Nebraska and onward day 5-7

If you missed days 1 & 2 click: here

If you missed day 3 click: here

If you missed day 4 click: here

Day 5:

We were sad to go, but we had plans to head east and then drop back down to Nebraska.  Our last day in the Black Hills consisted of me getting a wonderful 1 hour massage and facial...and Sean taking the kids to McDonald's and cleaning up baby covered from head to toe in poop.  He said I planned it...I swear I didn't.  

We headed an hour east of Rapid City to a drug store.  How could you not stop...they had billboards lining the highway...apparently we HAD to stop.  If you have no clue what I am talking about..it is Wall Drug Store in Wall, SD.  It was in one big compound, but more like a mini-mall.  There was a drug store and then little specialty shops like camping, kids toys, home decor, gold mining....the list goes on...we didn't visit every little store.  There was also a soda fountain, fudge shoppe, and a little cafe.  I heard that they had wonderful homemade donuts...and yes they did!  That was our lunch for the day.  Kind of sad I know.  The kids didn't seem to mind.  Don't worry we got them some more McDonald's later that evening.  :) Here are a few pictures of Wall Drug.

You know...a jackalope

Singing cowboys

All this excitement for only 50 cents!!!

Jocelyn was upset because we weren't going to go pan for gold...again.

That night we made it to our next destination of Valentine, Nebraska.  We rented a cabin at Heartland Elk Ranch.  We had no internet, cell phone service, or television.  It was kind of nice!  My husband went fishing for a bit at their pond and we drove around checking out the area.  

Day 6:  

Our plan was to take the kids tubing in the river on this day.  We were so excited and had even bought a double tube so it would be easier to keep track of the kids.  Well we took one look at the river and decided it was not going to happen.  The river was really high and was moving faster than both Sean and I had anticipated.   Maybe in a few years.  We were all a bit let down by this, but all in all we had a great day.

We ended up hiking to a few waterfalls: 

Smith Falls 

and Fort Falls

after we ate lunch and drove around checking out other state parks we took the kids back to Smith Falls and swam under the waterfall.  It was PERFECT for them and they had so much fun.  

Weston testing out the waters...he wasn't so sure at first.

Me...I always look like a dork!

Weston loved it...and he loved eating the rocks and the sand too!

We then took them to the river to wade and our decision about not going tubing was confirmed...the current was way too fast.

 So that was it.  Our first family vacation by ourselves. We had so much fun!  Any ideas of where we should go next year??  Oh and I took quiet a few more pictures...I will post those on facebook sometime.

I hope you enjoyed hearing about our vacation!