Cedar Pass Campground, Interior, South Dakota
During wheat harvest, Reuben went out into the fields and found some mandrake plants, which he brought to his mother Leah. Rachel said to Leah, “Please give me some of your son’s mandrakes.” But she said to her, “Wasn’t it enough that you took away my husband? Will you take my son’s mandrakes too?” “Very well . . . he can sleep with you tonight in return for your son’s mandrakes.” So when Jacob came in from the fields that evening, Leah went out to meet him, “You must sleep with me, I have hired you with my son’s mandrakes.” So he slept with her that night. . . and she bore . . . Issachar . . . and she bore another son . . . Zebulun . . . and sometime later she gave birth to a daughter and named her Dinah. ~ Genesis 30:14-21 This story just keeps getting more and more strange, doesn’t it? It seems mandrakes were considered an aphrodisiac. And the women are still fighting over Jacob – or at least his ability to provide children. At this point, Rachel is so desperate that she’s resorting to old wives’ tales and superstition, rather than humbling herself before the One Who gives Life. How like her we become when God doesn’t answer our prayers the way we want, or as fast as we want! How often do we take matters into our own hands out of desperation or impatience?
The day was cool – in the mid-seventies! But it didn’t start out that warm. In fact, we dropped from a high of 107⁰ four days ago, to 49⁰ last night! Is that crazy, or what?!? In between, the days still hovered near 100 or more!
But the weatherman promised one clear day, with no smoke – finally! So we headed back out to do the loop drive and stop at many of the same overlooks again – as well as some we skipped the first time. The only blur on the horizon (we learned at one of our stops) was infiltrating air pollution mostly blowing in from Rapid City which is 80 miles away. Fortunately, the air is usually clear here – except for the annual wildfire smoke.
So we drove. And we stopped at a few places along the way. At one of the stops (I can’t remember which one), we stopped walking and listened to coyotes howl in the distance somewhere! What fun!!
That’s Blaine in the orange shirt.
And then we came to this dirt and gravel road with a name – Quinn Road. So we decided to check it out, even though it wasn’t on the National Park map we had with us. Boy, were we glad we did!!
Heading down 
Quinn Road. You could never do this in a typical car!
We saw deer running pell-mell down in the valley, and a few minutes later, cows were running in the opposite direction. Both were tearing across the terrain like the place had caught fire! We don’t recall seeing cows run before. 😊
We were just finishing our time exploring, when a rancher came by us on his ATV. How did we know he was a rancher? Well, he drove that thing right out to where the cows were, and many of them came running to see him! How do we know, since they were so far away? We got out the binoculars to check ‘em out! 😊
We don’t know what he did that got them so excited, because it looked to us like he just drove around.
We continued down the road a bit further before turning around and returning to the main drag.
Pretty cool!
This is the picture we took today under clear skies 
This one’s from the other day
We’ve determined that we think we prefer the Yellow Mounds area over all the other areas of the Park. Notice I said ‘think’. That’s because they’re all awe-inspiring! But the Yellow Mounds area is so full of myriads of color in an almost colorless Park, you just have to love them! We spent a good amount of time here, taking oodles of pictures and hiking around.
When we finally made the decision to leave, it was lunchtime, so we went in search of a nice place – – and found a picnic area. Ya just don’t get views like this too often from a picnic table!
After we ate, I walked over to use the facilities, and lo and behold! There was an interesting spot to check out! Off we went, to check out the Pig Dig. 😊 It was a bit disappointing, because after 30 years, there was absolutely no indication that any one – ancient pig or otherwise – had spent any time here. Still, it was fun to explore for a bit.
The last time we drove this road, we’d skipped our next stop – the Ancient Hunters Overlook –because the air quality was so bad, but today, being clear and all, we stopped. And just look what we saw! Besides incredible views (which no picture ever does justice to), we noticed a bone (probably from a buffalo) stuck in the wall, being uncovered by erosion. So cool!
A couple more stops. A buffalo sighting.
And then we came to Roberts Prairie Dog Town, and decided to get out and see what kind of fun the little things were up to this afternoon. We walked away from the others visiting who were hanging out near the parking lot, and into the mounds of dirt. There was much chirping and running around.
One little guy seemed to take an interest in us, so I knelt on the trail and started softly ‘clicking’ at him.
All of a sudden, he took a run at me! I held my ground and kept my phone snapping, and he came right up to me, sniffed my boot, then backed off a bit. (Hmm . . . now that I say that, I wonder about that . . . did he think I had stinky feet?) Anyway, it wasn’t long before he returned and this time, touched his nose very gently to my knee. Maybe he was looking for a handout? He stuck around for a minute, went over to check on Blaine and then returned to his hidey-hole. What a nice surprise that little visit was!
Interesting stone!
So we were headed back, when we came around a corner and face-to-face with one of those huge pick-up trucks – on our side of the road! What they were thinking? We could only imagine! Our guardian angel stopped us in time for him to go around us, and then, a little further along, there was a regular traffic jam blocking the road! At least we saw that coming. It took us a minute before we saw the reason – or at least we think it was the original reason. There was a buffalo in the ditch right beside the road. The weird thing was – only one person was taking his picture. Everyone else was wandering around the other side of the road. We think they just stopped, took the buffalo picture, then decided to wander through the rocks without moving their cars.
It took a few minutes, but we managed to get through. Crazy tourists! 😊
At the end of our day, we got another picture of our newest grandson, Matthew! He just keeps growing! Can’t wait to see him – and everyone else – in a few weeks!
