We stayed at a campground right off the highway, which is usually a bad thing. In this case, it was not so bad. They shared a pool with the hotel next door, so Victoria had a lot of fun playing there. It was a brand new facility and the bathrooms were things of beauty. I didn't notice the highway noise, but that might have been due to the bottle of wine Brian and I split. You can get alcohol anywhere in SD; this was from the WalMart back in Sioux Falls. The grocery stores carry hard liquor. Convenience stores usually have two barrels near the register with ice and drinks--one has bottles of soda, the other has cans of beer.

In the morning we went to the Corn Palace. We took the tour and watched the video and colored the coloring page and bought Victoria a pretzel. Victoria has yet to accept the fact that traveling with Brian means eating like a reptile. Her 3yo body thinks that it needs food 4 or 5 or more times in ONE DAY. To be honest, I'd prefer to eat that way, too, but what would a vacation be without a companion's eccentricities? This vacation was especially charming as we had, in addition to Brian's food issues, the moodiness of one daughter and the incredibly tiny bladder of the other. Christopher stayed home, darn it.

Next we went to Dakotafest, which is a farm show. I guess you'd learn a lot about new equipment and techniques if you were a farmer. I learned a lot because it was all new to me. It was like FOSE for farmers. In addition to finding out how to train a horse (annoy him until he does what you want) and how to get a tag in a cow's ear, I scored an apple from a veterinary supply house, a frisbee from the farm bureau, and some water from an insurance company. I could have stayed much longer and Victoria was willing, but Jennifer was hot and Brian had seen enough so we headed further west.