Up early this morning so that we could be assured a slot for the Minute Man Missile control room tour. This is a look see at the under ground control room where the men would have launched the nukes in the event of a war with the USSR. The small two person control room was 30 or so feet underground suspended on huge shock absorbers. Each control room would control 10 missiles located from 5 to 15 miles from the control room, all connected by a hardened cable. Apparently lots of security around these things at the time, a good thing to.
Leroy thinks he recalls seeing a couple of the missile silo sites as a kid, perhaps on the uncles ranch near Hereford.
There were 150 missiles in South Dakota during the height of the cold war. Those in S.D. have been decommissioned but there are still a bunch scattered around to cause all sorts of havoc. Ellsworth Air Force base just east of Rapid City was the support base.
After a short peek at a training missile silo it was off to Wall Drug.
Motorcyles and lots of them.
We have been seeing lots of motorcycles since we hit I 90. Most are headed east. They must have been the first wave into Sturgis. Thus it was not surprising to see a large number in Wall.
We had brunch in Wall Drug, drank the world famous ice water, scared the bejesus out of the child when the local T-Rex woke up and roared a bit. A bit of people watching, an ice cream cone, grocery shopping and a fuel stop later we were on our way to the Badlands loop from Wall back to Interior.
Lots of interesting geology, a few antelope and prairie dogs. Rosalie seemed very interested/impressed by it all.
Swimming and spaghetti topped off the day. Perhaps tomorrow will be a kick back day. We are looking for a clear night so that we might take in the meteor shower. It would be a shame not to see it out here where the light is at a minimum.
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