It was a rough wake up at 6am. We had gone to bed too late the night before so alarm was particularly difficult. Our morning routine ensued. Mom up first- brushed teeth/ washed face- boil water and pour into fresh press for my cup of joe. Then I wake C because she starts earliest.

The bonus of a 25′ (small) RV is that it is fast and comfortable to drive. The negative is there is not much space inside and every morning and night we have to shuffle our belongings so that we can function. Sleeping bags are put away and stored on the bunk. The dinette table is re-assembled and the school bins are brought out.

Ciela freshens up and I make her breakfast and she dives into school work. The others slowly wake and have breakfast before classes start.

By far the most challenging obstacle of this trip is WiFi. This RV camp proving to have the worst even though when I called ahead to check they confirmed it was excellent.

So the kids started school like this-

But they soon moved on to the storage garage near the front office that proved better WiFi. I discovered this by asking the teenager who worked there where the best WiFi was. Will use that in the future.

They were able to complete the morning. But it was incredibly stressful because the kids didn’t want to miss school. Sometimes I wish they were a little more less serious about school. 🤪

At 10:30 they were done- we ate lunch and we departed. The badlands bypass was insane-

Fossil hike was the most informative- with educational posters discussing the fossils and age of the badlands. The formations were formed because at one point it was all under water.

From badlands we did a quick pit stop at Wall Drugs- so overrated.

We did buy some great cowboy Indian books.

We did one more loop in Badlands to visit the buffalo. We drove for miles without seeing any and then we found them near the buffalo entrance… chilling, happy, fearless.

At the entrance to Rushmore- girls were asking people to mark where they are from on the world map-

George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Teddy Roosevelt and Abraham Lincoln- far cooler in person then we ever imagined. Loved learning the history of their creation.

Franco and Gray got a workout in by walking to the lodge to get wood for the fire which they also started solo.

Firelight makes for nice movie ambiance outside-

Still eating healthy on RV with my salads. Thank you Trader Joe’s.