Today was a crazy day! We had parked on forest service land, and Deon had some work to get done this morning before we headed out. So, I decided to take the kids on a geocaching hike. It is so beautiful here in the black hills. 

So, there is one super close. 1/10 of a mile away. So, we head out. It’s a really strenuous uphill, but we make it. Aunica is awesome holding Jedi’s hand the whole way up, and I’m carrying Kieran. Everyone is stoked when we find it, and we decide to do another one. It’s a half mile away, but we are already up on the ridge. We hike our way up. Sidda, Dimitri, and Finn finish it up and find the geocache, as the last bit is a bit of rock climbing. Success! What fun!

   
    
 
So. Time to head back to the van. Awesome, the app has directions back to the parking lot, which is where we parked. So, we set off. Hike out. 

Anybody who has known me for long knows I have NO sense of direction. And an amazing knack for getting lost. I once got lost for 2 hours in LA when I only had one turn to make it home. So…

I took us to the wrong parking lot. And my phone died. So, we are lost. I did manage to find a larger dirt road, and then the main highway. And then flag down a motorist to use their phone to call Deon to pick us up. Three hours later, no snacks, major hear advisory, no water. But we survived, and had fun, for the most part.

From there we headed to Hill City for the train ride I had promised Finn for his birthday. The train was a vintage 1880s steam train, running the same line it did 130 years ago for the mines. So exciting! It was a two hour round trip ride. As expected, we all enjoyed it, but none more than the little boys. The adventure part came in when we were about 15 minutes into the ride back and ran into a severe thunderstorm. Cold, driving rain into our open-air car. There were plastic windows, but they did little good. It was still fun though, all part of the adventure of travel. 

   
    
   
As a post script, Jedi has been asking for weeks after if we can take another ride on the “80s train.” I can’t help but think of soul train, and it’s 80s counterparts, and laugh, and laugh!