I never knew I needed to visit South Dakota. And then we came and saw how beautiful this state was, and I’m here to tell you that you need to visit too! It’s NOT a fly over state.

We planned most of our adventures around the southwest corner of South Dakota, as we made our way from Indiana all the way to California in our longest road trip yet!

Here’s our list of the top five places on our list to see during our SD travels:

-Badlands National Park

-Mt. Rushmore

-Wall Drug

-Mammoth Dig Site

-Custer State Park

Badlands National Park (Wall, South Dakota)

I didn’t know something that is called “BAD-lands” would actually be worth visiting. The landscapes were absolutely stunning, what I would describe as rugged beauty. Definitely not bad. Actually, quite good.

We boondocked on the “Wall” near Wall, South Dakota (GPS coordinates for prime spot on the Wall: 43.8898, -102.227. We stayed here: 43.905, -102.2297)  It’s quite a popular spot for people looking to dry camp. There is plenty of space to spread out and we parked at a prime location on a cliff edge overlooking the Badlands. The views were seriously amazing! Warning: the winds get CRAZY up there. The winds were pretty consistent at 20mph, but one night they were gusting to 60-70mph, and it was rocking the RV pretty hard. We even had to make sure the kids stayed farther away from the cliffs edge knowing that a wind gust may sweep them off their feet and down off the edge. 

Our RV is the grey one in the middle of the photo!

What to do in Badlands National Park

We only spent a few hours at the park, but were really impressed with it’s beauty! It’s also really easy to navigate. Here are our list of the best things to do in the Badlands with kids:

-Go to the Visitor Center

Our first stop was the visitor center to pick up our Jr. Ranger books. Due to Covid, the visitor center was only open for restrooms, the gift shop, and information/maps.

-Take a Family Friendly Hike

Windows Trail -.25 mile round trip, flat and easy hike with great views!

Door Trail- .8 mile round trip, flat and easy hike with great views!

Fossil Exhibit Trail -.4 mile round trip, flat and easy hike! There are educational placards along the boardwalk that display the history of the land, soil, and fossils in the area.

The Notch Trail- 1.33 miles long, moderate hike. The Notch Trail is a great option even with kids. This trail head is in the same parking area as the Windows and Door Trails, if you find you need a little more spice on your hikes. It’s a bit longer of a hike but not too long for the kids. Plus, it’s out and back so you can always just turn around if it’s too much for them! There are only a few semi-dangerous parts of the trail where children and parents will need to use extreme caution. Other parts of the trail are perfectly flat and filled with fun rocks to climb on and in! In the Badlands, off trail exploration is actually permitted.

-Take a Scenic Drive

This is always a fun time for us, as we love landscape views as well as looking for wildlife. Badlands is the mecca for finding prairie dogs, and we all got a kick out of watching them in their environment. We also saw bison and coyote!

-Badlands Ranch Store

Located just outside of the park is the Badlands Ranch Store. They sell little bags of peanuts for $1 where you can feed the prairie dogs that live on property. This was a highlight of our trip because the kids LOVED doing this! Prairie dogs are so entertaining to watch, and they are so stinkin’ cute.

Wall Drug

You can’t drive anywhere in South Dakota without seeing hundreds of signs leading up to this place. It’s been around since the 1930s when tourists and travelers would stop in for their famous “free ice water” and “five cent coffee.” Sure enough, both are still true. They still have free ice water and five cent coffee…and a LOT more!

Endless shops are lined up inside a covered building selling cheesy tourist trinkets and tchocki items, as well as artisan crafts. The on-site restaurant is medicore and overpriced (don’t waste your money, dine elsewhere!) BUT the homemade donuts are to die for. At two bucks a pop, they were actually worth the money. I’ll repeat, GET THE DONUTS.

They also have gem-mining, an arcade and other fun things but they were all closed when we visited. The “backyard” area features fun photo backgrounds and props to satisfy all of your touristy-picture needs.

After visiting the Badlands, we moved on to Custer, South Dakota and found an excellent boondocking site along a forest road just outside of Custer State Park. This was a great, secluded, central location to many of the places we wanted to visit in this part of the state. (GPS coordinates: 43.7481, -103.661)

Mount Rushmore

What person doesn’t have Mount Rushmore on their bucket list? I’ve always wanted to visit here, and it was awesome to see it with my own eyes!

First things first, you should know that visiting Mt. Rushmore is FREE! I was surprised by that. However, it is only free after you pay the $10 parking fee.

We recommend a visit when it’s warm outside, not 20 degrees like when we went. Oh, and also go during the visitor center’s operating hours so that you can actually go inside. We didn’t plan accordingly so we were freezing cold AND we couldn’t actually learn anything about the monument. Mt. Rushmore also offers a Jr. Rangers program, which we did not get to do either since the visitor center was closed. We basically just took pictures and left, and we hope for a future visit again! It’s just mind boggling that this massive carving could be done without most modern day tools.

Mammoth Dig Site

The Mammoth Dig Site is location in Hot Springs, South Dakota, which is about a 40 minute drive from Custer. The dig site is a real, current archaeological dig site, so we were able to see actual archaeologists working on the site with their cool little tools working around the bones.

Visit their website for hours and ticket pricing here. 

First, we went into their theater room to watch a short film about the history behind the dig site. It was actually fascinating and really educational. Then, we went into a very large domed room that surrounds the dig site. There they were, mounds and mounds of perfectly kept mammoth bones. I’ll save the story of how they got to this particular site, and why there were so many of them in this area, for when you get a chance to visit and learn for yourself. There was also an artifact room, a laboratory (downstairs via elevator) to watch people work on the bones, and a little kids play area. Overall, we enjoyed our adventure to the Mammoth Dig Site and would recommend taking a visit!

On our way back towards Custer, we drove through Wind Cave National Park. Unfortunately cave tours aren’t operating due to Covid, so we attempted a hike at Rankin Ridge Trail. It’s only a 1-mile loop trail which seemed manageable. However,  4 minutes in to the hike, a child “had to poop” so we turned around and went home. “A” for effort.  We also drove around a looked at the wildlife on the way back. We even spotted a coyote eating a prairie dog!

The hike that lasted 4 minutes.

Coyote eating a prairie dog.

Custer State Park

We had heard about a beautiful hike along a lake in Custer State Park, called Sylvan Lakeshore Trail that was perfect for kids, so we planned a trip here for some hiking! At only 1.1 miles with gorgeous scenery, it seemed like the best bet for our hike.

…and then it snowed.

Like, really snowed.

But we were pretty determined and we went anyways. It was BEAUTIFUL, truly a winter wonderland (in October) but very cold. Also, very different than what I had imagined this place to be. In pictures, I had seen sunny skies, beautiful trees and rocks surrounding a clear lake. Instead, it was monochromatic landscape of grey and white, and we couldn’t see much of anything with the snow falling! Definitely not the hiking conditions we were expecting but glad we went! I could imagine wanting to spend a few hours here on a nice weather day (so if you do go, pack a picnic!)

We ended up getting around 6-8″ of snow that day and night, which made for an interesting time getting out of our boondocking spot. Chris had to sweep off the snow from the roof of our RV, plus use water to melt the ice layer on our slides. The temps were dipping into the 20’s and even lower windchill and we knew we needed to get out of South Dakota before more snow came! We were biting our nails and saying prayers thinking that our rig would either get stuck in  the snow or the weight of it would cause us to slide out of control down the road. 

Well, that’s a wrap on our time in South Dakota. It is a truly beautiful state and we loved our adventures here! Is South Dakota on your travel bucket list? Let us know if you’ve been or if you’re planning to visit!

**This post contains affiliate links. If you click a link and make a purchase, at no additional cost to you, we receive a small commission. Thank you for supporting our travel fund!