On Monday, we headed from Custer, SD to Hill City. I hadn't been in Hill City in about 20 years and couldn't believe the transformation. It is all grown up! We walked the Main Street, visited a couple of shops and enjoyed the warm sunshine. We continued north on Highway 385 and decided to take the road to Deerfield Lake. Deerfield lake is deeper into the Black Hills and over the years many improvements have been made to the road leading there. And, they're continuing to make improvements. About 10 miles out of Hill City, we saw some road construction road signs, then a few minutes later they had a "flagman" posted dead ahead. We must have just missed the last group of cars and had about a 10-minute wait. The flagman turned out to be a woman who lives in the Black Hills and we had a great talk about living in the Black Hills and especially how difficult it had been during the past winter. The winter began early with a huge major snowstorm that left hundreds of thousands of cattle and other animals across Western South Dakota when three inches of rain fell, then over a foot of snow then another three inches of rain. She said the autopsies on the animals pointed to drowning from the heavy wet snow and nearly six inches of rain.
 Soon, the pilot car showed up and off we went further west into the hills . After the pilot car turned off, we found that we had gone past the road into Deerfield Lake, and I decided not to go back, instead we pressed on. We took another road and started heading back east, when another road off to the right had a sign about getting into the far side of Deerfield where the Forest Service had put in a boat launch. We traveled down this road, by some remote campers and into the Deerfield Lake valley. While the lake isn't large by other lake standards, it is beautifully tucked into areas of open fields and stands of heavy, dark Ponderosa Pine.
 We enjoyed the view, and because we were the only visitors, let the dog go and run on her own. We stayed about 30 minutes then headed back down the road we had entered on. Along the way we saw several pairs of bright blue Bluebirds. They were not comfortable with us around and if we tried to get close for a photo off they went. Dolly did, although, find one that stayed put long enough for a quick picture.
 After weaving our way across a couple of narrow gravel roads we came upon Rochford and stopped at the largest "small" Mall in the United States . Small is the key word here, and it wasn't open as they must have decided on a long weekend. After a quick photo, we continued back toward Highway 385. I wanted to drive through Mystic, SD, but decided that Dolly had had enough weaving back and forth on these back woods roads and opted for the 7 mile drive back. After we got back to the highway, we headed south and came upon Pactola Reservoir. Pactola, I remember from years ago, when after work with the South Dakota Army National Guard's 129th Public Affairs Detachment in Rapid City, one summer (probably 1978) a few of us went fishing at Pactola. That was an interesting fishing trip in that it was at night, and we hung a lantern over the side of the boat and used sweet corn as bait and caught a very nice group of trout. That was a first for me.
 After having lunch at the Visitor's Center, we departed Pactola, went back through Hill City, and South of town stopped at "Prairie Berry Winery." We've been to several wineries and this one was wonderfully interesting . It was much larger than I would have expected in Western South Dakota, and well laid out and stocked. Dolly did the tasting - they offered a taste of five of their wines...free and even gave her another one, because she asked about the sweetness of another of their brand. They do have unique names for their wines - see the photos for some. We then continued to Custer and back down Highway 385, past Wind Cave and into Hot Springs. We continued through this interesting small town to a KOA just one half mile from the intersection of Highways 385 and 79. 
 We really like this KOA and met the owners who are friendly and fun to talk with. After settling into our campsite and relaxing a while, we headed back to Hot Springs to visit dear friends, Randall (Randy) (Spike) and Kathy Meyers. I worked with Randy back in the late 1990's when I was the Recruiting and Retention Manager for the South Dakota Army National Guard.  
 We met at the South Dakota Veterans Soldiers Home where Randy works (because I knew where that was) and followed them to a local waterhole and restaurant that is their favorite . We spent several hours remembering "the old days" and having a great time catching up. Afterwards we went to Randy and Kathy's beautiful home just outside of Hot Springs and spent another couple of hours visiting. Since they both had to work Tuesday, we said our goodbyes and went the couple of miles back to the KOA. We turned in shortly after we got back and woke up in the middle of the night to the pitter patter of rain on our "RV."
 What a wonderful day in the Black Hills and great visit with Randy and Kathy.
 The next morning, we headed to the Rapid City area and enjoyed driving around the city. Rain was on and off all day, but we had the opportunity to have lunch with Steve Sewell who is the State Transportation Officer for the SD Army National Guard. We had a great lunch talking about his career, our trip and his plans for the future.
 Later in the afternoon, we made contact with Gary Telkamp. Gary lives in Rapid City, and has for many years. We agreed to meet for dinner at the Elk Creek Steakhouse in Piedmont. We met Brenda and Gary at about 7pm and spent several fun hours bringing each other up to date. Gary was in the same floor in Scobey Hall at SDSU when I first transferred there, later we worked together at Camp Bob Marshall (4-H camp) in the Black Hills one summer and also were roommates in several apartments while finishing college. I hadn't seen Gary in years and it was a great time reconnecting and meeting Brenda. What a couple of days!