DAY 2: BROOKINGS TO
PIERRE
The next day was going to be a big one.
Not particularly challenging in terms of distance, just 180
miles along Highway 14, the The Laura Ingalls Wilder Historic
Highway, to the state capital Pierre. But these, we'd been
warned, were the plains at their plainest.
Almost as soon as we'd started, we arrived
in De Smet, "The Little Town on the Prairie," and
if it was good enough to persuade the Ingalls to stop, it
was certainly good enough for us. A guide, dressed in period
clothing, showed us around the Surveyors' House where the
Wilders had spent their first Dakota winter in 1879-80, and
then "the house that Pa built" in 1887, where Ma,
Pa, and Laura's blind sister Mary lived for many years after.
This was real history, history you could
touch and smell as well as read about. But what brought it
home most vividly that these people existed beyond the pages
of a book and the flickering screen of a 1970s TV series,
was the town cemetery. Set in a stunningly beautiful location
of shady pines, this is final resting place of Caroline and
Charles (Ma and Pa); three of Laura's sisters, Mary, Grace,
and Carrie; and most touching of all, Laura and Almanzo's
unnamed son who died shortly after his birth in 1889. These
were people who'd lived, raised families, and died here.
Respects duly paid, it's out of the cemetery,
check for traffic (you never know, there'd been some earlier),
turn left and back onto Highway 14, heading west.
And the guys in the bar were right. The
roads were empty and the countryside was virtually featureless.
Mile upon mile of flat farmland and plains, with only the
occasional homestead in the distance to break up the horizon.
But to us, visitors from a country where you can't go 10 miles
without bumping into a decent-sized town or city, this was
mesmerizing.
Some landscapes are soporific, sending
you into semi-conscious autopilot, but this was entirely different.
Brilliant blue skies, endless grassland changing color over
massive landscapes, impossibly long freight trains being hauled
along the Dakota, Minnesota & Eastern railroad by bright
red and yellow locomotives. Seriously, even the asphalt looked
exciting and different from anything we'd experienced before.
It was stimulating, hypnotic, and magical;
something I remain moved by today. This was America, this
was why we'd come. So it was with more of a sense of disappointment
at having finished the drive than tired relief that we reached
Pierre.
"Can we help you?" offered two ladies,
quickly identifying us as either vagrants or confused out-of-towners
as we entered a characterful-looking building that stated
'Hotel' on the outside but clearly wasn't on the inside. Discovering
that we were not only out-of-town but out-of-country, the
SD charm switched into overdrive. "Be sure to visit our
beautiful State Capitol, won't you? Take a walk by the river,
you'll love it. You want to eat? Go to La Minestra - it's
Italian and great food. Say, we could be your guides! You
need a hotel? The Days Inn does great waffles for breakfast."
Five minutes later, having successfully
negotiated the road works that had seen the main road through
Pierre transformed into a Third World dirt track, we stood
in line at the hotel reception. "What price for Triple-A
members?" "We're seniors, what's your best rate?"
"Three night at fishing-party rates please?" Being
British and therefore finding money-related talk in general
and discount requests in particular excruciatingly embarrassing,
we simply asked about room availability. And I swear she gave
us a better price that the three parties before us.
Unpack, shower, renegotiate the hazards of
West Sioux Ave -- this time on foot -- and we find ourselves
at the Veterans Bar, directly on the banks of the Missouri,
drinking Bud and watching water skiers. Forty-eight hours
before, we'd spent Independence Day at La Crosse, Wisconsin,
enjoying their annual Riverfest on the banks of the Mississippi.
Tonight we were watching one of America's other great rivers
flow slowly by. There's a point in every trip when the amazement
you feel at finding yourself in these far-off places makes
way for something more comfortable, a kind of settling-in
process where everything's still beautiful and exciting, but
you begin to feel part of it. This was our fitting-in moment,
and it felt great.
Next:
Pierre to Rapid City>
Peter
Thody
January 8, 2006
