Last summer (summer of 2022), I went on a road trip from Milwaukee, Wisconsin to Mount Rushmore National Memorial, South Dakota. Here is an overview of the trip on google maps:

I have shown Rapid City in the map here, since it is the nearest city to the Mount Rushmore National Memorial.

Day 1: Drive through Wisconsin & Minnesota

The first day was a drive across the state of Wisconsin in to the state of Minnesota. I had decided to stay at Sioux Falls, SD for my first night on the trip. This little city is right after you cross the border of Minnesota into South Dakota. The state of Wisconsin had little to no things to offer along the way in terms of sight seeing, but I did make a quick pit stop at La Crosse, WI. This city is right on the Mississippi river, which also serves as the border between MN and WI.

As I crossed the border on to MN, I kept looking for stuff along the way that I could possibly stop by. The first (and only) thing that I stumbled across along that path was a giant green giant statue. For those of you who don’t know, it’s a brand of frozen and canned vegetables owned by B&G Foods. I stopped by to take a quick look, but for most it might not be worth stopping (unless you want to take a break from driving). Here is a picture of the giant statue:

The Green Giant Statue, MN

Again, might not be worth stopping, but might be a cool (?) conversation piece for the future! This place also had a museum with all the green giant products. This was basically it in MN, and I ended up staying the night in Sioux Falls, SD at a hotel. Below is an image of the falls.

Day 2: Drive across South Dakota: 1880 Town and Badlands National Park

When Richard Hullinger bought 14 acres at Exit 170 back in 1969 he had no plans for an attraction. In 1972 a gas station was built at this location along with forming an idea of an old west attraction. Later, an additional 80 acres was purchased.

About that time a movie company came to a small town nearby to film an 1880 era movie. A main street set was constructed from old buildings and a number of Indian relics and antiques were borrowed from Clarence Hullinger, Richard’s father. Winter set in and the filming was abandoned. The movie company returned home giving the main street set to Clarence for the use of his artifacts. The movie set was moved to the 80 acres and the 1880 TOWN was born!

1880Town.com

1880 Town was my first major stop of the day. The drive through South Dakota was pleasantly surprising, with a lot of meadows and farms along the way, but 1880 town billboards were intriguing enough for me to take the exit to check it out. After purchasing the tickets, I walked in to check out the museum. The museum contains many artifacts from the 1880s-1920s, very well preserved and displayed, including props that were used in the movie Dancing with Wolves. It is also kind of a museum of buildings, where really old buildings were transported here and preserved, including the contents inside. What seemed like a potential waste of time to take an exit to check out a never-heard-before thing for me, turned out to be pretty fun! If I’m ever driving through the area, I am definitely taking that random exit again!

Another quick stop I took was to feed prairie dogs. After that, on the way to my stop for the second day, I stopped by to check out Badlands National Park. This was an awesome experience in that first of all, I didn’t know anything about it (when I left Milwaukee for Mount Rushmore, the only things I had planned was where I was going to stop for the nights and how many days I am going to take to get there). Secondly, the grand canyon-esque landscape was mind-boggling. Definitely a fun surprise! South Dakota, I find, is massively underrated in that sense. Obviously, it doesn’t have enough diversity in what it has to offer landscape-wise (which is what attracts me to most places) compared to some of the other states, but it does have enough to keep you interested. Definitely not a state to just dismiss.

There is so much more to see out there, maybe even take day hikes to find better places to take pictures in or sit and watch in awe, but these are the few I have that I found worth sharing here.

Day 3: Mount Rushmore National Memorial

Mount Rushmore was something I saw on TV and the movies while in India and has always been one of the things I associate the USA with. That was my inspiration behind choosing this place as my destination. I didn’t have very high expectations as I was well aware that it’s just going to be a bunch of faces on a mountain, and therefore, it did not disappoint.

The memorial was just as expected, nothing crazy. The memorial is carved into Mount Rushmore in the Black Hills region of South Dakota. The Black Hills National Forest doesn’t come up that often in conversations, but it was a very fun drive through it (some pictures included above). Well worth it staying an extra day or two and doing some day hikes out here!

As always, thanks for reading through, and I will always appreciate any kind of feedback or sharing of the articles with friends and family!