One of the best things about our trip to South Dakota was how doable it was for us, women of a certain age. Every morning we got up, had a nice coffee at the little place next door, and then we took off. Our loft apartment was just on the edge of the original downtown and close to all the roads point north or south or east or west.

Because everything is more or less flat and full of space the roads were straight and uncrowded and there was very little squabbling over directions and I only had to admonish Donna twice for talking over the nice woman inside my Maps app, who tried to give me directions.

We just got in the car and went. We could as easily have been heading to Nashville for Christmas shopping, or to Louisville for lunch with Nancy, except our way was considerably more restful. No traffic. We piddled around, mostly, stopping at Sturgis to look at trashy t-shirts, getting that free ice water at Wall Drugs, meandering through the Badlands, pulling over at least ten times to gawk and take selfies.

The selfies were Donna’s idea. Her daughter-in-law had a birthday that day, and she wanted to send Emily greetings from all our stops. The cheesier the better. I’m guessing the new wore off for poor Emily about midday, but we kept it up until almost dark.

We followed the Griffin Rules on this trip. In Donna’s family they would get up at a reasonable hour, have a big breakfast, or at least a good one, take off for the day, maybe have a little something around 1:00 pm–ice cream being a favorite–then get back to the hotel for a nice dinner somewhere. It worked great for us, even though I am more of a get up and get going kind of person. But because we were on the road no later than 9:30, my nerves and goodwill remained intact.

Every place we stopped, even privately owned attractions like Crazy Horse, had a welcome center and a small theatre where informational films aired every twenty minutes or so.

Watching every such film is also a Griffin Rule. Donna admitted her kids didn’t like them much, but she and Otis wouldn’t miss one. I don’t like to miss them, either.

Most are old and scratchy. I am pretty sure we didn’t see a single one produced after 1985, but this only added to their charm. At Mt. Rushmore we learned the background of the sculptor, Gutzon Borglum. Did you know he studied in France and became a close friend of Auguste Rodin? Me, either.
In a little museum off the hallway was a display of the equipment the cutters used, including the swinging chairs in which they dangled off Roosevelt’s nose, but I was only able to identify them because I first saw the film in the little theatre.

I was most struck by the immense spaces set aside in the parks for recreation, especially passive recreation. Meadows, lakes, little overlooks. Plain old roadsides, with no one approaching from either direction. At one visitor’s center, I can’t remember which one now, a family with babies, grandmas and children lined the small foot bridge spanning a creek, most with fishing poles, angling in the shade of a cottonwood tree. Right there, not ten feet from the parking lot, just camped out for a pleasant afternoon.

It looked perfectly natural. There were no signs granting or denying permission. It echoed the freedom to be had out there, where there is room for everyone, to breathe, to be left alone. Donna said last week she was ready to go back out west. Me, too. I worry sometimes that I am too old for such a trip, that somehow if I am in Colorado, say, I have to hike or ski or mountain bike, or why go?

Now I think it is perfectly reasonable to go and look, and see. Catch the direction of the breeze. Hike a little if you want to, although John Muir, who embodies all the wild spaces, said he hated that word. That we should saunter through the woods, not hike. Hiking is work. Sauntering, a word derived from the journeys of pilgrims, is a joy.
And I can saunter with the best of them. And I can gape through a windshield or from a park bench. But first, the film.