near complete. They have a great visitor's center and museum set up at the site now to generate income to finish the project, though, and so they are definitely picking up speed compared to the beginning when it was literally just one guy working on carving out a mountain.

This is a picture of the monument by itself from the visitor's center viewing platform, and here is another picture with a replica of what the eventual monument is going to look like so you can get an idea of how it all fits together...definitely have a long way to go. I think I'll be back to check their progress in 10-20 years but probably not before.

I did not actually take any pictures of Mt. Rushmore, as it was really not that notable after seeing where Crazy Horse is headed. The idea of paying money to see that monument to imperialism when there is literally a monument to the people that we stole the country from a few miles away just stuck in my craw, as well. So, no photos!

This next set of pictures are all from the Badlands in SD, which is one of my favorite national parks in the country. I would say that some of my favorite parks in Utah (Arches, Zion, Bryce Canyon) are more impressive on their own, but what is really striking about the Badlands is how uniform the rest of that part of SD is. When you come up on the Badlands after traveling across miles of prairie, you immediately understand how they got their name.

A juvenile bighorn sheep munching grass close enough to the road for me to open my door and touch it if I had tried...by far the closest I have ever been to one of these animals!

The vistas there are incredible...this one is shot from the top of the Badlands looking down at the rock formations. This park looks completely different from the bottom vs. the top, and I regret not getting a good picture from the bottom

And one of my favorite formations in the park is a little understated in terms of topography but the natural colors in these "painted domes" are beautiful:

These are heavily eroded rock formations that contain three notable geological eras - the grey shale at the top, the red sandstone in the middle, and the yellow sediment below.

We did not get a ton of pictures from the rest of the trip, in part because eastern SD and southern Minnesota are pretty monotonous, but mostly because we were just booking it at that point to try and get to our new place and be able to relax. It was really awesome to be able to take the ferry across Lake Michigan from Milwaukee to Muskegon, given that, even if it was a little pricey. Nothing like driving 35+ hours and then getting to move closer to your destination for a couple hours without having to do anything. And the Milwaukee skyline from the ferry was gorgeous, even if my cameraphone really fails to do it justice:

And now here we are in Michigan, living dat rural life after coming from Oakland. It is quite the change-up already, but this Midwestern man is not complaining about getting to see sights like this out his back door again:

Home at last!