saultert

Four of us are going from Minneapolis to Mt. Rushmore in September for 5 days. The trip from Sioux Falls to Minneapolis is set. Does anyone have any suggested itinerary
for the drive from Sioux Falls to Rapid City?

I've stayed outside of Rapid City before but any suggestions on a comfortable place to stay for a couple of nights in the RC area? I'm not looking for high end but also not focused on price. Clean and comfortable is what we need.

Coming back from Rapid City to Minneapolis are there any cool sites that might not get mentioned in the travel books?

longhorn55

We stayed in two different Rapid City hotels on our recent trip to the Black Hills area. At the beginning of our trip, we stayed at the Sleep Inn and Suites at 4031 Cheyenne Blvd. This is a new hotel with a lot of nice amenities. At the end of our trip, we stayed at the Big Sky Lodge at 4080 Tower Road which is an older property, but has fabulous views (especially from the hot tub) of the city. Both hotels were clean and comfortable and offered rates around $100 per night. I would stay in either hotel again.

WhereAreWe

Stop at Minuteman Missile NHS, take a guided tour there and then drive through Badlands NP before going to Rapid City.

What all have you looked at doing or seeing on the way back? Palisades state park looks nice, there's also Pipestone National Monument and Blue Mounds State Park in Minnesota.

saultert

Thanks!

Tentative itinerary in South Dakota:

Day 1 - drive from Sioux Falls to Rapid City stopping briefly at the Corn Palace, the Laokta Museum in Chamberlin and driving through some of the Badlands.

Day 2 - Mt. Rushmore, Custer State Park and Black Hills

Day 3 - Devils Tower and then start to head back to Minnesota. Possible stop at Wounded Knee site.

karens

There's not all that much on the drive from Rapid City to Souix Falls. I wish we had time to see the Minuteman Missile site. We stopped at Wall Drug (naturally), the Badlands and the Corn Palace. About mid-way through, we stopped to each lunch at a place that also had a large car collection/museum.

I am amazed reading trip reports of the Black Hills area how many different things there are to see in this area. I thought Spearfish Canyon was beautiful. I wish I knew about the movie sets from "Dances with Wolves" near Rapid City - they would have been interesting to see.

Here's our trip report:

http://www.fodors.com/community/unit...uth-dakota.cfm

I hope you have a great trip.

WhereAreWe

Well, the Wounded Knee site is south of Badlands NP. I think it would make more sense to go there after visiting Badlands since you'll only be an hour or so away, rather than leaving it for day 3.

You may want to google some reviews of the Wounded Knee site so you know what to expect.