The Badlands

   It's the middle of my two weeks on the road and so far I've managed to cross two more states off my bucket list, Nebraska and South Dakota. I wish I had more time to spend in each state and more freedom to stop at the places I see. 

   I loved driving through The Sand Hills in Nebraska and South Dakota and I got to see a little piece of The Badlands. Going through the area of the Badlands I was in there was a thunderstorm so it was really amazing to see the rain, storm clouds and lighting over the rock formations. There were so many places I was so close to and would have loved to stop at though like Mount Rushmore, Wall Drug, The Mitchell Corn Palace, Sturgis and more. I also see so many places to eat I would love to stop at like Space Aliens Grill & Bar in Albertville, Minnesota. Oh yeah I went to Minneapolis too, actually drove all the way back from there just this morning. 

     While I was gone I got the new memory cards for my camera in the mail. I upgraded from two 32GB cards to two 128GB cards. I will keep using the old memory cards in my old cameras. I also got the new telescope adapter for my old camera. I have been wanting one for several years now, but I didn't want to risk using one with my main camera. The way they are made I figured you could get a lot of dust in your camera and a lot more risk of damaging the camera. I don't know how well they will work either, but now I've got a couple old cameras laying around I can use. 

         I would have loved to have my camera and telescope in South Dakota. Where I stopped at a rest area walking around looking at the Native American statue and concrete teepee it was a beautiful clear starlit sky. Although it was very cold out! The second night wasn't as bad as the first though, the first night it was down to 34 degrees. My telescope would take up too much room and it's cramped enough as it is in the truck. I don't want to carry my camera because I rarely get to stop anywhere to take pictures. It would just be one more thing to lug around, risk getting damaged or stolen. 

            I also got my new GPS for my Jeep in the mail. My old one stopped working a couple years ago, so I haven't had one for a while. When I've gone places I just used old school map navigation, memorized the route and decorations before I left or occasionally used my phone. Using my phone eats up a lot of data though and I would rather use it for Netflix. 

            Had a really cool idea for a intro video to my website where I say a few words from each line in a different location. I tried to start filming it in South Dakota with my phone, but it was so dark all you could see was my silhouette and the Native American statue behind me. 

              Well I'm exhausted and I want to get a decent nights sleep in a real bed before I head back out in the morning so I'm going to call it a night.