Day 15 - 9 July 2022
Here was the original plan as sketched out before bed the night before on the back of a receipt by me:
I woke up at 545 and got moving. My shower and bumping into the cabinet got the rest of the team moving. We actually got out of the dump station by 815, way ahead of schedule and on the way from Custer State Park to the worst kept secret of boondocking and RVing, Nomad View Dispersed Camping in Buffalo Gap Natl Grassland outside of Bandlands Natl Park. It is quite a view.
It took a minute to get the rig level, but once that was done we knocked out lunch and got to our tour at the other thing we missed our last trip, touring Delta-01 Launch Control within the Minuteman Missile Natl Hist Site.
MM NHS discusses nuclear war from all platforms (air, sea, and land based), but focuses mainly on the missile fields that dotted the Dakotas and northern Midwest (closest US based locations to the primary Cold War targets). The Delta Minuteman missiles were manned from airmen from Ellsworth Air Force Base in nearby Rapid City. Most of the missile silos and the launch facility are about .5 mile from I-90. It's nuts that such destruction was just innocently on the side of the road.
Anyway, the tickets for the Delta-01 tour are harder to get than it was getting a boarding group for RotR. There are 4 tours a day and only 6 tickets are issued per tour. The tour is 1 hour long and normally you get to tour the topside support facility, but that part was being remodeled. It's not the fancy part anyway. Just some bedrooms, kitchen, common room, and a security desk. The big part of the tour is going down to the "egg". The secure room 30 feet underground were two Air Force Officers from the late 60s until the mid-90s kept watch over 10 nuclear payloads 24/7 365.
Some dark humor on the blast door that could only be opened by someone at Ellsworth Air Force Base. It was opened only during shift change, food delivery, and maintenance.
The control panel at the senior officer's desk. Each column of lights, bordered by blue, is the status of the 10 missiles. To the right you can see where the key goes in the event of a launch.
Here's a look towards the door of the "egg" with my back to the senior officer's desk. The junior officer had more things to work on including the teletype and the other radios and such on the left. Inside the egg were their work stations, a bed (behind the blue curtain on the right), a toilet (behind the brown curtain on the left), a manual air supply (1 hour of cranking filtered 24 hours of air), and 2 weeks of food in compartments in the floor. The officers would do 24 hour shifts. The shifts could go longer if their relief couldn't make it due to snow (which never happens in South Dakota...ha) or other contingencies.
The ranger was quite knowledgeable and she provided many anecdotes from former crew and staff from the missile fields. There is an active effort from the old missileers to volunteer and contribute to the NHS. The tour was really a great experience on top of the great visitor center.
After the tour we drove through Badlands Natl Park. We hit the park pretty hard our last trip and with the limited time we hopped out at a few overlooks and were content with that.
There was a heat advisory with 105+ heat index. The rig was totally heat soaked all day. Our generator can only run one of our ACs, which couldn't beat the heat. So instead of suffering in the rig for dinner, we decided to go out for dinner in Wall, SD. After dinner the kids begged to get ice cream at Wall Drug...ok twisted my arm. They also wanted this picture too. I don't get it, but it's going to be in both their wedding albums.
After dinner we got back to the rig and fired up the generator again. It was still too hot to head in so we gathered around the shade of the rig and tried to beat the heat. The animals ran out of iPad charge so they had to huddle around the outlet.
Once the sun went down it cooled into the 80s. The camper just wouldn't cool down. It was a long night until around 3 when it finally got to a manageable temp.
Day 16 - 10 July 2022.
After our short night of sleep we woke to a front blowing in. The wind was whipping. The many campers that were around us joined our efforts to pack and get out of dodge. We left Nomad View for Ponca State Park near Ponca, NE. The trip was routine with a stop for fuel and lunch.
Ponca SP is quite nice, as many NE SPs seem to be. It has a pool and some nice sites along the river. We got there in plenty of time for the kids to swim for a few hours after a long day on the road.
Day 17 - 11 July 2022.
Our last leg from Ponca SP to home was about 6 hours. Again, routine driving. We pulled into the driveway around 3 pm and unloaded the camper. The yard was a total mess, but fortunately all the automatic sprinklers I set up for DW's plants did the trick and all the garden and flower beds made it through really nasty heat while we were gone.
Summary.
We were out for 17 days of trip. We covered about 2400 miles of driving. The kids earned their 47th and 48th Natl Park Junior Ranger badges. It was a trip for the memory books.
Thanks for reading along. I enjoyed sharing it with you all and let me know if you need any tips for any of these places as I know a few of you have mentioned wanting to get out this way in the near future.
. And off the Bama Ed/DW payroll. 
