Friday

Saturday morning at the KOA is always Pancakes and bacon. Good! Packed up and headed for Rapid City and Prairie Edge. Prairie Edge is the ultimate in Pendleton, Native artifacts and new items and all to make things with. I tried my best to keep my wallet in my purse….not easy. Arriving in downtown with our little trailer was a bit of a challenge for parking. We discovered that the historical society or mayor or? Had decided to acquire a bronze statue of each of the presidents of the USA. There was one on each street corner so getting photographs of each one was a job. We did not get each on but there is “next time.” We pulled out of there around noon and headed to Pine Ridge. Following GPS and 3 different maps we headed south. The chosen road was through the Lakota Sioux reservation. It was a good choice for seeing and experiencing a wonderful tour of the Red Cloud Heritage Center. The counselor at the school showed us the language center; church with stained glass windows designed by the students, Red Clouds grave, and told us a ton of history. The agreement between Red Cloud and the Jesuits was for the good of the children. He realized the children needed an education in order to preserve their history, language, stories and ability to blend into society. The Jesuits were his answer. They found a way to blend Catholicism and Indian Religion. Going to the grocery store on the Rez was a new experience for Paulette. It is a lot different than going to a Pow Wow at Traders Village in Houston. We did go to the Pow Wow area thinking we would be able to camp there. We had been told it would be a good way to see and experience the event. A place to park was not as great as the ground was extremely rough and we should have gone early to get a better spot. I am use to blending in and no one knowing I don’t belong. Paulette was aprensive about being singled out and was not comfortable. I realized that we did have a lot of things in the truck that were valuable and I would hate for someone to breaking and take something while we were in the ceremony. It was really different that others I attended. We walked around and checked out the vendors and realized it would be another 2 hours before they began and it was dusty hot. We pulled out and headed toward Nebraska. The campground we found there was just lovely.